|
Home >
Travel >
State Parks >
Texas >
Mustang Island State
Park |
Mustang Island State Park
|
|
P O Box 326
Port Aransas TX 78373
361/749-5246
History: Mustang Island State Park is 3954 acres with about 5 miles of beach on
the Gulf of Mexico in Nueces County, south of Port Aransas. It was acquired from
private owners in 1972 and opened to the public in 1979.
The earliest known inhabitants of Mustang Island were Karankawa Indians, known
for their fierceness and cannibalism. The Karankawas were a hunter-gatherer
people, and depended heavily on shellfish and mussels for food. Encountered
first by Spanish explorers, the Karankawas survived in the region until the 19th
century. The island was first named "Wild Horse Island," then "Mustang," because
of the wild horses, called "Mestenos," brought to the island by the Spaniards in
the 1800s.
The first historical record of Mustang Island was by Alonso Alvarez de Pineda,
who charted this section of the Gulf coast in 1519. In 1747, Captain Joaquin
Orobioy Basterra landed here and trekked overland to a bay which he named San
Miguel Arcangel. The bay was renamed Corpus Christi by Diego Ortiz Parrilla, who
made detailed explorations of the coast in 1756. A notable event occurred in
1553 when a Spanish treasure fleet was encountered a hurricane off Padre Island.
Many ships were lost, and only two survivors lived to reach Mexico.
T.P.W.D. photo
Padre Island was part of a Spanish land grant to Padre Nicholas Balli about
1800, and the Balli family established a ranching tradition that continued for
several decades. Records show that an Englishman named Robert A. Mercer and one
H. L. Kinney both ran cattle on Mustang Island in the 1850s and that Uriah
Hayden obtained a patent on land in the state park area in 1858. A small fort
was built on Mustang Island during the U.S. Mexican War, 1846-48, to guard the
entrance to Aransas Bay. During the Civil War, the coastal area was blockaded by
the Union Navy, but the conflict ended with no major battles occurring in this
area. Ranching resumed, and a meat-packing plant was built and operated until
the 1880s.
Regular steamship service between Mustang Island and New Orleans began in the
1850s, with the first deep draught shop sailing through Aransas Pass in 1859.
Mercer's Dock, a small port settlement, was destroyed in an 1875 hurricane, and
was replaced by another called Mustang Island. In the passing years the
community was known as Ropesville and Tarpon before finally being named Port
Aransas about 1910.
Activities: Activities include camping, picnicking, fishing, swimming, hiking
and mountain biking on 5 miles of open beach, sunbathing, hiking, surfing, and
excellent birding, especially during spring and fall migrations. Tours:
Interpretive ecological tours done on request. |
|
|
|
