HAWTHORNE, TEXAS. Hawthorne, on Farm Road 2778 some sixteen miles southeast of Huntsville in Walker County, was named for the hawthorn bushes that flourished in the area. The community was served by a post office from 1902 to 1919; J. L. Gustine was postmaster in 1914. By 1911 Hawthorne had a school with classes through the seventh grade, and in 1914 the town had a population estimated at twenty-five and a general store, drugstore, and gin. In 1929 the Hawthorne school and two other area schools consolidated with those of nearby New Waverly. Around 1936 Hawthorne had a lodge, a community school, a seasonal industry, two gravel pits, two churches, and numerous dwellings. By the 1940s the community comprised two businesses and a school. A cluster of churches served the surrounding rural area in 1990.

BIBLIOGRAPHY: D'Anne McAdams Crews, ed., Huntsville and Walker County, Texas: A Bicentennial History (Huntsville, Texas: Sam Houston State University, 1976).

James L. Hailey