Partner Collection
Eanes History Center · Westbank Community Library District
The full Eanes History Center collection — letters, oral histories, books, photographs, illustrations, and family records — donated to and held by the Westbank Community Library District. Westlake History is the official digital home for this collection.
The official archive home
This is the Eanes History Center collection, assembled at the Westbank Community Library District over many years and now hosted on this site as its official digital home. With explicit permission from the Westbank CLD, Westlake History maintains and presents the full collection — 69 items spanning letters from Mary Mowinckle Johnson, oral-history notes with the Beards and the Sheltons, photographs of the Eanes Rock Schoolhouse from the 1930s and 40s, hand-drawn illustrations of the 1857 Eanes-Marshall Home and the 1871 Arch Bridge over Barton Creek, the 1957 and 1958 Travis County Rural Directories, and the foundational books Eanes: A History of the School and Community and Eanes: Portrait of a Community.
Provenance
- Originals. Held by the Westbank Community Library District at the Eanes History Center. - Digital reproductions. Originally produced by The Portal to Texas History (UNT Libraries) under their partnership with the Library District; mirrored on this site under explicit permission from Westbank CLD. - Contributing donors. Acknowledged on each item where known.
How to use this collection
Items are grouped below by kind — photographs, illustrations, oral histories, letters, essays, and so on. Each item links to its full record. Citations should follow the form:
> [Item title]. Eanes History Center, Westbank Community Library > District. Westlake History, https://westlakehistory.com/collections/eanes-history-center.
If you have material you would like to add to the collection — a photograph, a document, a recording — use the {" "} contribute form and we will work with the Westbank Community Library District to bring it in with proper provenance.
Items in the collection
Each item has its own page in this archive — every photograph also appears in the full Documents browse and on the place and person pages it's tagged to.
Photographs
Photograph of Students
Children in a Wagon
Portrait of Charles R. Eanes
Eanes Rock Schoolhouse Class
Group of Boy Scouts
Students Playing in the Snow
Eanes Elementary Class Photograph
Eanes School Picnic
Photograph of Students in a Wagon
Students in a Car Trunk
Eanes Rock Schoolhouse Students Outside
Students in a Wagon (Alamo Field Trip)
Photograph of Students Having Lunch
Photograph of West Lake High School
Four Eanes Rock Schoolhouse Students
Students at the Alamo
Students in a Wagon
Photograph of Della Edwards
Westlake High School
Photograph of Bruce Marshall
Bruce Marshall and Dorothy Depwe
Photograph of Emma Beard and Friend
Eanes Rock Schoolhouse Students
Photograph of the Johnson House
Students Having Lunch Outside
Westlake High School (1976)
Photograph of Humble Dealership
Photograph of Eanes Rock Schoolhouse Students Outside
Photograph of Eanes Rock Schoolhouse Students
Illustrations
Oral Histories
Oral History
Oral History Interview with Mary Ellen Mowinckle Johnson, April 28, 1975
Handwritten letter from Mary Johnson to Dorothy Depwe with an attached survey on life at the Eanes School and her teaching years there.
Oral History
Recorded Conversation with Emmett Robert Shelton Sr.
Oral history with Emmett Robert Shelton Sr. on the land development of Austin, the Brackenridge family, the laws passed in that period, and trading interactions with the Comanche.
Interviews
Interview
Interview with Emmett Shelton and Benton Beard
Transcription of an interview with Emmett Shelton and Benton Beard on the rise of the Eanes area, the Beard family, land development, the PTA, and Prohibition.
Interview
Interview with Earl Short
Transcription of an interview with Earl Short by Dorothy Depwe. Short discusses multiple murders that occurred in the Westlake, Texas area as well as the lives of several local families.
Interview
Typed Interview with Mary Ellen Mowinkle
Mary Ellen Mowinckle (later Johnson) on her years teaching at Eanes Rock Schoolhouse — how she was hired, classroom discipline, and a measles outbreak that left only two students attending class.
Interview
Interview with Mr. Elliot
Transcription of an interview with Mr. Elliot on his upbringing at Noack's Crossing and his eventual move to Eanes County.
Interview
Typed Interview with Dan Molberg
Interview with Dan Molberg on student life at Eanes Rock Schoolhouse in the 1940s — the 'big room' / 'little room' classes, daily meals, recess, PTA events, and fundraisers.
Interview
Interview with James Short
Transcript of an interview with James Short by Dorothy Depwe on growing up in Westlake Hills in the 1940s, including the famous bus 'egg fight'.
Interview
Growing up in Westlake Hills (James Short)
Interview transcript with James Short, an Eanes Elementary alumnus, on incidents at school: bees on the school bus, a road bonfire built to stop the bus, and student fights.
Interview
Interview with Eanes Rock Schoolhouse Alumni
Interview with Myrtle Blankenship Treadwell, Pauline Becker, Ellen Seals, and Frank Spiller on Eanes Rock Schoolhouse in the 1930s and 40s — including the PTA-mothers' hot-lunch program and the displacement of Spiller Hill residents as the area was developed.
Interview
Interview with Gertrude Johnson
Interview with Gertrude Johnson, a long-time resident of Deep Eddy, on her work with the church and school, a 17.5-pound sweet potato she once grew, and her years teaching in the Eanes area. Includes a recipe for 'Mrs. Johnson's unbaked cookies.'
Interview Notes
Interview Notes
Interview with Rev. A. D. Eberhart
Notes from an interview with Rev. A. D. Eberhart that include his age and notes about the Young and Brown family and guns.
Interview Notes
Notes from an Interview with Mike Molberg
Typewritten notes from an interview with Mike Molberg about his time at Eanes School and a list of women who taught there.
Interview Notes
Notes about W. L. Beard
Transcription of a taped interview with W. L. Beard. Beard discusses his time in the Eanes County area, the dam break that forced people to abandon the riverside, and the construction of the Eanes Rock Schoolhouse.
Letters
Letter
Letter from Mary Mowinckle Johnson to Camila, February 13, 1975
Photocopy of a letter from Mary Mowinckle Johnson to a woman named Camila. The letter goes into details about Johnson's time as a teacher at the Eanes Rock Schoolhouse and she also inquires about the Marshall family.
Letter
Letter from Mary Mowinckle Johnson to Dorothy Depwe, February 12, 1976
Letter from Mary Johnson to Stanley Depwe on a marker board added to the Eanes School. Includes a short biography of Mowinckle's life.
Essays
Essay
Essay about Jackson Cemetery
'Jackson Cemetery, Travis County, Texas — Its Value as an Historical Landmark.' Covers creation of the cemetery, lot purchase, and interview material gathered by Melissa W.
Essay
Biography of Gertrude Johnson and Winnie Johnson
Biography of Gertrude (Mrs. Frank A.) Johnson and Winnie (Mrs. E. W.) Johnson as founding members of the Westlake Hills Presbyterian Church in Austin. Notes their being awarded 'Honorary Life Memberships in the Women of the Church.'
Essay
Essay by Laura Castro (Dellana Family)
Essay on how the Dellana family came to Rollingwood. Castro covers Condado Dellana's emigration from Italy to Texas, his work building the capitol building, and the cave on his Rollingwood property whose bat-guano fertilizer he sold to nurseries across the state.
Essay
Cemeteries in Austin, Texas
Photocopy of a list of ten cemeteries in the Austin area with brief descriptions of each.
Essay
Blue Book Essay about the Beard Family
Essay about the Beard family contained within a Blue Book. 'Beard Info' written in red pen on the front; essay in pencil edited in black pen.
Essay
Westlake Hills History: The Johnson Family
Article about the Johnson family — particularly Charles Johnson and his wife Emilia Johnson.
Essay
Report about the City of West Lake Hills
Essay detailing the rise of the city of West Lake Hills — the founding of the Eanes School and the small businesses that helped build the town's infrastructure.
Essay
Essay about the Carlson Family
Handwritten 9th-grade report on the Carlson family of the Eanes area — focused on Oscar Carlson, son of John Hendrik Carlson and a Swedish woman named Morning Star.
Essay
Eanes: Portrait of a Community
Book history of the Eanes community area — geology, Native American history, the founding of the community in the mid-1800s, and development through 1986.
Essay
Eanes: A History of the School and Community
Foundational text on the Eanes community and the history of the school district — covers the origins of the city of Austin, the development of the school, and includes transcribed supporting documents.
Essay
Echoes from the Past
Brochure of historical information and stories about the Presbyterian church in the southern United States, presented at the 1936 Spring meeting of the Presbytery of Brazos in old First Church, Galveston.
Manuscripts
Manuscript
Note about the Jackson Family and Jackson Cemetery
Handwritten notes about the Jackson family and Jackson Cemetery — including the landscape of the Eanes area and a smallpox epidemic that killed many Austin-area residents buried at Jackson Cemetery.
Manuscript
Handwritten Note about the Dellana Family
Handwritten account by Dorothy Depwe of life on Tucker Lane in the 1920s — the Tucker family's children and the lives of the Teague, Ryan, Young, and Small families.
Manuscript
Handwritten Account of the Boat Parade
Handwritten account by Mary Mowinckle of the July 4, 1981 Boat Parade on Lake Austin, written for the Neighborhood Section of the Austin American-Statesman.
Newspapers
Newspaper
Article for Westbank Picayune
Article by Dona Price for Westbank Picayune on a new grocery store added to the Westbank area — a substantial change for the community whose nearest grocery had previously been miles away.
Newspaper
The Texas Gulf Historical and Biographical Record, Volume 11, Number 1, November 1975
Book of historical articles about Texas counties and towns and important historical figures.
Newspaper
1957 Travis County Rural Directory
Directory and classified buyers' guide for Travis County: alphabetical resident and business listings, house numbers by road, farms by type, and a classified ads section.
Newspaper
Frontier Times, Volume 1, Number 3, December 1923
Magazine of frontier history, border tragedy, and pioneer achievement — including articles on Navarro and Denton county colonists, a Texas Ranger's reminiscences, the capture of Cynthia Ann Parker, and James R. Moss of Llano.
Newspaper
1958 Travis County Rural Directory
Directory and classified buyers' guide for Travis County: alphabetical resident and business listings, house numbers by road, farms by type, and a classified ads section.
Family Record
Sources & Connections›
People
Places
Documents
Photograph of Students
Children in a Wagon
Interview with Rev. A. D. Eberhart
Portrait of Charles R. Eanes
Illustration of the Eanes-Marshall Home
Article for Westbank Picayune
Oral History Interview with Mary Ellen Mowinckle Johnson, April 28, 1975
Eanes Rock Schoolhouse Class
Note about the Jackson Family and Jackson Cemetery
Illustration of Arch Bridge
Interview with Emmett Shelton and Benton Beard
Interview with Earl Short
Group of Boy Scouts
Students Playing in the Snow
Typed Interview with Mary Ellen Mowinkle
Essay about Jackson Cemetery
Biography of Gertrude Johnson and Winnie Johnson
Eanes Elementary Class Photograph
Eanes School Picnic
Photograph of Students in a Wagon
Interview with Mr. Elliot
Students in a Car Trunk
Eanes Rock Schoolhouse Students Outside
Students in a Wagon (Alamo Field Trip)
Photograph of Students Having Lunch
Photograph of West Lake High School
Notes from an Interview with Mike Molberg
Four Eanes Rock Schoolhouse Students
Handwritten Note about the Dellana Family
Barton Family Tree and Bob Barton Obituary
Letter from Mary Mowinckle Johnson to Camila, February 13, 1975
Students at the Alamo
Handwritten Account of the Boat Parade
Essay by Laura Castro (Dellana Family)
Typed Interview with Dan Molberg
Illustration of Lost Creek Log Cabin
Cemeteries in Austin, Texas
Students in a Wagon
Blue Book Essay about the Beard Family
Westlake Hills History: The Johnson Family
Notes about W. L. Beard
Photograph of Della Edwards
Westlake High School
Photograph of Bruce Marshall
Illustration of Eanes Frame School
Report about the City of West Lake Hills
Interview with James Short
Bruce Marshall and Dorothy Depwe
Photograph of Emma Beard and Friend
Growing up in Westlake Hills (James Short)
Eanes Rock Schoolhouse Students
Photograph of the Johnson House
Interview with Eanes Rock Schoolhouse Alumni
Recorded Conversation with Emmett Robert Shelton Sr.
Students Having Lunch Outside
Letter from Mary Mowinckle Johnson to Dorothy Depwe, February 12, 1976
Westlake High School (1976)
Photograph of Humble Dealership
Interview with Gertrude Johnson
Photograph of Eanes Rock Schoolhouse Students Outside
Essay about the Carlson Family
Photograph of Eanes Rock Schoolhouse Students
Eanes: Portrait of a Community
Eanes: A History of the School and Community
The Texas Gulf Historical and Biographical Record, Volume 11, Number 1, November 1975
1957 Travis County Rural Directory
Frontier Times, Volume 1, Number 3, December 1923
Echoes from the Past
1958 Travis County Rural Directory
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