Rice Military Addition, a Brief History
by Will D. Wilkinson, P.E. RMCC Secretary

As a civil engineer, I am often intrigued by the way the City of Houston has grown and become one of the largest in the United States.   Houston was founded in 1836 by the Allen brothers and became part of the Union in 1845.  

Like many of you, I read the “History of West End” located on the RiceMilitary.org website (under documents) and was intrigued with the history of the neighborhood that we all call home.

The 1917 map shown here and found in the map archives at the Houston Public Library has been highlighted with our current neighborhood area to show the evolution from past to present.

The first portion of the current neighborhood is the Brunner Addition which is bordered by Reinerman to the west and to Patterson to the east with White Oak Bayou creating the north border and the south border being modern day Dickinson Street (Pine).   The streets labeled Bethje and Brunner are the modern day Durham and Shepherd (although a small piece of Bethje still remains near Feagan St).

This brings us to the Rice Military Addition which was added around 1917 between Camp Logan and the Brunner Addition.   The original Rice Military borders went from Knox Street to the west to Asbury Street to the east, and stretched from Washington Avenue to Buffalo Bayou.   North of the area is shown as Woodcrest.   The area known today as Cáceres was in the area between Rice Military and Brunner.   Note that Lillian Street used to be Dodge Street.   Also, South Road, Ariel, and Maple Streets combined to become Blossom Street, which also used to have a street car track along it as denoted by the dashed line providing travel between Camp Logan and downtown.   Kent Street and Oak Street combined to become Feagan Street.   Carl became Venice, and May perished to Memorial Drive.   By 1924, Cohn (now Westcott), West (now Reinecke and TC Jester), and Detering (shown as the unlabeled street crossing through the “W” in West End) were added to the neighborhood as was Logan south of Memorial Drive. Due to the original layout of the Rice Military Addition, Lillian, Floyd, Gibson, and Dickson Streets all dead-end into Reinecke Street.

One final note regarding the map. Present day Shepherd Drive used to be a dam at Buffalo Bayou. It was called Shepherd’s Dam and was built by David P. Shepherd to be used for a mill that he never was able to get permitted by the State. It turned into a popular swimming hole but eventually washed away due to floodwaters and was replaced with a bridge.