Editing Rockport, Texas (section)

===19th Century===
Following the Civil War, a number of people considered developing the Live Oak Peninsula.  Joseph F. Smith, who had founded the nearby town of St. Mary's in 1850, joined with Thomas H. Mathis and his cousin J.M. Mathis, who were agents of the Morgan Steamship line, and built a wharf at the site of what would later become the town of Rockport, in 1867. The same year, George W. Fulton and his wife, Texas heiress, and Joseph Smith's cousin, Harriet Smith Fulton moved to her extensive land holdings on the peninsula.  Fulton also took an interest in the development of Rockport, as well as creating the town of Fulton farther up the coastline. In response, a nascent cattle-slaughtering and packing operation at the wharf expanded rapidly, allowing Rockport to be officially incorporated as a town in 1870; its name arising from the rock ledge that runs along the shore. Thomas Mathis became Rockport's first mayor after being appointed by the governor.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/fmacr|title=Mathis, Thomas Henry|publisher= Texas State Historical Association|access-date=September 9, 2017}}</ref> A year later in 1871, the town achieved "city" status after continued growth.<ref name="Rockport, Tx">{{cite web| url= https://tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/hgr05|title=Rockport, Tx |publisher= Texas State Historical Association|access-date=August 9, 2012}}</ref>

In 1871, the Mathis cousins teamed up with local ranching families of George W. Fulton and Thomas M. Coleman to raise and slaughter cattle for shipment out of the city's wharf on their steamship line. The partnership proved highly successful and continued to draw people and businesses to the city.  The national Panic of 1873 took its share of the town's prosperity and caused a slump for the next few years.  The meatpacking market was slow to recover, and the Mathis cousins abandoned the ranching partnership in 1879.  Fulton and Coleman then re-formed their ranching partnership, an organization that continued into the 1930s.  For many years Fulton and others petitioned for the railroad to extend their lines to Rockport to provide a second source of transportation and break the Morgan Line's monopoly on the Coastal Bend ports.  After offering free rights of way across the Coleman-Fulton ranch, and hundreds of acres in town lots, finally, in 1888 the railroad arrived. The Morgan Steamship company now had competition, and as the local cattle ranchers began shipping live cattle by train, The Morgan Line withdrew from serving the Coastal Bend. Another brief growth spurt began and soon ended, here and across Texas, due to some bad winters and the development of the cattle industry in the mid-west. The railroad, however, brought tourists, and the city's economy grew with several large hotels catering to that industry.  Rockport's economy soon came to be dominated by shipbuilding and tourism toward the end of the 19th century. At the same time, the railroad offered speedy transportation for crops, and a land boom caused by farming followed until brought to a halt with the national [[Panic of 1893]].<ref name="Rockport, Tx"/>