Founding year: the first Karnes City post office (Blevins & Helbock, CC0).The full story ↓
History grade
What drives Karnes City’s History grade
On its age, its old homes and the National Register, Karnes City is more historic than 58% of U.S. towns, #103 of 642 in Texas. Its National Register listings hold the grade up; its age pulls it down.
B
HistoryA character grade: shown, never part of Karnes City’s overall grade.
Few Texas towns list much on the Register (a typical Texas town has 0.0 per 10,000 residents, the U.S. 2.4), so Karnes City’s 8.3 sits above most of its state (86% of Texas towns have fewer) while its 3 historic buildings outnumber those of 65% of U.S. towns.
How sure. Graded on any two of the three inputs instead, the letter would range from C+ to B+. The pre-1940 share is a Census survey estimate (±7.4 points). The founding year is the first post office, not a stated founding date.
Founding year: the first post office (other dates in Quick answers). Homes: Census ACS 2020–24. National Register: National Park Service, May 2026 list; each listing counted once (boundary changes and added documentation belong to their listing), and a historic district counts its contributing buildings. How TownRatings grades history →
What stands out about Karnes City’s past
Read from the archive, the National Register and the record. The page puts what stands out first.
In 1894, as a result of a special election, the county seat was moved from Helena to Karnes City. Ten years earlier, Colonel William G. Butler (1831–1912) had blamed Helena and its corrupt mayor for the death of his son, Emmett, who was killed on December 26, 1884, by a stray bullet from a bar fight. Butler, a wealthy rancher, retaliated by arranging for the San Antonio and Aransas Pass Railway, which started construction in 1885, to bypass Helena.
The Karnes City post office opened in 1891, the earliest record of the town by name (U.S. post office records).
How does Karnes City rank for history?
Karnes City is more historic than 58% of U.S. towns, #103 of 642 in Texas. The History grade combines the town’s founding era, the share of homes built before 1940 and its National Register listings. It’s a character grade, so it isn’t part of the overall grade. How it works.
What is on the National Register in Karnes City?
One place: the Karnes County Courthouse (listed 2010).
How old are the homes in Karnes City?
12% of Karnes City’s homes were built before 1940 (Census estimate, ±7.4 points), against a typical 1.6% for a Texas town; the median home was built in 1974.
Founding dates: Wikidata, Wikipedia, the U.S. post office records of Blevins & Helbock (CC0) and the Census. Homes by year built: Census ACS 2020–24. National Register of Historic Places: National Park Service (list of May 22, 2026). Old photos, postcards and papers: Wikimedia Commons, the Library of Congress and other public archives, credited on each item’s page. Maps: U.S. Geological Survey historical topographic maps (via Esri) and Sanborn fire-insurance maps (Library of Congress). History text and census tables: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0). Places that used to be: USGS Geographic Names Information System (2021).
From Wikimedia Commons (6), the National Register of Historic Places (1), Wikipedia, Wikidata and Wikipedia for famous people, U.S. Geological Survey historical maps, U.S. Census counts (via Wikipedia), the US Post Offices dataset (Blevins & Helbock) and the USGS Geographic Names Information System. Archive images are copied here with their credits and licenses, shown on each photo’s page. Refreshed monthly.
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