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History · Trinidad

Trinidad’s post office opened in 1891, and 13% of its homes were built before 1940

Below: old-book passages.

1891first post office
0on the National Register
13%homes built before 1940
Quick answers

How Trinidad began

When was Trinidad founded?

1891

The Trinidad post office opened in 1891, the earliest record of the town by name.

2020 census: 860135 years
Founding year: the first Trinidad post office (Blevins & Helbock, CC0).The full story ↓

What stands out about Trinidad’s past

Read from the archive, the National Register and the record. The page puts what stands out first.

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Start Trinidad’s collection

The first neighbors to add old photos shape how Trinidad’s history is told.

Decades since 1900 with photos
00s10s20s30s40s50s60s70s80s90s
0 of 10 decades. The empty ones are waiting for someone’s album.
The story

How Trinidad came to be

From Wikipedia’s history of Trinidad.

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Around 1840, O. M. Airhart ran a ferry across the Trinity River (originally called the Trinidad River), and Zach Smith operated a ferry four miles north of the present townsite. A general store and a saloon were located there by 1844, when it became known as Trinity Switch. In 1880, it became a station on the St. Louis Southwestern Rail Road. That same year, the town's name was changed to Trinidad because of a conflict with another post office with the name Trinity Switch; the Trinidad post office, though, did not actually open until the next year. Five businesses and a population of 70 were reported by 1910. Texas Power and Light opened a plant on the Trinity River in the 1920s, and manufacturing of chemical fertilizers began in a plant there. By 1940, the population was 550, with 16 businesses in the community. Trinidad had 1,056 residents in the 1990 census, but the population had g…

Text from Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.

From the old history books

What they wrote about Trinidad in 1929

Passages that mention Trinidad, cut from the printed page as they were published.

continue to grow as Texas continues to develop. It takes about 150 hands to operate the plant there now and it has something over five hundred hands in its employ in the county, working at and operating lignite coal mines. This plant proper is about one mile south of Trinidad now, with a beauitful …
History of Henderson County Texas1929 · page 232Read the page →
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continue to grow as Texas continues to develop. It takes about 150 hands to operate the plant there now and it has something over five hundred hands in its employ in the county, working at and operating lignite coal mines. This plant proper is about one mile south of Trinidad now, with a beauitful paved and finished road leading from the town of Trinidad to the plant. Besides this plant owns one of the finest inland lakes in East Texas, containing about 800 acres in pure water and it is called the fisherman's paradise.

Text read by machine from the scan; it may contain errors.
Trinidad is now forty-eight years old. It was located by the Cotton Belt railroad when it first went through this county. It is practically on the west line of this county, on the Trinity river. Trinity was originally called Trinidad and went by that name as far back as 1840 or 42 when the sight of…
History of Henderson County Texas1929 · page 231Read the page →
Read the text

Trinidad is now forty-eight years old. It was located by the Cotton Belt railroad when it first went through this county. It is practically on the west line of this county, on the Trinity river. Trinity was originally called Trinidad and went by that name as far back as 1840 or 42 when the sight of the Capital of the State was being located. The commissioners, who were charged with locating and reporting the place selected by them, were charged not to go any farther East than Trinidad river. So I guess whoever named Trinidad, gave it the original name of the river on which

Text read by machine from the scan; it may contain errors.

Scans and text from the Internet Archive. Books published in 1930 or earlier, which are in the public domain.

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History across the town line

Each neighbor’s History grade, on the same three inputs.

Questions about Trinidad’s history

What year was Trinidad founded?

The Trinidad post office opened in 1891, the earliest record of the town by name (U.S. post office records).

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Sources

Where this page comes from

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). How TownRatings grades history →

From Wikimedia Commons (3), the Library of Congress (1), Wikipedia, the US Post Offices dataset (Blevins & Helbock), the USGS Geographic Names Information System and old county and town histories (Internet Archive). Archive images are copied here with their credits and licenses, shown on each photo’s page. Refreshed monthly.