Local city information for Kerrville, TX

Kerrville is a city in Kerr County, Texas, United States. The population was 20,425 at the 2000 census. Kerrville is named after James Kerr, a major in the Texas Revolution, and friend of settler-founder Joshua Brown, who settled in the area to start a shingle-maker camp.

Being nestled in the hills of Texas Hill Country, Kerrville is best known for its beautiful parks that line the Guadalupe River - which runs directly through the city, its nearby youth summer camps, hunting ranches, and RV parks. It's also the home of Texas's Official State Arts & Crafts Fair, the Kerrville Folk Festival, H-E-B Grocery Stores, Mooney Airplane Company,James Avery Jewelry, Kerrvile Bus Company, and Schreiner University.

Archeological evidence suggests that humans dwelled in the area known as Kerrville as early as 10,000 years ago. The early modern residents were successful shinglemakers whose mercantile business became a hub that served the middle and upper Hill Country area in the late 1840's. One of the earliest shinglemakers was Joshua D. Brown. With his family, Joshua Brown had led several other families on an exploration of the Guadalupe Valley. These early pioneers organized their settlements near a bluff just north of the Guadalupe River in the eastern half today's county line. The settlement was referred to as "Brownsborough," but after the area was formally platted in 1856 by James Kerr, a major in the Texas Revolution, the settlement was formally known as "Kerrville" and maintained a county seat with Texas.

Starting in 1857, a German master-miller named Christian Dietert and millwright Balthasar Lich started a large grist and saw mill on the bluff. This mill established a permanent source of power and protection from floods, and became the most extensive operation of its kind in the Hill Country area west of New Braunfels and San Antonio. Soon afterwards, Charles A. Schreiner rode Kerrville's newly-found popularity, by serving Kerrville's mercantile needs. Charles Schreiner established a family-ran empire that helped build Kerrville's early prosperity by owning almost all of Kerrville's business sectors, including Kerrville's freighting enterprises, retail, wholesale, banking, ranching, marketing, and brokering operations.

The Civil War slowed Kerrville's development, but with the start of The Reconstruction Era, Kerrville's economic boom and ethnic diversification continued anew as demand grew in San Antonio for lumber, produce, and craftsmen. Kerrville's boom was also catalyzed by the combination the cessation of Indian raids and the expansion into the business of cattle, sheep, and goat ranching. Cattle drives punctuated the boom-years of the late 1880's and the 1890s. In 1887, the San Antonio and Aransas Pass Railway reached Kerrville, and in 1889 the town incorporated, with an "Aldermanic" form of city government.

The Kerrville Water Works Company began to provide water for town dwellers in 1894. Telephone service was introduced in 1896, and the city began to pave streets in 1912. Kerrville adopted a "commission" form of city government in 1917, then changed to the "city-manager" form in 1928. In 1942 the town adopted a home-rule charter, while continuing with a city manager. Kerrville has displayed steady population growth throughout the twentieth century, increasing from 1,423 residents in 1900 to 2,353 in 1920, 5,572 in 1940, 8,901 in 1960, and 15,276 in 1980. Its economic base has diversified and broadened through business, agriculture, light manufacturing, health care, transportation, services, education, the arts, and tourism. By the mid-1990s the Wall Street Journal described Kerrville as one of the wealthiest small towns in America. By 1995 the city's official population was still under 18,000, with another 20,000 people in relatively affluent residential areas south of the river and in the rest of the county. In 2000 the population reached 20,425. Much of the growth in population included retirees and young professionals and semiprofessionals; for many years Kerrville also experienced significant outmigration of young adults raised in the area.

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