Williamson County, named after 'Three-Legged Willie,' to celebrate 175th birthday in March
Named in 1848 after a Texas state government leader known as "Three-Legged Willie," Williamson County will celebrate its 175th birthday in March. A two-day celebration will include live entertainment, tours of the courthouse, a laser light show and a market day.
Festivities will start at 2 p.m. Friday, March 10, with a formal ceremony on the east side of the courthouse. After all the candles are blown out, birthday cake will be served in the courthouse on a first-come, first-served basis. There also will be live entertainment on two stages from 2:30 to 6:30 p.m. outside the courthouse. The celebration will continue with a concert by '90s cover band Zoodust at 6:30 p.m. and a special laser light show starting at 7:30 p.m.
The celebration will continue on Saturday, March 11, with a party-themed Market Days from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. on the downtown square in Georgetown. Activities will include a bouncy house, train rides for children, face painting and a scavenger hunt.
There will be a proclamation about the county's 175th birthday at the Commissioners Court meeting on Tuesday, March 7. The meeting starts at 9:30 a.m. at the Williamson County Courthouse, 710 S. Main St. in Georgetown.
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Tours of the historic courthouse will be available from 2 p.m. to 5 p.m. on March 10. Main Street between Seventh and Eighth streets will be closed all day for the party.
Future events will be announced on the website at wilco175.org.
The public also is invited to help paint a new mural celebrating the county and the city of Georgetown’s 175th birthday from noon to 4 p.m. on March 10-11 at 904 S. Main St. The mural will be painted on the side of the county’s tax office building. The artist, Yasaman Mehrsa, and volunteers will assist the public with painting the mural, according to the release.
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The Texas Legislature established the county on March 13, 1848, and named it after Robert McAlpin Williamson, who was one of the first state district judges, a member of the Texas Supreme Court and a state representative, said Billy Ray Stubblefield, the co-chair of the county's 150th anniversary celebration. The Legislature established the county on March 13, 1848.
One of Williamson's legs was bent at a 90-degree angle because he suffered from polio, so he also had a wooden peg leg, said Stubblefield, a former Williamson County attorney, a former district judge and the former presiding judge of the Third Administrative Region in Texas.
"When he walked it looked like he had three legs," said Stubblefield.
"Williamson was an important figure in the early days of the Texas Republic," said Stubblefield. "He was also a well-liked man of great humor, and he played the banjo," Stubblefield said. After Texas won independence from Mexico in 1836, it became its own country called the Texas Republic. It became a state when it was annexed by the United States in 1845.
Stubblefield also said that Williamson was a good friend of William Barret Travis, who died defending the Alamo in 1836 during the Texas revolution. Travis County is named after him.
Williamson County was formed out of part of what had been Milam County, said Stubblefield.
"A lot of people don’t realize that Williamson County was not just a placid farming culture," he said. "You can’t forget also this land was occupied by Tonkawa Indians, and by the very mobile Indian tribes such as the Comanche."
The pioneers who arrived after the Indians "had it rough," Stubblefield said. "They were creating the kind of country they wanted it to be, and they struggled."
The pioneers were from the southern and midwestern United States, as well as from Czechoslovakia, Germany and Sweden, he said. There also were Black slaves brought to the area, according to county records.
"We tend to think of Williamson County as having been settled by southerners primarily, but it is to be noted that when the Civil War began to divide the country, Wilco did not wish to secede," the former judge said.
Stubblefield said his father was born in 1899 in Liberty Hill and that his mother lived in the San Gabriel River area near Georgetown. He said he moved with his mother to Georgetown in the 1950s.
"It was a quiet town," he said. "The downtown square had never recovered from the Depression. The only really vibrant commercial activity was Gold’s Department Store. We used to say they rolled up the sidewalks about 6 p.m. every evening and that was the end of the day."
Stubblefield said he always believed Williamson County "had a big future" and would grow. The county currently has an estimated population of 665,000 and some of its cities, such as Georgetown and Leander, are among the fastest-growing of their size in the country.
This article originally appeared on Austin American-Statesman: Williamson County, named after 'Three-Legged Willie,' is 175 years-old
