Union Valley

UNION, TEXAS (Wilson County). Union is on Farm Road 1681 twenty-two miles northeast of Floresville in eastern Wilson County. The area was settled just before the Civil War . The community grew up around a rural post office called Union Valley, which was established in 1883. S. E. Johnson, an early settler, operated a general store at the site and was the first postmaster. By 1892 the community had a three general stores, a saloon, a Methodist church, a mill and cotton gin, a grocer, a blacksmith, and a reported population of 300. A two-teacher school was in operation by 1903, when it had an enrollment of sixty-five. The post office name was changed to Union by 1900, although the church and school continued to use the older name. The post office was closed in 1915 and the mail sent from Nixon. The town continued to decline in the 1920s and 1930s, and in 1947 only two stores and a population of fifty were reported. In later years many of the remaining residents moved away, and in 1990 Union was a dispersed rural community with a population of twenty-two. The population remained unchanged in 2000.