Natalia, TX

Natalia was founded in 1912 by the Medina Irrigation Company and named for Natalie Pearson, daughter of engineer Fred Stark Pearson, the driving force behind the Medina Dam project. A post office opened in 1913, with Natalie's name misspelled in postal records. Irrigation, the Missouri Pacific Railroad, and the promise of farm land pulled the town into the Medina Valley. A canning plant later processed local vegetables, employing hundreds in peak seasons.

Natalia incorporated in 1968 and now sits along State Highway 132 and Interstate 35, about thirty miles southwest of San Antonio. Natalia Independent School District serves students from kindergarten through twelfth grade, while the Bexar-Medina-Atascosa Counties Water Control and Improvement District carries the irrigation legacy forward. Medina County roads connect the town to Hondo and the San Antonio region. The town's growth still follows the old water-and-transport pattern. Natalia is a place where a dam, a railroad, a highway, and irrigated fields still overlap in the way people work, study, and move through south Texas.