Red Rock, TX

Red Rock is a small Bastrop County community about twelve miles southwest of Bastrop. Its name is tied to the red stone used in the chimney of early settler James Brewer's house in the 1850s, and a post office opened in 1870. By the late nineteenth century Red Rock had a gristmill, cotton gin, stores, churches, and a rail connection: the Missouri, Kansas and Texas Railroad extended its line toward the community around 1890, prompting the settlement to move about a mile to meet the tracks. Cotton and cattle kept the place tied to the surrounding farm country.

The twentieth-century story added oil wells, but Red Rock remained a small rural center as population rose and fell with the fortunes of agriculture. Today Red Rock Elementary sits on FM 20, and Bastrop Independent School District serves the community through its wider campus network. The area lies in the rolling, wooded country southwest of Bastrop, where old farm roads connect Red Rock with Rockne, Cedar Creek, and the rest of Bastrop County. It is the kind of place whose history is visible in the name, the school, and the road leading through the old center.