Written by Suzanne Haberman Friday, 12 June 2009
A fire alarm rang out over Hutto at about 10 p.m. on a late summer Saturday in 1902. Wind from the southwest lifted embers from the burning frame of C.J. Jackson Restaurant where a gas stove had exploded, sending fiery debris over East Street toward the yard filled with cotton for sale. The exact date of the fire has been lost over time, but the amount of cotton in the yard suggests it occurred after the harvest, between July and September.
In the absence of an organized fire department, Hutto’s residents fought the fire. They filled buckets, pots and tubs — anything capable of holding water. They hand-pumped water from 15-foot wells and poured from cisterns. The women reportedly saved the cotton yard by assembling a bucket brigade and delivering water to the men. A horse team pulling water tanks on wagons made laps from the business district to get water from the Round Bale Gin, three blocks away and on the south side of the International & Great Northern Railroad.
Records show that at the turn of the century, Hutto’s population totaled 563. Access to the I. & G.N. rail and east Williamson County’s fertile soil attracted cotton farmers. By the time of the fire, businesses bordered both sides of East Street, once Hutto’s main thoroughfare.
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