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Letters, church and courthouse records indicate that the first families in the Yancey area settled on the Tehuacana Creek in the Northern part of what is now Frio County, about seven miles south of the present-day Yancey.
Among the first arrivals were John J. Kilgore, his wife Elizabeth, their three sons, Jesse, Yancey and Charles, and their daughter Mattie. John Joseph Strait came from Alabama; he married Mattie Kilgore in 1875. Levi Wilson and his brother Perry Wilson and their families came from Missouri. Other early settlers in that community included Langfords, Bandys, Rowlands, Stanfields, Adcocks and Wisdoms. Later, the Wards and Newton brothers, Bill and Jim, arrived.
The land around the town site was originally owned by the Straits and Kilgores. When Yancey was ready for a post office in 1898, someone suggested that one of their names be used. Kilgore already was in use. Both the Strait and Kilgore families had sons named Yancey so that was the name chosen for the town. Cotton was a very profitable crop in 1900 and Yancey was a thriving little town.
In the 1920s and ‘30s, the young people left Yancey for school and jobs. However, during the Great Depression and WWII, families moved elsewhere to find employment and school enrollment dropped drastically.
– McAnelly, Dora Mae and Anna Lee McAnelly Strait. “Communities: Yancey.” The History of Medina County, Texas, Rev. ed., vol. 1, Castro Colonies Heritage Association, Castroville, TX, 1994, pp. 140-142.
