Tyler in the 1910s8 cards: 3 firsts and 5 beginnings
- The city runs a public hospitalBought and repaired for $3,500; later called the “old pesthouse.”
- The East Texas Fair Association is foundedThen a permanent fairground on 75 acres of city parkland.
- The city’s first known money for parks$25,000 set aside; Bergfeld Park was among the land bought.
- The Tyler Elbertas, a minor league team named for a peachClass D, in the South Central League.
- The city council approves buying Bergfeld ParkRudolph Bergfeld offers the land for $4,000; the council approves.
- Tyler Traction runs its first streetcar, to the fairAt the end of September 1913, the Tyler Traction Company’s first streetcar headed west on Elm Street to the fairgrounds, and more than 1,300 people rode the cars for that year’s fair opening.
- The first train carload of rose bushes shipsBy the 1940s, more than half the nation’s rose bushes grew within ten miles of Tyler.
- Voters fund the county’s first paved roadsA $1,000,000 bond; the first concrete road followed in 1921.