Titus County
Titus County, Texas came into being on May 11, 1846 by the amalgamation of Bowie and Red River Counties.
It was named after Andrew Jackson Titus, who was born in Rutherford County, Tennessee on Mar. 12, 1814 and who opened the county’s first road to the river port in Jefferson. Andrew Jackson Titus was a seventh generation descendant of Robert Titus, the English immigrant who landed at Weymouth, Massachusetts in 1635 with his wife and two children. Andrew’s father, James Titus, was employed by the U.S. Government to assist in removing the Choctaw and Chickasaw Indians to the Indian Territory in OK, and who settled in Texas in 1832.
The Titus County Courthouse is located at100 West 1st Street, Suite 204, Mount Pleasant, Texas. Phone 903-577-6796. The County Clerk has birth, marriage, death, land, court and military records from 1895. The District Clerk has divorce records from 1895. It should be noted that the County Courthouse and all county records were destroyed by fire in 1895.
Titus, Florida
Henry Theodore Titus, the founder of Titusville, Florida, was a seventh generation descendant of Robert Titus, the English immigrant of 1635. He was born on Feb. 13, 1822 at Trenton, Mercer Co., NJ and died on Aug. 7, 1881 at Titusville.
A writer named Bert Collier produced newspaper articles for Florida’s Lakeland Ledger. The following article from the Jul. 27, 1975 issue, describes the colourful career of Colonel Henry Titus, and starts off as follows:
“Col. Henry T. Titus was a mountain of a man and he had a personality to match. His ambition so far as Florida was concerned was to create a city in his own image. In this he succeeded, calling it Titusville, and in his latter years it was his personal domain. This hulk of humanity, crippled wirh rheumatism, sat in a wheelchair on the veranda of his hotel with a loaded shotgun in his lap. With this he enforced his will, not that anyone was likely to challenge him. He ruled Titusville, said the historian A. J. Hanna, as his namesake, the Emperor Titus, ruled Rome.”
Mr. Collier goes on to describe the almost unbelievable career of Col. Titus, who for 25 years had engaged in episodes that frequently reached comic book proportions. He had commenced with an unsucessful operation, in conjunction with Gen. Narcisso Lopez, to liberate Cuba. Most of the expedition were caught and shot, while Gen. Lopez died on the gallows. After a short period as a Jacksonville merchant selling supplies to the US army troops that were chasing Seminole Indians, he moved off to Kansas in a military expedition attempting to hold the state for the slavery advocates. Again, the venture was a failure, and after almost wiping out Lawrence, Kansas, he was taken prisoner, “…and narrowly escaped a lynch mob organized by John Brown.”
After another failure of an attempt to take over Nicaragua he assumed the role of smuggler and blockade runner during the Civil War. Finally, he returned to Florida and started to build his little village of Titusville, including the construction of his hotel, Titus House, that marked Titusville as “the best known resort between Daytona and Key West.”
As Bert Collier concludes, Col. Titus established his motto “I live and let live.” and notes: “Not a bad slogan for the town Henry Titus founded, which would one day see men launched to the moon from nearby sandy beaches.”
Titus Canyon, California
On the east side of Death Valley, in Death Valley National Park, there is a deep gorge cut into the face of the Grapevine Mountains. It is called Titus Canyon. It is named after a prospector, E. M. Titus, who ended his life there.
The following is from the Portmouth Herald’s Feb. 5, 1906 issue: “Somewhere in the solitudes of Death Valley lie the bones of Earl Weller and E. M. Titus. They started out one summer morning accompanied by John Mullin, with two horses and 19 burros. Soon after getting into the desert they lost their way, and at the end of five days the horses dropped dead. Titus left the others and started out in a blind search for a water hole. Weller and Mullin remained, and by digging got a small supply of water each day for themselves but none for the burros. The animals died one by one. Filling three canteens with water, Weller started out to find Titus. He never returned. Mullin was found delirious and almost dead in the camp. Such instances might be continued almost indefinitely. The most terrible tales told by prospectors who have been rescued would be surpassed in horror by many others, no doubt, but those tales will never be told, because the bones of the victims lie in the sand and blazing sun somewhere in the deadly desert.”
The following is an excerpt from the website DesertUSA, Southwest Adventure, Living and Travel:
“Before starting the Titus Canyon trip, make sure and check at the ranger station in Furnace Creek or at the posted notices at your motel to see if the canyon road is open. Since it can be closed due to flash flooding, it is also wise to check the weather forecast for any weather conditions conducive to thunderstorms. Make sure your vehicle is full of gas and in good mechanical condition. A lunch and extra water, along with a snack, make for a great time in the upcoming trip. When you leave the comfort of Stovepipe Wells keep in mind that there are no further services available on this backcountry tour.
The road to Titus Canyon is a one-way road going east to west. Take highway 374 east from the junction of 190/374 near the sand dunes and just east of Stovepipe Wells. The highway travels east through the park over Daylight Pass, heads for the old ghost town of Rhyolite and then on to Beatty, Nevada. Just a couple of miles after exiting the Park, and a couple of miles before Rhyolite, there is a marked gravel road to the left. This lonely, 12-mile strip of dirt heads straight to the foothills of the Grapevine Mountains.”
Titusville, Pennsylvania
Titusville, a city in Crawford County, Pennsylvania, had a population of 5,602 in a 2010 census.
The area named Titusville, Pennsylvania was first settled by Jonathan Titus. It was a slow-growing community until the 1850s, when oil was discovered in the area. Eight oil refineries were built in the area between 1862 and 1868 and the population quickly grew from 250 to over 10,000, almost twice the population that lives there today.
Jonathan Titus was of the German Titus line, a third generation descendant of Peter Titus who immigrated to the Staten Island area from Germany in the 1760s. Jonathan was born on May 27, 1772 in or near Frankstown, Blair Co., PA. and died on Feb. 12, 1857.
Titusville, New Jersey
Titusville, New Jersey is an unincorporated area in Hopewell Township in Mercer County, New Jersey. It is located just north of the Johnson Ferry House, where George Washington crossed the Delaware during the American Revolution.
It is a small village, sitting on a bluff overlooking the Delaware River. At the south end of the town is Washington Crossing State Park, where every Christmas day Washington’s crossing is commemorated.
Benjamin Titus was a fifth generation descendant of Robert Titus, through Robert’s son, Content Titus. He was born on August 2nd, 1759 in Hopewell Township, Hunterdon Co., New Jersey and is included in the DAR Patriot List as a private from New Jersey. It is said that he was George Washington’s flag bearer and it is claimed that he was the man in the back of the boat holding the flag in a picture of Washington crossing the Delaware.
Hopewell: A Historical Geography (1990) states: “In 1832, Uriel Titus (along with other local landholders) sold a 113-foot-wide strip of land through his property to the Delaware and Raritan Canal Company. The feeder canal for the Delaware and Raritan Canal was soon completed within the right-of-way, and this important regional transportation route provided the initial stimulus for the growth of the community of Titusville. In 1834, however, Uriel died, leaving both his lands and his role as the village’s leading developer to his son, Joseph Titus.”
Uriel Titus was a fifth generation descendant of the English Robert Titus through his son Content Titus. Members of this Titus lineage have been living in the Mercer County area since fourth generation Ephraim Titus, who died in 1789, settled in Hopewell in the early 1700s.
Titusville, New Brunswick
Titusville, New Brunswick is a rural village in Kings County, NB. Located near the village is Titus Hill Cemetery in Hampton Parish.
Charles Titus, grandson of John Titus, was one of the original settlers of Titusville, He was born in 1799 and died on September 14th, 1879. He and his first wife, Elizabeth (Dykeman) are both buried in Titus Hill Cemetery.
The birthplace and genealogical line of the original New Brunswick settler, John Titus, remains a mystery. He was born in 1732 and died in 1804. He is said to have arrived in New Brunswick from New York aboard the ship John and Jane with his brother, Benjamin, in 1771. He settled in Queens County, New Brunswick, near the town of Jemseg.
He could have belonged either the Dutch or English Titus lines, and there is evidence for either argument. Because modal DNA markers are available for both the Dutch and English lines, it remains for a male New Brunswick descendant to undergo testing to determine which line the New Brunswick folks belong.
Titus, Alabama
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Titus Mountain, New York
The recent history of the ski resort on Titus Mountain was outlined in the obituary of Paul Augustine, owner of the resort, on Jan. 5, 2011 in the Malone Telegram of New York:
“While those in the ski industry will miss Titus Mountain owner and developer Paul Augustine, who died on Jan. 1 at age of 79, his death won’t affect operations at the local ski mecca. “He was in a nursing home for the last six years,” Titus General Manager Jim Hewitt said Tuesday. “A corporation runs us so nothing will change at all for our operation.” Mr. Augustine was very well known in the ski industry, and was “a really special guy,” Mr. Hewitt added. “He did an awful lot for the community. We’ll miss him.” According to his obituary, Mr. Augustine grew up on a farm just west of Hastings, Minn. He enjoyed skiing as a young adult and eventually decided he wanted to build and operate a ski area so started acquiring land in the St. Croix River Valley near the Twin Cities. In the fall of 1963, he started building Afton Alps. On Dec. 21, 1963, the area opened to a crowd of 37 paid customers. Now it averages over 200,000 skier visits annually. In 1970, Mr. Augustine bought Ski Haven in Mankato, Minn. and renamed it Mount Kato. He oversaw a substantial renovation and expansion of the area. In 1980, he purchased Moon Valley Ski Area in Malone. That ski area dated back to the late 1940s when the Johns family in Chasm Falls put up a tow rope so neighbors could ski. Moon Valley opened to the public in 1960. Mr. Augustine rebuilt the area, added several runs to the lower part of the mountain and renamed it Titus Mountain. After a few years, he expanded to the upper mountain, adding a chalet along with more runs and lifts. Today, Titus Mountain offers 27 trails, a terrain park and two lodges, serviced by 10 lifts. The ski area also opens a tubing park on weekends and holidays. The ski destination was bustling at Christmas with a group of more than 400 skiers from Canada enjoying the plentiful snow. The recent record warm temperatures changed the landscape, however. “We had to close a couple trails on Sunday because of weather,” Mr. Hewitt said. “We’re making snow again all day, and expect to have everything open again this weekend.”