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Quincy Adams Wooster - Founder of the Town of Wooster, Texas

By Nick Wooster

Quincy Adams Wooster was born on 4th Sep 1839 in Walden, Vermont to parents the Reverend John Wooster and Fanny Reed Stebbins^1,2. He was a 4x great grandson of Sergeant Edward Wooster, founder of the Connecticut line of Woosters and a 4th cousin of Colonel William Burr Wooster and Dr Samuel Russell Wooster, who both served in the American Civil War.
Quincy's grandfather David moved north to Campton in New Hampshire where his father, John was born³ and John then migrated west into Vermont. However, these migrations were small-fry compared to what was to come.
Quincy married Catherine Morilla Monroe from Pennsylvania and they, together with his younger brother Theodore Frelinghuysen Wooster, then migrated around 1500 miles west, first to Minnesota, where their first child was born⁴, before settling in Mapleton in Iowa. They had a total of ten children, with the last nine all born in Iowa, before another huge move occurred, this time over 1000 miles south to Texas!

The Migration to Texas

In 1891 Quincy visited the Harris County area of Texas as a correspondent for the Monona County Democrat newspaper and was so impressed with the area that he immediately sold his farm and purchased over 1000 acres of land near Baytown⁵.
By 1892 six of Quincy and Catherine's children had married and were starting families of their own and the oldest five of these opted to stay in Mapleton. This was only a temporary reprieve however, as the wanderlust inherent in their genes eventually got the better of them! Two migrated to Oregon whilst the other three ended up in Kansas, Minnesota and California.
The youngest five children all went to Texas with their parents, including Ida Jane Wooster who had married William Amidon Shreckengaust in Mapleton the previous year⁶ and their first child Flossie Morilla Shreckengaust, born in Mapleton in February 1892⁷.

Quincy with his family at his home on Scott's Bay ca.1906 Photo: Findagrave.com

Unlike their older siblings, most of the younger children and their families stayed in Texas for the rest of their lives. Fanny Roxy Wooster (b.1874) married Steve Steinman⁶ and the Steinman and Shreckengaust families, together with Quincy's son John Lewis Wooster (b.1876) would go on to play a pivotal role in developing the Wooster community. For much of its early existence Wooster was an unincorporated community⁸, meaning it was not governed by a local municipal corporation, although it was incorporated into Baytown in the 1950's⁵.

The Development of Wooster - The Schoolroom⁵

By 1894 the community had its own post office and in October 1894 a school was built. Quincy approached the Harris County Commissioners to build a school for the children of Wooster. Junius Brown (another migrant from Iowa) donated the land and in 1894 the schoolhouse was built by John Lewis Wooster, Steve Steinman, William Shreckengaust, Bert Brown and Wesley E Crow.

John Lewis Wooster (1876-1937) who was pivotal in building the schoolroom. Photo: Findagrave.com

This was a single room, single teacher school with all the furniture, writing slates and books provided by the community. In 1937 the school was moved to a new venue and used as part of the larger David G Burnett School. After abandonment in 1980, the schoolroom was saved and moved in 1986 to the Republic of Texas Plaza to serve as a living museum.

The Wooster Schoolhouse, now as a living museum, and the Texas Historical Marker at the school. Photos: Waymarking.com9

In 2011 Trevia Beverly nee Wooster (1931-2022), John Lewis Wooster's granddaughter, successfully applied for an official Texas Historical Marker for the school and produced a 10-page document in support of the application, which is available online5 and gives much more detail about the settlement of Wooster and especially the schoolroom. Photo: Findagrave.com

The Development of Wooster - The Cemetery

The community had its own cemetery and the first burial there was Quincy and Catherine's youngest son Martin Elmer Wooster who died in 1894 aged just 10². The cemetery suffered from subsidence and several gravestones were lost. However, Quincy's headstone was saved and moved to the Cedar Crest Cemetery in Baytown where several of Quincy and Catherine's descendants are buried².


Quincy and Catherine's headstones in Cedar Crest Cemetery. Photo: Findagrave.com

Wooster in the Modern Era

A large portion of the original Wooster community was on the Brownwood peninsula and was plagued with subsidence and hurricanes which caused much damage. The final straw came in 1983 when all but a few of the remaining houses in that area were destroyed by Hurricane Alicia and the area was condemned^5,8. It is now the Baytown Nature Centre and in 1990 the nearby giant Exxon Mobile oil refinery started purchasing homes in the remainder of Baytown^5,8. Very few residential properties remain as the area is now mainly industrial, but this area of Baytown is still called Wooster and in the northern part of the area Wooster Heights still exists. One of the main streets running through the area is Wooster Street and in the Wooster Heights area, Steinman Street as well as East Shreck Avenue and West Shreck Street, named by Quincy after his sons-in-law still exist.



Map showing the Baytown area and the location of the Wooster Family cemetery along with Wooster, Wooster Heights and Scott Bay



Map showing the locations of descendants of Quincy and Catherine.

Sources

1. 1900 United States Census, Texas, Harris, ED 97, Justice Precinct 3 (all north of Buffalo Bayou excl. La Porte town)
2. Findagrave.com
3. Family Search: New Hampshire Death Records, 1654-1947
4. 1870 United States Census, Iowa, Monona, Maple
5. Trevia Wooster Beverly, An Application for an Official Texas Historical Marker for Wooster Common School no.38, Baytown, Texas. Presented to the Harris County Historical Commission. https://www.baytownhistory.org/images/Appllication_-_Wooster_School.pdf
6. Family Search: Iowa, County Marriages, 1838-1934
7. Family Search: Iowa, Delayed Birth Records, 1850-1939
8. Wikipedia
9. https://www.waymarking.com/waymarks/wm10E2E_Wooster_Common_School_No_38_Baytown_TX

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  Page last updated

  16 November 2025