Winnie, It's early in the morning for me, so maybe I'm not thinking straight. :-) But I think Indianola would have been too far south for travelers to Brazoria County. Brazoria County is places like Lake Jackson, Freeport, Alvin, etc. It's just west of Galveston and south of Fort Bend County. So the closest port would be Galveston. Indianola is on the southwest side of Matagorda Bay. It would have been used for New Braunfels (spelling?) and other western German settlements. The storm in 1875 damaged the town severly, and the final blow came in August 1886. Library research fees are on their web site (www.rosenberg-library.org) Shelly