I thought that Comanche was n one of the counties farther west around Wichita Falls or in the Panhandle.
I grew up in the town of George West which is the county seat of Live Oak County that lies between San Antonio and Corpus Christi. My parents moved there in 1960 and I believe that the only two Black people in the county were an elderly couple--the man was a ranch hand and the woman was a house servant of the founder and namesake of the town, George West. That Black couple lived next to us in the house that we renting when my family moved into when we first arrived in the county.
During my twelve years in the school system there were no Blacks in either George West or the other school district in the county which is Three Rivers.
My parents moved into the home they owned which was across the street from the county historian and I don't recall her ever mentioning anything about Blacks within the county. Live Oak County wasn't formed by the Legislature until 1856 as part of the McMullen tract that was formed from Nueces and San Patricio counties and the population was probably a couple of hundred people during the time of the Civil War so I can't find any evidence of the Confederacy in Live Oak County. Similarly, I don't have any knowledge of any covenant restrictions, lynchings, or other evidence that there was either a formal or an informal policy against Blacks in either the town or county.
My brother worked at the refinery in Three Rivers in the 1980s and he never mentioned anything about Blacks working there (and he would have said it if there were). In the 2000 census, it indicated that the county only had 0.41% classified as Blacks/African American. While that would have only been about 50 people, I suspect those Blacks were inmates at the federal penitentiary outside of Three Rivers.
What came as a surprise to me was that between 2005 and 2010 my high school band had a Black drum major for a couple of years. I still thought that the entire school district was composed of either Whites or Hispanics (no Asians or Native Americans either) so my jaw nearly dropped to the floor when I read the news.
I can't really blame Blacks for not moving to Live Oak County since they would be cultural outcasts there. The starting point for research in Live Oak County is probably at mysoutex.com, but the county newspaper (The Progress) was bought out by the publishing company in Beeville which is in adjacent Bee County between 15-20 years ago. I haven't been to Live Oak County in more than two decades, but I suspect that the population is still as White as "the touch, the feel of cotton" commercials that we see on TV.
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