TOLUCA RANCH CEMETERY

Hidalgo Co. Cemeteries of Tx

Submitted by Frances Isbell

With Permission  of Hidalgo Co. Historical Commission (2005)

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LOCATION, : Progreso Lakes, at Toluca Ranch, ¼ mile east of FM 1015 on Rancho Toluca Road, 1.1 miles south of US 281. Cemetery is southwest of church. There is a separate graveyard 500 yards north of the church.

SURVEYED: Goldsby Goza and Fran Isbell on 23 March 1980, updated May 2005. Texas Historical Markers on church and homestead, 1965 and 1967; Colonial Dames 17^th Century marker for Toluca Ranch on FM 1015, 1980

HISTORY: Florencio Saenz and his bride Sostenes Cano established 5900-acre Toluca Ranch in 1880 in Llano Grande Land Grant. The complex, one of the few intact early ranch communities in the Rio Grande Valley, is a Historic District.

Eventually Saenz acquired nearly 10,000 acres. In 1899, he built a chapel, St. Joseph’s Church, in thanksgiving for finding a well of sweet water. Saenz promoted improved farming and ranching, and operated a store and kiln which provided bricks for the Victorian style ranchhouse and for the later Saenz store and home and businesses in Mercedes. He was Hidalgo County Commissioner 1882-1902.

The couple adopted their three-month old niece Manuela Cano Champion in 1882. She married Spaniard Amador Fernandez in 1908; they raised eight children. Fernandez managed the store and operated a ferry on the Rio Grande.

Saenz sold the northern 4,000 acres to American Rio Grande Land & Irrigation Company in 1903. He established the ranch cemetery in 1914. After a bandit attack in 1915, the family moved to Mercedes. When Saenz died in 1927, his remains were interred in the Toluca Cemetery, but later moved to Campacuas Cemetery to lie beside his wife’s family. Toluca Ranch now encompasses approximately 670 acres and is owned by descendants. It is maintained by Ernesto Fernandez and family members.

A separate graveyard 500 feet north of the Toluca Cemetery on the Jose F. Fernandez home holds the remains of the oldest son, Jose Florencio Fernandez and his family.