While New York, Pennsylvania, and Ohio were being settled by Ennis and hundreds of others, so was Texas and other states.

        A native of Belleville, New Jersey, Cornelius Ennis went to work in a drug store in New York City in 1834. Hearing a great deal about Texas, in 1838 he moved to Texas, bring with him a stock of drugs and merchandise.
 

        In Houston, he formed a partnership with James W. Kimball, who had recently arrived from Vermont. The partners operated a general trade store, and shipped the first bale of cotton from Galveston to Boston in 1841.
 

        In this same year, Mr. Ennis married his partner’s sister, Miss Jeanette Ingalls Kimball. In 1842 Kimball and his family took passage for New York to buy stock. The brig went down in a storm off the Florida coast and all were lost. However, the business continued to expand under the management of Ennis.
 

        As mayor of Houston in 1856-57, Ennis devoted time and his own money to apprehending robbers who were preying on the wagons that came to Houston to trade.
 

        As one of the incorporators and directors of the Great Northern Railroad (later the International Great Northern), Ennis was also a builder of the Houston and Texas Central Railroad (today a part of the Southern Pacific) He served the road as general superintendent, controller, and later as financial agent, The town of Ennis, Texas, once the railroad’s terminus, was named in his honor.
 

        During the Civil War, Mr. Ennis was a blockade runner. After the war he opened a cotton exporting business in Galveston. While in Galveston he became interested in the “Galveston News”, and was chairman of the building committee for the present home of that newspaper. This was said to be the first fireproof building in Texas,
 

        Ennis’ eldest daughter married Alfred H. Belo, owner of the “Dallas News” in later years.

        Col. Ennis died in Houston on Feb. 13, 1899* A tall man, grand in stature, and holding himself erect, he bore himself proudly to the end. He left upon his community the indelible