El Camino Real de los Tejas NHT Association

Association Board

The Board of the Association is made up of 15 individuals and geographic diversity throughout the trail is ensured through our regions policy. This is the first interim board of the Association. The accomplishments of the current board to date are the non-profit organization status, the bylaws, the membership and the website.

Maureen "Mo" Brown is a sixth generation native of San Antonio and the site manager of Casa Navarro State Historic Site in downtown San Antonio, which is one of the twenty sites managed by the Texas Historical Commission. She has been a professional historical archaeologist for over twenty years and has also worked extensively in education outreach and cultural heritage tourism projects in south Texas and Jamaica. In addition, Mo was the founding director of the Museum of the Coastal Bend in Victoria. She is also a contemporary artist and photographer.

Linda Curtis-Sparks currently serves as Director of the Sabine Parish Tourist Commission that promotes Toledo Bend Lake Country and includes Ft. Jesup State Park. From 1989-2002, she served as Director of the Sabine River Authority which manages Toledo Bend Reservoir and became involved in the promotion of El Camino Real.  She has served as an appointee by several Governors on numerous Commissions for the State of Louisiana and has won awards for conservation and tourism development.  Linda is the sixth generation of her family to live along El Camino Real and currently lives  near one of the original crossings on the Sabine River.

Chief Rufus Davis has served as Chief and Tribal Charman of the Adais Caddo Indian Nation for 21 years.  The tribal history that he compiled achieved tribal recognition by the State of Louisiana.  He also facilitated the placement of St. Anne, the tribe’s historic church, on the National Register of Historic Places in 1994.  He has served on the founding board of the Old Courthouse Museum in Natchitoches, LA, as the chairman of the advisory board of Los Adais State Park, and as commissioner on the Cane River National Area Commission.

Gary Dunnam serves as the executive director of Victoria Preservation Inc., participating in the annual historic homes tours and cemetery tours are a part of VPI’s outreach into the community.  In January of 2000, he was appointed Victoria County’s first Heritage Director, and serves in that capacity today.  The Victoria County Heritage Department maintains a historic archives of Victoria County materials and is heavily involved in heritage tourism.  He and his wife reside in the historic house that is Registered Texas Historic Landmark, and listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

Lucile Estell has a master’s degree in history and taught the subject for ten years at East Texas Baptist University.  Lucile later earned her doctorate in education and is a member of the Milam County Historical Commission.  She has been an active member of the National Trust for Historic Preservation and the Rockdale Historical Society.  Dr. Estell is a retired educational administrator with many years of experience at the local school district and regional service center levels.

Joy Graham is a fourth generation Milam County Texan She is the past chair of Milam County Historical Commission and many other committees in Milam County dedicated to historical preservation.  In 2003 she received the Texas Historical Commission's John Ben Sheppard Leadership Award.  She assisted in the planning of the Texas Brazos Trail Region and co-chaired El Camino Real de los Tejas Symposium in Milam County in 2005.  Her historical research was published in “Bits of History.” She is Vice-President of Historic Sites and Property Preservation within the Texas State DAR organization. 

Duke Lyons has promoted tourism and historic preservation of El Camino Real in East Texas and worked on getting the route recognized as a National Historic Trail.  Mr. Lyons has established the first visitor’s center on El Camino Real de los Tejas.

Carl Mica served as an ex-officio member during the first year of the Association‘s existence, as an employee of the Office of US Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison. He now works as the Director of Business Relations for The University of Texas System. He is also on the Board of Directors for St. Michaels Catholic Academy in Austin, where he resides with his wife.

Melissa Sanford is Executive Director of the Nacogdoches Convention and Visitors Bureau.  El Camino was one of the streets that the “oldest city in Texas” was planned around.  Melissa has been promoting tourism and travel in the City of Nacogdoches for nearly a decade.

Andrew Sansom has served on the board of organizations including the Texas Historical Foundation, Bat Conservation International, and the National Audubon Society.  He worked as the Executive Director for both Texas Parks and Wildlife and the Texas Nature Conservancy before acquiring his current position as Executive Director of the River Systems Institute at Texas State University.  He is dedicated to conservation, historic preservation, and heritage tourism and has a great deal of experience in those areas.

Irene Ramos is former mayor of Poteet, Texas and has served on the association board since 2010.  She is instrumental in organizing the Poteet Middle Camino Real Trail Project along with the Rivers, Trails, and Conservation Assistance program of the NPS.

Richard G. Santos is the former chairman of the Bexar County Historical Commission, former vice-chairman of San Antonio Alamo Plaza Committee, and the former chairman of Zavala County Historical Commission.  He is an advocate of historic heritage tourism and the development of El Camino Real de los Tejas, as reflected in his published articles on the subject in the San Antonio Express-News and the Zavala County Sentinel.  He is currently the Grants Manager for the City of Pearsall. 

Mark Stine was the Director for The Texas Heritage Cycling Experience, a club of cyclists that tour on famous historic Texas routes, including El Camino Real de los Tejas.  He initiated the 2005 legislative update to the Texas Transportation Code that created collaboration between involved parties to identify potential bicycle tourism routes and trails.  He now works as a Coordinator of the BikeTexas Trail Doctors Program within the Texas Bicycle Coalition.

Kay Wesson is the County Commissioner for Bastrop County.  She works with the County Historical Society giving tours on local history, and she helped rededicate three Daughters of the American Revolution markers on El Camino Real.  Bastrop is a frontier colony on El Camino Real and Kay is knowledgeable of the history of the route and ways to market this history.