HEARD OF LA VERNIA? | More about the Bears’ community, Kilgore’s next playoff opponent
Kilgore plays La Vernia next, to see who will play in the UIL Class 4A-Division I State Championship Game Dec. 20 at AT&T Stadium.
ETBlitz.com answered “who’s next?” for Kilgore several times in the last few days. La Vernia, we told people.
Their immediate question?
“Who? I’ve never heard of them.”
So, La Vernia is in the San Antonio area, about 25 miles east of the Alamo City.
La Vernia is in Wilson County, and the high school mascot: the Bears. They’re also often referred to simply as “L-V,” much like East Texans abbreviate Texarkana-area school Liberty-Eylau as “L-E.”
The actual population of the city of La Vernia was only slightly less than 1,100 in the 2020 Census, but obviously, LV is in the 4A-DI playoffs, so the population of the greater LV area must be much more.
According to websites and the city, La Vernia was settled around 1850 by a Mississippi native named W.R. Wiseman, originally under the name “Live Oak Grove,” after the tree grove there. Wiseman established a Presbyterian church, it’s said, and three years after people began to establish homes there, the U.S. Post Office placed a branch there in 1853.
The town was re-named La Vernia six years later, from slang for “green oaks.” By 1893, the railroad was constructed nearby and La Vernia’s population grew from around 200 to about 1,900.
In the 2005 census, La Vernia’s population was 1,017, and about five years later, an H-E-B grocery store came to the community.
La Vernia is listed in the most recent Census as 68 percent white, 27 percent Hispanic.
LV Independent School District has a total enrollment of 3,182 students, and is one of the largest employers in the area. Another: the Guadalupe Valley Electric Cooperative, and the largest retailer remaining the H-E-B store.
La Vernia’s school colors are blue and silver, similar to Kilgore College.
We at ETBlitz.com don’t really know who these folks are, but notable natives of La Vernia are Olympic high-jumper Dusty Jonas; former Texas Secretary of State Jane Y. McCallum back in the 19th Century; Hugh M. Tiner, a former president of Pepperdine University; and Austin Mahone, a pop singer on the current scene who’s roughly 28 years old.
From Wikipedia on Mahone:
“(Mahone) gained initial recognition performing covers of songs on YouTube. He was discovered by record producers Rocco Did It Again! and Mike Blumstein in 2012, and subsequently signed with their label, Chase Records in a joint venture with Republic Records in June of that year. His 2012 debut single, “Say Somethin’” and its follow-up, “Say You’re Just a Friend” (featuring Flo Rida) both received gold certifications by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), while his 2013 single, “What About Love” did so and marked his first entry on the Billboard Hot 100.”
He also had a single, “Mmm Yeah,” featuring Pitbull, in 2014 that was his highest-charting song (finishing at 49 on the Billboard Hot 100.
Now, about La Vernia Bears football.
La Vernia football – 11-3 right now (more on that in a bit) – competes in UIL District 15, Division I. And they have had a quick turnaround.
The Bears were 10-3 in the 2023 season, bowing out of the playoffs in a 45-31 loss to Davenport.
They were 9-3 in 2022. But in 2021, the Bears went 2-9. So it’s been a fairly-quick rise.
Their best recent season was in 2018, when the Bears went 12-2.
Brian Null is the Bears’ head coach and athletic director, and he’s in his first season as the football coach. He was named head coach at an LVISD meeting in February. He had been the track coach prior to the promotion. He had coaching stops at Wagner and Brandeis.
The Bears brought back 18 letterman from the 2023 season: eight starters on offense, seven on defense.
Somewhat surprisingly, La Vernia finished third in its district but is still playing. The Bears have had playoff wins over Tuloso-Midway (49-17), Austin LBJ (13-10), Calhoun (24-21), and last week, Bay City (42-24).
We’ll have a Kilgore-La Vernia preview on Thursday here on ETBlitz.com.
I was born and raised in Lufkin. I now live down the road from LaVernia. Yes, it has been discovered by people escaping San Antonio. It’s growing too rapidly for some of us