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 McNeil,
Texas is a Travis County village named for
George McNeil, once a section foreman on the
Austin and Northwestern Railroad. It is located
eight miles north of Austin at the intersection
of the International-Great Northern and Southern
Pacific Railroads. Established in 1882, the
community had one business, a post office and a
population of 70 in 1940.
In the late 1880s McNeil became the base of
operations for the Austin White Lime Company,
which is still in business. By the 1890s the
community also had a hotel, a general store, and
a population of 200. Today McNeil consists of
only the white lime plant, a small post office
and general store.
From THE HANDBOOK OF TEXAS : Volume II
and Texas Post Offices by County.
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 McNeil
High School was established in 1992. During the first year only
grades 9, 10 and 11 attended. Those juniors became McNeil's first
graduating class in May of 1994. In the five years previous to 1992,
McNeil's building was known as the Westwood Annex, a school for
Westwood High School's ninth grade. Each year, McNeil's population
has grown, and the building has recently gone through some major
expansion and construction |
 The
cave under the orchestra room is called Hidden Forest Cave. There
are two caves in the courtyard. They used to be one cave until the
roof collapsed, splitting the cave into two sections. One is called
Millipede Cave and the other is Millipede Cave Annex. Hidden Forrest
Cave has no critters in it because it was never open to the surface
until they drilled that hole. Millipede Cave and Millipede Cave
Annex, have been home to Texella reyesi, The Bone Cave Harvestman. A
harvestman is an arthropod, like a spider but in a slightly
different family, they eat spiders, VERY toxic venom, but tiny
fangs. The last time anyone went down there, back in 1999 or 2000,
Mike Wharton (super cave expert) and I did not find any evidence of
the harvestman. However, since it was pretty dry, they may have been
hiding in the narrower, moister parts of the cave that we couldn't
wiggle into. |
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