Bead-Shiner Green Flecked Stone Donut TB

This trackable has the goal to circulate more than five years and to be moved by at least 25 cachers. That is a target rate of five drops per year for five years, or a drop every 73 days.   As of 31-Jul-21 it had survived for 4.1 years and had been moved by 32 cachers, for an average release every 47 days. Keep it moving!

No permission is needed to leave the U.S. While in the U.S., please drop it in a Premium Member only OR a rural cache near a busy trail or road. Do not place it in an urban cache or abandon it at a caching event where there is no security. Transport the bug in the original plastic bag for as long as the bag lasts; the bag keeps the trackable clean, protects the number and prevents tangling with other items. Otherwise, take the trackable anywhere you wish.

This is one of a series of large beads obtained from different places and converted into travel bugs.  They are named for Texas towns with interesting names or histories.  Much of the text is from the online Handbook of Texas or texasescapes.com.

Shiner is at the intersection of U.S. Highway 90A and State Highway 95, fourteen miles west of Hallettsville in western Lavaca County.  In 1885 a post office called Half Moon was opened at a trading post near the present site of Shiner.  When the San Antonio and Aransas Pass Railway came to the area in 1887 it bypassed Half Moon and built through land owned by Henry B. Shiner.  Shiner donated 250 acres for a right-of-way and depot, and a town soon grew around the new transportation facilities.  At first the community was called New Half Moon, but in 1888 its name was changed to Shiner.  Shiner was incorporated in 1890, and L. P. Amsler was elected the first mayor.  Czech and German immigrants soon became the dominant ethnic groups, and Shiner developed a cohesive Czech community through social organizations such as the National Sokol Society and the Slavonic Benevolent Order of the State of Texas.  The population was reported at 2,074 in 1990 and 2,070 in 2000.  The town supports a weekly newspaper, the Gazette, which was established in 1892.  The most important agricultural products are dairy and beef cattle, cotton, and corn.  Shiner has industries that manufacture wire, racks, dye, and tool plating.  In 2002 the Spoetzl brewery, the sole producer of Shiner Beer, distributed their products in Texas and in twenty-two other states.  Shiner has supplanted Pearl and Lone Star as the beer most identified with Texas.