University students help clean Fort San Jacinto in Galveston

GALVESTON, Texas (AP) — A group of island college students could soon be bringing new life to a site of Galveston history.

The Galveston County Daily News reports Circle K club students at Texas A&M University at Galveston have been picking up trash at Fort San Jacinto for about a year, but club leaders want to take the effort to a higher level, Vice President Clare Shea said.

The fort is on the East End, just north of where Boddeker Road intersects with Seawall Boulevard, but it's hard to see from the road because it's overgrown, she said.

"We're looking for areas to set up picnic tables and set it up for tourists to come fish and hang out and learn," Shea said.

Shea, a junior, first heard about the fort's disrepair from the Galveston Kiwanis Club, an international service organization, she said.

Circle K is the college level version of Kiwanis.

Over the past year, the club has picked up more than 20 bags of trash from the site, Shea said.

Built in 1898, Fort San Jacinto was the first headquarters for Galveston's harbor defenses, according to the Texas State Historical Association. The fort was named in honor of the Texan victory over Mexican troops at San Jacinto and contained three gun batteries and a control station, according to the association.

Now, the land is U.S. Army Corps of Engineers property, spokesman Lt. Col. Mark Williford said.

The university club began cleaning trash last spring, but the area has so much more potential, Circle K President Rick Fuentes said.

"We would like to unveil this because right now it's not seen," Fuentes, a freshman, said. "You cannot see it from the road."

The site is covered with graffiti, much of it lewd, and overgrown, he said.

While plans are still in the conceptual stage, the club wants to place some picnic...