One of the things that makes Mueller such an incredible neighborhood is the parks. Perhaps you’ve noticed the fancy new signs! Like most of the streets in Mueller, several of the parks in Mueller are named after difference-making Austinites. (*Note: Despite what you may have heard, Lake Park is, in fact, named after the body of water not beloved 90’s talk show host and possible Austin visitor, Rikki Lake.) For this article, we’re going to focus on the namesake of one of Mueller’s original parks and first pool: Ella Newsome Wooten.

Style, Service, and a City-Shaping Legacy

Born in McKinney, Texas in 1878, Ella Newsome married Austin physician Goodall Harrison Wooten in 1897 and moved to the capital at the turn of the century. The couple soon became fixtures of a rising university town. Their residence - today known as the Goodall Wooten House / Hotel Ella - was begun in 1898 and completed in 1900 at 1900 Rio Grande, a short walk from the University of Texas. In 1910, Ella oversaw a dramatic expansion, transforming the earlier home into a grand Classical (Greek) Revival mansion with monumental columns and gracious verandas - an emblem of civic aspiration as Austin grew from college town to small city. 

Ella’s public life reached far beyond entertaining in a beautiful home. During World War I and World War II she organized and led Red Cross relief work in Austin, chairing the surgical dressings committee - one of the most labor-intensive volunteer efforts of the era. Contemporary accounts and later summaries credit her with thousands of volunteer hours and sustained leadership that helped channel Austin’s home-front energy into tangible aid. Her capacity to mobilize people - methodically, over years - made her a quiet force in local emergency response and civic life. 

She was also a business-minded organizer at a time when few women were invited into boardrooms. Sources note that Ella became the first woman to serve on the Austin Chamber of Commerce’s board of directors, an early crack in the glass ceiling of local civic leadership. In this, as in her Red Cross work, she stitched together society networks, practical needs, and a knack for making things happen - traits that would keep her name circulating in Austin club minutes and newspaper columns for decades. 

If service anchored Ella’s public reputation, horticulture gave it color. Her gardens were famous - especially for azaleas, which accounts credit her with introducing to Austin on a scale previously unseen. At its peak, the Wooten grounds reportedly featured as many as 1,800 azalea bushes, turning the property into a seasonal spectacle that neighbors and visitors remembered for years. Ella’s garden wasn’t only decoration; it was a calling card for hospitality and a living advertisement for Austin’s possibilities as a cultivated city. 

The house itself became a mirror of Austin’s evolution after the Wootens. Following Goodall’s death in 1942, Ella sold the property in 1944. Over the next several decades it served as a student residence hall, then a recovery center, and eventually a hotel - first the Mansion at Judges’ Hill and, after a restoration and rebranding in 2013, Hotel Ella. Each chapter layered new uses on a landmark that Ella had already imprinted with her taste and civic purpose. 

Why Her Name Belongs on a Park in Mueller

Mueller’s Ella Wooten Park opened in 2008 as the first major neighborhood green and pool - a community anchor built for daily use rather than special occasions. That’s exactly the register of Ella’s legacy: hands-on civic work (the Red Cross), institutional leadership (the Chamber), and a hospitable, garden-forward vision of city life that invited people in. In a district that remade an airport into a walkable neighborhood, attaching her name to a pool, playscape, and lawn says something specific about Austin values: service, welcome, and the everyday beauty of shared public space.

Key Dates & Facts

• 1878: Ella Newsome born in McKinney, Texas. 

• 1897: Marries Dr. Goodall H. Wooten; moves to Austin. 

• 1900: House at 1900 Rio Grande completed. 

• 1910: Ella leads transformation into Greek Revival mansion. 

• 1944: Sells the house after Goodall’s death (1942). 

• 2013: Landmark reopens as Hotel Ella after renovation. 

• 2008: Ella Wooten Park & Pool opens in Mueller. 

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References:

Texas Architect Magazine+3austintexas.gov+3Wikipedia+3
muelleraustin.com+1
The Portal to Texas History
austintexas.gov+1
Wikipedia+1
Texas Architect Magazine

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