Stephen Fuller Austin, son of Moses and Maria Brown Austin, was born on the Virginia frontier, attended schools in Kentucky and Connecticut, worked in his father's mercantile business in Missouri, served as a judge in Arkansas, and later moved to New Orleans to work at a newspaper and study law. In 1821, after Moses Austin received permission from Spain to settle 300 families in Texas and then died in Louisiana while recruiting settlers, Stephen Austin took over the project. Although Mexican leaders later rejected his father's original grant, he persisted and secured its continuance. He directed every aspect of the settlement of the original 300 families in southeast Texas from 1821 to 1825 and by 1832 had overseen the settlement of another 900 families in the area. After requesting separate statehood for Texas in 1833, he was imprisoned in Mexico. He returned to Texas in 1835, helped it win independence from Mexico, and became the new Republic's first secretary of state, earning recognition as the father of Texas.