1911 Kinney County Courthouse

When Kinney County completed its first courthouse in 1879, the county was a remote area of the Texas frontier. The extant two-story limestone 1879 courthouse is marked by simplicity and functionality. By the first decade of the twentieth century, the population had boomed and the county was connected to the east, west, and Mexico by rail lines. Kinney County built its second courthouse in 1911. The Beaux Arts courthouse designed by L.L. Thrumon reflects the county's transformation and growing sophistication. The new courthouse was built next to the original courthouse, which was purchased by the Las Moras Masons. The courthouse continues to play an important role as the political and symbolic center of the county. The building is eligible for listing in the National Register in the area of politics and architecture as a good local example of the Beaux Arts style.

Kinney County, located approximately 115 miles directly west of San Antonio on the Rio Grande, straddles the Edwards Plateau, and Rio Grande Plains regions. Less than one percent of the county is considered prime farmland. Arable farmland around Las Moras Creek has historically been the site of most settlements including Brackettville, the county seat. Brackettville is located roughly in the center of the county along Texas Highway 90.

For thousands of years prior to European settlement, the region was sparsely populated by various Indian groups. Several Spanish explorers traveled through the area in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, but an inhospitable climate and Indian attacks thwarted most early attempts to establish missions and settlements. In 1775 Franciscan monks established a mission at Las Moras Creek. By the time English impresario John Charles Beales came in 1834, the Franciscan Mission had disappeared. Beals brought fifty-nine colonists from the east coast and Europe to settle his land grant. His colony soon failed due to Indian raids, drought, and rumors of Santa Anna's approach.

Despite a sparse population and no established American settlements, Kinney County was officially organized in 1850. After being admitted to the union, Texas' large counties were divided into smaller, more governable jurisdictions. Kinney County was carved out of Bexar County and named after early settler Henry Lawrence Kinney (1814-1862).

Born in Pennsylvania, Kinney came to Brownsville in 1838 and then moved to present-day Corpus Christi in 1841. Kinney was involved in everything from politics to trade and land speculation. After Texas joined the Union in 1845, Kinney went to Washington to argue that the Rio Grande River, not the Nueces, should be the boundary between the United States and Mexico. He served in the first through fourth Texas State legislatures and then again in the eighth legislature, resigning in 1861 because he was opposed to succession. Kinney's business interests were varied and occasionally suspect-at one point he was accused of illegal trade with Mexico. Along with operating a trading post in Corpus Christi, Kinney acquired vast tracts of Texas frontier land and eventually owned most of the land between the Nueces and Rio Grande Rivers, which includes present-day Kinney County. Because of his interests in the area, Kinney actively promoted the region throughout the US and Europe. He advertised for settlers, but also operated a guide and outfitting business for 49ers heading to California from Galveston.

Two years after the formation of Kinney County, the first lasting attempts at settlement appeared in the form of Fort Clark and the town of Brackett (later Brackettville), both near Las Moras Creek. The United States Army established Fort Clark in 1852 to protect its newly acquired territory from Mexican and Indian incursions. Texas Militia and Confederate troops occupied Fort Clark during the Civil War until 1866.

From 1870 until 1912 a detachment of Seminole Negro Indian Scouts was assigned to Fort Clark. These "Negro Indians" were escaped slaves who had lived with Seminole Indians in Florida and then fled to Mexico to escape recapture or removal to a reservation. The scouts were contracted by the US Army to fight Indians on the frontier: "[their] knowledge of English, Spanish, and various Indian dialects proved valuable to the army, as did their years of experience fighting the Indians in Mexico. The scouts distinguished themselves in the Indian wars." When the Army disbanded the scouts, many moved to nearby Brackettville, where their descendants still live and the Seminole Indian Scout Cemetery is located.

Also in 1852, Oscar B. Brackett founded the town of Brackett. Brackett opened a dry goods store and freight office to service the San Antonio-El Paso stage line and nearby Fort Clark. Brackett also built the first home in the settlement. The Brackett house later served as a schoolhouse and was the site of the first meeting of county government.

Despite these early establishments, Kinney County did not experience steady population growth until after the Civil War. In 1860 the total population of the county was sixty-one (primarily settlers of Mexican descent, families of the men stationed at Fort Clark, and a small number of free blacks)." The population grew to 1,204 by 1870, and then to 3,781 by 1890.

The 1870s were a decade of change and growth in the county. In addition to the formation of the county government, the first school, church, post office, and Masonic lodge were established in Brackettville in the 1870s. The economy, which had been based primarily on cattle, shifted to sheep and goats and the county became an exporter of wool and angora.

The first meeting of the Kinney County government was held on January 27th, 1873.8 As was typical of many counties, the new government relied on makeshift meeting space in pre-existing buildings until a courthouse could be funded and built. The first meeting of the Kinney County commissioners was held in the "old Brackett house," which also served as the schoolhouse." The house is no longer extant, but it is believed to have been behind the Kartes and Co. building, which is located across Cook Alley from the first courthouse. The second and subsequent government meetings were held at the Kartes and Co. building until the first courthouse was built.

The 1879 Courthouse

By July of 1878 the Kinney County commissioners had specifications for a proposed courthouse. The site selected was Lot 3, block 6, at the corner of Ann Street and Cook Alley in Brackettville, which had been designated the county seat at the first meeting. The site was chosen because it was "very imposing, commanding a good view of the town and surrounding county."10 The commissioners made no specifications as to the style or physical appearance of the building indicating that they were interested only in the functionality of their courthouse.

Completed in 1879 the first Kinney County Courthouse is a simple rectangular plan, two-story limestone building with a low-pitch hipped roof and symmetrically placed stone arch openings. By this time, Texas's more populated counties were building high-style courthouses with various "Victorian" influences. The simplicity of Kinney County's first courthouse reflects the fact that the area was still predominantly a frontier town remote from outside influences.

Until 1883 the railroad came only as far east as San Antonio. Kinney County was accessible primarily by stagecoach, which connected San Antonio to El Paso. In 1881 the Galveston, Harrisburg and San Antonio (GH&SA), and the International and Great Northern railroads were built toward El Paso in a race to be the first to complete a transcontinental route across Texas. The GH&SA came through Kinney County, but instead of following the stage line through Brackettville as was expected, the route went through Spofford, about ten miles south. From Spofford, a branch line ran south connecting to Mexico at Eagle Pass. In addition to increasing traffic through the county, the railroad gave the wool and mohair industries broader access to markets, bringing growth and prosperity to the county. Even though the railroad did not go through Brackettville, it remained, and still remains, the largest town in the county.

Although Kinney County was growing, and the railroad connected it to larger cities both east and west, the area retained the feeling of a "wild west" town. An enlisted man stationed at Fort Clark in 1889 painted Brackettville as a raucous frontier town in an article for the New York Herald Tribune:

Adjacent to Ft. Clark, across a narrow stream dignified by the name of Las Moras River, was Brackettville, a nondescript frontier town, ten miles from the railroad, County seat of Kinney County, and about the worst place on the map. Everything ever pictured in the 'movies' of the wildest kind was there, and lots more besides.

The population was some 500, mostly Mexicans. Saloons were on every corner and plenty in between. Dance halls, brothels -let your imagination run riot and you may approximate what this town was like in those hectic days...there were several kinds of dances indulged in that are not seen on stage or ballroom floor. There was cheap liquor, cards, all kinds of gambling, women, and no legal restraint."

The 1911 Courthouse

By the first decade of the twentieth century, the 1879 courthouse was outdated and too small for the needs of the growing county. The county commissioners decided to build a new courthouse on the lot immediately next to the first one. The site was purchased in August of 1910 from Miss Virginia Ross for $1000.00.12 The Ross family, one of the early families to settle in the area, owned large tracts of land in Brackettville and lived in a home directly across from the two courthouses. Ann Street is named after Ann O'Hanlon Ross, mother of Virginia Ross.

When the county commissioners built the second courthouse, more attention was given to the style and architectural impact of the building. Whereas the design of the first courthouse was essentially up to the mason, who was only given dimensions, the second courthouse entailed more planning and the services of a professional architect. The commissioners specified that the new courthouse would be built of brick13 and that the center of the building was to be 48' 8" from the center of Fritter Street and 76' 6" from the center of James Street. 14 Dallas architect L. (Leslie) L. Thrumon, was hired to design the building. Thurmon, a Louisiana native, practiced in Dallas from 1910-1915, during which time he designed five Texas courthouses. Thurmon's other county courthouses include Jeff Davis (1911), Mason (1909-1910), Floyd (1911), and Franklin (1912).

Thurmon's other courthouses bear a strong resemblance to each other. All are Classical Revival designs with clock towers, monumental full-height porticos and symmetrical plans. In fact, Thurmon often reused the same plans, modifying them slightly from county to county.16 Although the Kinney County courthouse shares elements with these other courthouses, particularly the domed cupola with clock, it is the one example of Thrurmon branching out into a different style and plan altogether. Rather than Classical Revival, he employed Beaux Arts Classicism, using similar classical elements, but in non-traditional ways.

Named after the style developed at the Ecole de Beaux Arts in Paris during the nineteenth century, the Beaux Arts style is based on classical forms, monumental compositions, and functional floor plans. The style was popularized in the United States during the 1893 Chicago Exposition. The design of the Kinney County courthouse is not a pure adherent to the style; the Beaux Arts elements are restrained, mostly evident in the quoins, symmetrical facades, and classical elements. The octagonal bays flanking the main entrance are atypical of the Beaux Arts style, which tends toward more rectilinear forms. The use of turrets may reflect a Queen Anne influence, however, as a whole, the building is too symmetrical to be considered a Queen Anne.

For the construction of their new courthouse, the county also relied on a firm with courthouse experience. Falls City Construction Co. of Louisville Kentucky is the same firm responsible for the Carson, Rains, Deaf Smith, and Jeff Davis county courthouses." The contract was approved on July 7, 1910.18 Total construction costs were $44,50019 and the building passed final inspection on March 22, 1911.20 On February 13, 1911, the commissioners' court accepted a bid of $1,950 from Art Metal Construction Co. for interior furniture.11 These benches are still in use throughout the courthouse.

The professionally designed Kinney County courthouse reflects the county's growing and increasingly sophisticated population. Since its construction in 1911, the courthouse has played an important role as the physical and symbolic center of county government. It is nominated in the area of politics at the local level of significance and in the area of architecture at the local level of significance as an example of the Beaux Arts Classicism.