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THE COURTHOUSES
OF BEXAR COUNTY
By Terry
Jeanson
San Antonio has had a local government
since the first civilians from the Canary Islands settled there in
1731 around what today is the Main
Plaza. Meetings were held in the homes of private citizens or
in rented or borrowed quarters until the construction of the Casas
Reales began in 1742. The Casas Reales (Royal House) was a
one-story, adobe building with a dirt floor and a sundial in place
of a clock tower and was located on the east side of the Main
Plaza. It was completed in 1749, reconstructed in 1779 and reconstructed
again in 1783 with an adjoining jail. After Texas gained its independence
from Mexico in 1836, Bexar
County was officially organized with San
Antonio chosen as the county seat. The Casas Reales became the
first county courthouse in 1837. This building was the site of many
historic events, including the Council
House Fight of 1840 where many Comanche Indians were killed during
what was supposed to have been a prisoner exchange and treaty signing
between Texas and the Comanches. In 1850, five years after Texas statehood,
the citizens of San Antonio approved
the construction of a second courthouse and jail to be located on
the northwest corner of Military Plaza, west of the Main Plaza, where
the current City Hall sits. The 1837 courthouse was then used as a
public school and eventually demolished.
The second Bexar County courthouse, built by Thomas Whitehead, combined
the Greek Revival style with that of a Georgian style house. The two-story
building had a five-bay front, prominent stringcourse, corner quoins
and a hipped roof. The upper floor contained the courtroom while the
lower floor held the city offices. The jail, with four cells, was
attached to the rear side of the building. When bats took up residence
between the building's canvas ceiling and roof, the courthouse became
known as the "Bat Cave." Housing both city and county offices, by
1859 the second courthouse was becoming overcrowded, prompting city
officials to relocate their offices to the French Building, named
for its owner, John C. French. Completed in 1858, the French Building
was a massive stone office building, situated off the southeast corner
of the Main Plaza, directly east of the 1892-96 courthouse. In 1868,
it was designated as the courthouse, although the 1850 building was
still being used. In 1872, the courthouse was officially moved again
to the Masonic Building on Soledad Street, northeast of the Main Plaza,
built ca. 1858. The three-story rock building was purchased by the
county with the agreement that they would also pay off the debt and
back taxes owed by the Masonic lodge.
When the county and the city became separate government entities in
1872, the 1850 courthouse became the property of the city, but the
county was still allowed to use the building until a new courthouse
was built. By 1879, the French Building was again being used to house
county and city offices as was the Kampmann Building on the northeast
corner of the Main
Plaza. In 1882, it was decided to remodel and expand the Masonic
Building, making it the third Bexar County courthouse (although the
French Building is sometimes considered the third courthouse.) Selecting
plans submitted by well-known San Antonio architect Alfred Giles and
hiring D. C. Anderson as the contractor, the building was completed
and accepted by county commissioners on April 3, 1883. More than doubling
the size of the previous building, the three and a half story 1882
courthouse was built of limestone and designed in the Second Empire
style. The courthouse was divided into three equal bays, the central
bay being flanked by pavilions with Mansard roofs and bullseye windows.
The courthouse also included balconies and cast iron cresting around
the roof. Needing even more office space than the new courthouse provided,
in 1888 the county commissioners purchased the Meny Building immediately
south of the courthouse. Even before the purchase of the Meny Building,
structural concerns and space problems in the 1882 courthouse led
county officials to start discussions about building a new, larger
courthouse in another location. The 1850 courthouse was demolished
in 1889 for the building of the City Hall in 1890. The 1882 courthouse,
the French Building, the Kampmann Building and the Meny Building were
also eventually demolished.
In 1891, property was purchased on the south side of the main plaza
for the construction of the fourth county courthouse and a design
competition was held. The winning prize of $1,000 went to the design
by San Antonio architect James Riely
Gordon (with partner D. Ernest Laub,) whose plans were probably chosen
because of the commissioner's familiarity with him. In the following
years, Gordon would go on to design courthouses across the state.
The contractors for the fourth Bexar County courthouse were George
Dugan, Otto P. Kroeger and David Hughes. The monumental building is
four stories tall with a basement and designed in Gordon's familiar
Richardsonian Romanesque style with Spanish influences, built with
Pecos red sandstone on top of a foundation of Burnet pink granite.
Each corner of the courthouse contains a tower with the tower on the
northeast corner being taller (134 feet) with a beehive dome with
red tile while the other towers have pyramidal roofs with green tile.
A carved eagle with a twelve foot wingspan adorns the face of the
northwest tower just below the red terracotta foliated frieze that
surrounds the building below the hipped roof. A thirty foot segmental
arch buttressed by engaged towers with beehive domes preceded by a
large granite staircase greets visitors at the north entrance. The
entrance towers are interrupted on the second floor by a loggia of
polished granite columns that enclose a balcony behind the double-height
courtroom. Originally, the east side contained a U-shaped courtyard
with a twenty-six foot fountain flanked by stairs of granite that
led to a surrounding colonnade with granite balustrades and columns
with intricate carved capitals. Other ornamental details include heavily
bracketed balconies, arcaded windows separated by granite columns,
hipped roof dormers, a bowed oriel on the northeast corner tower and
carved faces at the east side entrance. The cornerstone for the courthouse
was laid on December 17, 1892, but disagreements over workmanship
quality, construction materials, plumbing, heating, electrical work,
continuing changes in the plans and rising costs kept the courthouse
from being completed until 1896, its $300,000 estimate soaring to
a final $621,000.
The courthouse served the county for almost twenty years before a
five-story addition was built onto the south side entrance between
1914 and 1915 as designed by architects Leo M. J. Dielmann and Chalres
T. Boelhauwe with the H. N. Jones Construction Company serving as
contractor. An even larger addition to the south side was built between
1926 and 1927, funded by $2,000,000 in revenue bonds, doubling the
size of the original building. The architects were Phelps and Dewees,
Emmet T. Jackson and George Willis with Walsh and Burney as the contractors.
Like the 1914 addition, the 1926 addition utilized the same granite
and sandstone as the original portion of the building and copied the
intricate stonework. A fifth story was also added to the center of
the building and the green roof tile was installed. Two extended wings
were added to the west side and the east side courtyard was filled
in, causing the fountain to be moved elsewhere. (See: Unveiling
in San Antonio - Bronze Goes Green without Verdigris.) The interior
of the building was also gutted at this time, the original steel beams
and masonry arches replaced with reinforced concrete framing. Several
modern remodels and additions were also made to the courthouse from
the 1960s to the 1980s but were unsympathetic with the exterior building
materials of the original courthouse. The most notable additions were
the two-story 1963 addition over the west side entrance and the six-story
1972 addition onto the southwest corner of the building. Both additions,
designed by Edward R. Gondeck, consisted of windowless granite slabs
that were uncomplimentary to the courthouses historic fabric. In 1967,
the double height courtroom over the north side entrance was cut in
half to create more offices and courtrooms.
The creation of new district courts and the need for more office space
finally resulted in the construction of the Cadena-Reeves
Justice Center in 1988 on the west side of the 1890s courthouse,
designed by architects Ford, Powell & Carson, Inc., Joneskell Architects,
Inc., and Saldana & Associates, Inc. and constructed by the Gilbane
Building Company. The Cadena-Reeves Justice Center subsequently became
the home of the criminal courts while the old courthouse housed the
civil courts. This was followed in 2010 by the building of the Paul
Elizondo Tower to the rear of the Cadena-Reeves
Justice Center, designed by Kell Muņoz Architects, Inc. & Saldaņa
& Associates Architects and built by the Zachry Construction Corporation.
Starting with a master restoration plan that was adopted in 2000,
funding from the Texas Historical Commission's Courthouse Preservation
Program along with additional money from the Hidalgo Foundation and
the county has allowed the 1890s courthouse to be restored to its
1920s condition. Work to clean and restore deteriorating exterior
sandstone, granite and terracotta details along with repairing and
replacing custom iron railings and investigating water seeping into
the stone foundations was completed in 2003. Interior restorations
included the return of many of the buildings courtrooms to their 1927
appearance, and the return of the two-story courtroom over the north
entrance to its 1896 appearance. The removal of the modern Gondeck
additions from the west side and southwest corner was completed in
2015, restoring the exterior stonework to its 1927 condition and a
rededication of the courthouse was held on July 14, 2015. The cost
of the fifteen year restoration effort was close to $35 million.
Terry
Jeanson
September 1, 2015
Sources:
The Texas Historical Commission at http://www.thc.state.tx.us/;
The Texas Historical Commission's County Atlas at http://atlas.thc.state.tx.us/shell-county.htm;
The Texas Historical Commission's County Atlas: Texas National Register
Profile at http://atlas.thc.state.tx.us/shell-desig.htm;
Courthouses of Bexar County: 1731 - 1978 by Sylvia Ann Santos, 1979;
The People's Architecture: Texas Courthouses, Jails, and Municipal
Buildings by Willard B. Robinson, 1983;
The Courthouses of Texas by Mavis P.Kelsey Sr. and Donald H. Dyal,
2nd edition, 2007;
James Riely Gordon: His Courthouses and Other Public Architecture
by Chris Meister, 2011;
"Splendor returning" by John W. Gonzalez, San Antonio Express-News,
January 6, 2015;
"'Grandeur' is restored at old courthouse" by John W. Gonzalez, San
Antonio Express-News, July 15, 2015. |
The 1988 Bexar
County Courthouse
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The
Paul Elizondo Tower, built in 2010
behind the Cadena-Reeves Justice Center.
Photo courtesy Terry
Jeanson, October 2011 |
The 1892 Bexar
County Courthouse
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| 1939
Photo courtesy TXDoT |
The 1892 Bexar
County Courthouse
Architect - J. Riely Gordon
Style - Romanesque Revival
Material - Red sandstone
Recorded Texas Historic Landmark |
Historical Marker
(on Main Plaza. 100 Dolorosa, San Antonio):
Bexar County
Courthouse
This courthouse
occupies the south side of Main Plaza, formerly called "La Plaza de
las Islas", as originally laid out by the Canary Islanders in 1731.
As it was then, this plaza is the administrative and judicial heart
of Bexar County.
This is the fourth edifice to house the government of the county since
Texas entered the United States. The citizens authorized $621,000
worth of bonds in the 1890s to finance its construction. James Riely
Gordon (1863-1937), architect for many imposing public buildings,
including at least one state capitol, submitted the award-winning
Romanesque design for this courthouse. The builders were George Dugan,
David Hughes, and Otto P. Kroeger. The foundation was laid in 1891,
and the structure was completed in 1896. Native Texas granite and
red sandstone are basic materials of the massive building. Towers
roofed in green tile and red tile, handsome columns and arches, carvings,
and many fine interior details gave the edifice great distinction.
Additions in 1914 and 1926 continued the use of Texas granite and
sandstone. Expansions in 1963, 1970, and 1973 employed other materials,
however, and also altered portions of the original design.
(1976) |
 |
The
restored Bexar County courthouse
The exterior now looks the way it did in 1927.
A restoration of the double height courtroom to its 1897 condition
was completed in January, 2015. A rededication of the courthouse was
held on July 14, 2015.
Photo courtesy Terry
Jeanson,, June 2015 |
Restoration
underway of the "rose windows" in the double height courtroom over
the front entrance.
Photo courtesy Terry
Jeanson, July 2014 |
The
courtroom windows after the restoration.
Photo courtesy Terry
Jeanson, August, 2015 |
The
1972 Gondeck addition on the southwest corner of the courthouse. A
portion of the 1963 Gondeck addition covering the west side entrance
can be seen behind it.
Photo courtesy Terry
Jeanson, July, 2012 |
SW
corner of the courthouse restored to its 1927 condition.
Photo courtesy Terry
Jeanson, July, 2015 |
A "human
fly" scales a balcony of the Bexar County Courthouse c.1926
Photo courtesy Institute of Texas Cultures, San Antonio |
| Postcard
c.1960 courtesy rootsweb.com/ %7Etxpstcrd/ |
Bexar County
Courthouseas as it appeared in 1898
Postcard courtesy rootsweb.com/ %7Etxpstcrd/ |
The courthouse
in 1910
Postcard courtesy rootsweb.com/ %7Etxpstcrd/ |
The
1892 Courthouse & the Cadena-Reeves Justice Center
Photo courtesy Barclay
Gibson, June 2003 |
The 1892 Courthouse
entrance
Note the Cadena-Reeves Justice Center
Photo
courtesy Barclay
Gibson, June 2003 |
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|
Bexar
County Courthouse interior
TE Photo, 2002 |
|
|
Courtroom door
TE Photo,
2002 |
The 1892 Bexar County Courthouse Courtroom
Photo courtesy Terry
Jeanson, August 2015 |
The
1892 Bexar County Courthouse Courtroom
Photo courtesy Terry
Jeanson, August 2015 |
L - Courthouse
tower
R - Columns
TE photos February 2002 |
Courthouse faces
TE photos February 2002 |
| Postcard
courtesy rootsweb.com/ %7Etxpstcrd/ |
The 1882 Bexar
County Courthouse
|
"A drawing
of the 1882 Bexar County courthouse in a display case at the courthouse.
The caption next to it said it was a drawing of the old courthouse,
but didn't give a year, so I am assuming it is the 1882 courthouse.
According to Sylvia Ann Santos of the Bexar County Historical Commission
the 1882 courthouse was an Alfred Giles remodeling of the Masonic
Building on Soledad Street."
- Terry
Jeanson, April 2007 photo |
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