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| Titus
County has technically had five courthouses.
Four of them built prior to 1870. The fifth (and current) courthouse
dates from 1895, although you'd never know it. Looking like a cross
between the Battleship
Texas and and a geometrically-challenged Mexican pyramid, the
Titus County Courthouse is one you'll never forget. |
The 1895 Titus
County courthouse today
Photo courtesy Terry
Jeanson, December 2006 |
Sometimes, facts need facing. Some buildings are just
plain ugly. To borrow a phrase from Susan DuQuesnay Bankston, some
buildings are so ugly "they'll wrinkle your pants if you walk in front
of them." The current Titus County Courthouse is one of these. Calling
it "The Ugliest Courthouse in Texas" is not done to be cruel - nor
is it just our opinion. The words spring involuntarily from the lips
of most first-time viewers. We've even heard it from several Titus
Countians, and in fact, its ugliness is sometimes bragged about.
Why are we writing about it? For one thing it's three hours to quitting
time and for another, people love an ugly-duckling story (even if
it's in reverse).
The building started out as a rather above-average building when it
was first built in 1895. If you think of courthouses as schoolgirls,
then the 1895 courthouse was the girl next door. Pretty, but not fancy.
It was a composite of typical contemporary designs. It wasn't a "wedding-cake"
courthouse and it wasn't ostentatious. |
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The 1895 design
Postcard circa 1909, courtesy THC |
The
primary purpose of a courthouse isn't to look good. It's to provide
a place for justice to be administered and to keep juries out of the
rain. And while we're on the subject of inclement weather, we'd like
to say that in Texas, it was a major factor in courthouse design.
After the first six or eight towers were blown off their moorings,
some counties got smart and voluntarily dismantled them before disaster
struck. By the time the Great Depression made it's appearance, many
courthouses in Texas had already been altered to the Moderne style
- which was in vogue at the time. Efficient and modern streamlining
= good. Ornamentation and decoration = bad. The Federal Government
needed to create make-work projects and what better place to start
a make-work project than in the center of town?
All across Texas Beaux-arts and Victorian masterpieces were dismantled
or destroyed to make way for the clean, sleek lines of Moderne and
Art Deco. Here in Titus County, however, the courthouse wasn't razed.
County commissioners figured it was easier and less costly to remove
just enough of the old so it could be covered by the new. |
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Titus County
Courthouse after the 1940 remodeling
Photo courtesy TXDoT, 1940 |
Another view
of the Titus County Courthouse in the 1940s
Photo courtesy THC |
| In
1940 the courthouse received the first of several remodelings. It
was new and shiny and people just knew that they would get used to
it - given enough time. |
Titus County
Courthouse and square in the 1940s
Postcard courtesy rootsweb.com/
%7Etxpstcrd/ |
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Then, in the early 1960s, when the country was in the
throes of "urban renewal" fever, another remodeling took place. This
nearly windowless design was completed by 1962 and had all the success
of an operation performed to correct bad plastic surgery. A third
remodeling was done in 1990 and by then this architectural Frankenstein
was gaining a statewide reputation. |
Titus County
Courthouse after the 1962 remodeling
Photo circa 1965, courtesy rootsweb.com/ %7Etxpstcrd/ |
| Oscar
Wilde once said "The one thing worse than being talked about - is
not being talked about" and so we're happy that Titus County has its
distinctive landmark. Perhaps the next time a make-work project is
needed, County Commissioners can peel off the layers of progress and
reveal a hardly-used beauty. |
The
current Ector County Courthouse encasing the 1938 courthouse
Postcard courtesy THC |
The
second ugliest courthouse in Texas? Our
survey isn't complete, but according to exit polls, the Ector
County Courthouse of Odessa is a front-runner.
Coincidentally, it is another "severely improved building" - an 1938
design encased under a new facade.
© John Troesser |
Titus
County Courthouse Update
The Bell Tower
by Bob
Bowman
("All Things Historical") |
|
In
the mid-1890s, as Titus County completed its fifth and present courthouse
at Mount Pleasant, county officials
hung a large bell in a tower atop the building.
As it tolled the hours and half-hours, the bell became a beloved fixture
in the town. From the bell’s sounds, people set their clocks, opened
their businesses and planned their schedules. |
The 1895 Titus
County Courthouse
Postcard circa 1909, courtesy THC |
| But
in 1940, the county removed the bell tower to add a fourth floor and
in the sixties slapped an aluminum skin on the courthouse, earning
it the title of “the ugliest courthouse in Texas.” |
Titus County
Courthouse after the 1940 remodeling
Postcard courtesy rootsweb.com/ %7Etxpstcrd/ |
Although
the bell no longer rang out the hours and half-hours, it was placed
behind a glass case on the first floor of the courthouse.
But, thanks to Claude Alexander and the Titus County Historical Commission,
the bell will soon ring again across Mount Pleasant’s courthouse square.
To build a new, free-standing bell tower and an electronic operating
system to ring the bell, the Commission and others are putting together
a $60,000 pot. County officials are putting up 42% of the cost, the
City of Mount Pleasant is paying 20%, and the remaining funds are
coming largely from engraved bricks.
To understand the bell tower project and the part that brick sales
has to do with it, one must first know a little history of the Titus
County courthouse.
The first courthouse was a log house built in 1847 on the present
courthouse square. The second courthouse was built in the early 1850’s
and the third came in the heels of the second in 1859 and lasted only
eight years.
The fourth courthouse was built after 1867, but burned just after
midnight on September 21, 1895. Local legend has it that a county
employee was trying to cover up something and did so by burning down
the whole building.
Luckily, the county had just finished a two-story fireproof vault.
The county clerk and a helper had carried an armload of records into
the vault after closing time on September 20, and all the remaining
records were to be moved into the vault the next morning.
The county’s records prior to 1895 were destroyed, but individuals
who had personal copies of deeds re-filed them with the county. |
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Titus County
Courthouse after the 1962 remodeling
Photo circa 1965, courtesy rootsweb.com/
%7Etxpstcrd/
|
After the county’s
ill-fated experience with aluminum siding in the sixties, the metal
skin was removed in the 1990s and the building was restored to its
1940s appearance--much to the relief of everyone.
If you’re interested in buying a brick for the bell tower, get in
touch with Claude Alexander at 903-572-2897.
All
Things Historical November
15, 2005 Column
(Distributed by the East Texas Historical Association. Bob Bowman
of Lufkin is a past president of the Association and the author of
more than 30 books about East Texas.) |
Titus County
Courthouse fire of 1895
"The
Titus County Courthouse fire of 1895 was not set by a employee to
cover anything up. It was set on fire to break one of the Belcher
boys out of jail for murder. They where my 4th great grandfather and
4th great uncle. They both ran to Oklahoma after that. This story
has been in our family for a long time. My mother knows the names
of the two who ran to Oklahoma.... I hope you can find this correction
useful on the courthouse fire of 1895." - Respectfully, Sgt,
Edward B. Carter, Platoon Leader, Delta Co., 2nd Battalion, 19th Regiment,
April 24, 2017 |
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