Earle-Harrison House
Waco, McLennan County, Texas
Marker Inscription
Built in 1858-59, this handsome Greek revival house symbolized culture to early Waco, although only half was ever completed. Local post oak, plantation-made brick, cypress siding, and heart pine flooring were used by the builder, an unknown shipwright. Owner B. W. Earle, a physician, died in 1859, but his wife Eliza Earle lived and entertained here for years. Her brother, Gen. Thos. Harrison, a Civil War veteran and lawyer, bought it in 1872.
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Rising on the young frontier town of Waco just before the Civil War, this Greek Revival house announced that culture had arrived on the Texas prairie—even though only half of the ambitious design was ever finished. Built from local post oak, plantation-made brick, cypress, and heart pine by an unnamed shipwright, it passed from the widow of physician B. W. Earle to her brother, a Confederate general and lawyer, in 1872.
Why it matters
The house captures how antebellum Texans imported Southern architectural refinement to a raw frontier, and how such homes carried families straight through the rupture of the Civil War.
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Related people
- · B. W. Earle
- · Eliza Earle
- · Gen. Thomas Harrison
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Waco
Waco, TX
Founded in 1849 and named for the Waco Indians who had lived along the Brazos, the city grew from a frontier settlement into a hub of Central Texas. In the Civil War it sent men to both state frontier defense and the Confederate Army and counted five Confederate generals among its residents. Today it anchors the region as home to Baylor University, Paul Quinn College, and the Heart O'Texas Fair.
Earle-Napier-Kinnard House
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This Waco house grew in stages across turbulent decades: John Baylis Earle built its first two rooms in the 1850s and, in a mill raised in 1861, manufactured uniforms for the Confederacy. The main house followed in 1868 for the Napier family, newly arrived from Alabama, and a Napier daughter lived here until 1957.
General Richard Harrison
Waco, TX
Richard Harrison was one of three brothers — great-grand-nephews of President William Henry Harrison — who each rose to the rank of general in the Confederate Army during the Civil War. A physician and statesman before his service, he won his commission in Mississippi in 1865, then moved to Texas in 1866 to join his brothers near Waco. There he practiced medicine, farmed, helped rebuild the shattered postwar economy, and served as a trustee of Waco University, a forebear of Baylor.
Samuel Johan Forsgard
Waco, TX
Born in Sweden in 1828, Samuel Johan Forsgard joined the first wave of Swedish immigration to Texas in 1855 and settled in Waco, where he opened a bakery, restaurant, and confectionery. He served in the Confederate Army during the Civil War, then returned to business, patented farming equipment, and helped establish a sporting goods company. Over more than fifty years he became a well-known figure in the city's 19th-century growth.