Grierson-Sproul House
Fort Davis, Jeff Davis County, Texas
Marker Inscription
This masonry residence resembles other buildings in the community, including several officer’s quarters at the military post of Fort Davis. Completed in 1908 by B. H. Grierson Jr., the house incorporates pink volcanic rock known as tuff that exemplifies early 20th century construction. In 1912, a fire destroyed much of the structure, but local rancher and County Sheriff Franklin Sproul directed the restoration of the home. It is due in large part to the Sproul family that the residence became a center for community activities. The home now serves as an architectural link to the military and agricultural history of West Texas. RECORDED TEXAS HISTORIC LANDMARK – 2016
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Completed in 1908 by B. H. Grierson Jr., this masonry home was built of local pink volcanic tuff, echoing the officers' quarters at the nearby military post of Fort Davis. After fire gutted it in 1912, rancher and county sheriff Franklin Sproul rebuilt the house, and under the Sproul family it became a gathering place at the heart of community life in this West Texas town.
Why it matters
The house links the region's military garrison and ranching frontier in a single building, showing how a former army post shaped the civilian community that grew up around it.
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Related people
- · B. H. Grierson Jr.
- · Franklin Sproul
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Trueheart House
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Built about 1898 in native stone, adobe, and milled wood, this fine Queen Anne house served as a summer home for the Galveston real-estate investor Henry Trueheart and his family. They came each year to escape the coastal heat and enjoy the cool, healthful climate of the Davis Mountains, keeping the house until 1920.
First Baptist Church of Fort Davis
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Reverends L. R. Millican and D. B. Rose gathered six charter members into this Baptist congregation in 1896, high in the mountains of far West Texas near Fort Davis. For years the Baptists shared buildings with local Methodists and Presbyterians, worshiped in a converted skating rink and theater, and finally raised a traditional church in 1942. The congregation sent missionaries into Mexico and remained woven into community life for more than a century.
Jeff Davis County Courthouse
Fort Davis, TX
Erected in 1910–1911 to replace the county's original 1880 adobe courthouse, this Classical Revival building was designed by the Dallas firm of L. L. Thurman and Co. and built by a Louisville, Kentucky, contractor. A massive Doric portico fronts the concrete-and-stone structure, whose walls show alternating bands of locally quarried pink rusticated stone beneath a Beaux Arts clock tower fitted with a Seth Thomas timepiece. More than a century on, it still serves as the seat of Jeff Davis County government.
Jeff Davis County Jail
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The town of Fort Davis grew up around the U.S. Army post established in 1854 to guard travelers on the San Antonio–El Paso Road, and it served as a county seat for both Presidio and, from 1887, Jeff Davis County. This crenellated, fortress-style jail was built in 1910–1911 alongside a new courthouse, designed by Dallas architect L.L. Thurman and disguised in scored plaster to resemble cut ashlar stone. Divided into an office, kitchen, jailer's quarters, and cell block, it held prisoners until 1978.