J. W. and Ruth Baines House
Fredericksburg, Gillespie County, Texas
Marker Inscription
J.W. and Ruth Baines House Joseph W. and Ruth (Huffman) Baines, maternal grandparents of President Lyndon Baines Johnson, built their home here in 1904, following Joseph's service in the Civil War and a career as a journalist, Texas Secretary of State, legislator and attorney. The couple used prefabricated cement blocks, made locally by Hugo and Henry Basse, and known as Basse Blocks, on the exterior of the home. Other features include a gabled dormer with paired windows above the entryway, jigsawn fretwork and turned columns. The widowed Ruth sold the home in 1907, the same year daughter Rebekah wed Sam Johnson. Recorded Texas Historic Landmark - 2002
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Joseph W. Baines and his wife Ruth built this home in 1904 after a career that spanned Civil War service, journalism, and posts as Texas Secretary of State, legislator, and attorney. They faced the exterior with locally made "Basse Blocks" of prefabricated cement and dressed it with a gabled dormer, jigsawn fretwork, and turned columns. Ruth sold the house in 1907, the same year her daughter Rebekah married Sam Johnson—a union that would produce President Lyndon Baines Johnson.
Why it matters
As the home of LBJ's maternal grandparents, it roots one of America's most consequential presidents in the Texas Hill Country and the frontier statesmen who shaped his family.
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Related people
- · Joseph W. Baines
- · Ruth Huffman Baines
- · Rebekah Baines Johnson
- · Sam Johnson
- · Lyndon Baines Johnson
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
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Once crossed by the trails of roving Indian peoples, these Hill Country lands were settled by German immigrant pioneers in 1846, with a group of Mormons founding Zodiac the next year. The county was created and organized in 1848 and named for Richard Addison Gillespie, a Texas frontier defender and Mexican War captain who was killed at the Battle of Monterrey in 1846. Fredericksburg became its seat.
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When Gillespie County's commissioners hired San Antonio architect Alfred Giles to raise this native-limestone courthouse in 1881–82, they were giving civic permanence to a frontier German-Texan community barely a generation old. Its careful symmetry made it the county's second and grandest courthouse, serving justice until 1939 before a gift from the McDermotts restored it as a library and community hall. The stone itself, quarried nearby, ties the building to the Hill Country landscape it governed.