Jim Wells County Courthouse
Alice, Jim Wells County, Texas
Marker Inscription
Governor Oscar B. Colquitt signed legislation creating Jim Wells County on March 11, 1911. Taken from territory formerly a part of Nueces County, the new county was named for prominent Brownsville attorney and business leader James B. Wells, Jr. (1850-1923). The first county elections were held two months later, and in January 1912 the citizens of the new county approved a bond election to finance the construction of a courthouse and jail. The county commissioners hired San Antonio architect Atlee B. Ayers to design the courthouse. The laying of the cornerstone on July 25, 1912, drew a crowd of more than 2,000 people. Celebration activities included performances by the Alice Concert Band and the Alice Symphony Club, as well as a barbecue, rodeo events, and baseball game. The discovery of oil in Jim Wells County in 1938 led to increased economic development and a population boom. The courthouse was remodeled in 1948-1949, and annexes later were built nearby. Although its original appearance has been altered, the Jim Wells County Courthouse stands as a significant structure in the county's history. It continues to serve as the center of county government. (1992)
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
After Jim Wells County was created in 1911 from Nueces County territory—named for Brownsville attorney James B. Wells, Jr.—voters approved bonds for a courthouse, and San Antonio architect Atlee B. Ayers drew the design. The 1912 cornerstone-laying drew a crowd of more than two thousand for a barbecue, rodeo, and baseball game. The 1938 discovery of oil brought an economic and population boom, and though later remodeling altered its look, the courthouse remains the seat of county government.
Why it matters
The courthouse charts a young South Texas county's arc from ranching frontier to oil-boom prosperity, all centered on the civic square.
Own a business near here? Add it to the map.
Related people
- · James B. Wells
- · Atlee B. Ayers
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
McGill Brothers Building
Alice, TX
Sons of a Mississippi family, the McGill brothers built one of South Texas's notable ranching operations, purchasing the Santa Rosa Ranch in 1916 and rising to lead the Southwestern Cattle Raisers Association. In 1941 Frank McGill erected this office building for the family's ranching enterprise, reportedly patterning it after San Antonio's Alamo, which had impressed him on a visit. With its corbelled stone parapet and Greek touches, it later passed to a museum corporation as a South Texas landmark.
Duval County
San Diego, TX
Created by the legislature in 1858 and organized in 1879, Duval County took shape as settlers arrived — first from Mexico in the mid-19th century, then Anglo pioneers in the 1860s — building an economy on ranching and farming. The railroad's arrival in the late 1870s swelled population and employment, and the early-1900s discovery of oil, gas, and uranium brought a fresh wave of settlement. Its layered history reflects the blended cultures and resource booms of South Texas.
Cattle Drives from South Texas
Corpus Christi, TX
By 1840 tens of thousands of wild longhorns roamed the brush country between the Rio Grande and the Gulf, so plentiful they were nearly worthless to the Texans who owned them. Ranchers began trailing small herds toward distant markets — New Orleans, Missouri, Ohio, even California and Chicago — but the real boom came after the Civil War, when hungry Northern cities and advancing railroads finally made the long drives pay. Feeder trails near here fed the great Chisholm and Dodge City routes to the Kansas railheads, and by 1880 some four million head had gone up the trail.
Near Site of Hide and Tallow Plant ( King Ranch, 1866-69)
Kingsville, TX
Capt. Richard King launched this hide-and-tallow works in 1866 to help his ranch recover economically after the Civil War. With beef herds worth little at distant markets, King salvaged value from cull animals by rendering their tallow for soap and saving their hides for leather, boiling the fat in iron vats eighteen feet long on Santa Gertrudis Creek. The plant ran only a few years, but its vats lingered for half a century, and the site is still called "Matanza" — slaughter — pasture, worked today by descendants of the original hands.