Original Old Rock Courthouse Cornerstone
Benjamin, Knox County, Texas
Marker Inscription
Erected in Benjamin in 1891, when the officials of Knox County were: J.J. Truscott - judge; W.H. Benedict, T.P. Reeder, J.A. Spinks, G.B. Stewart, commissioners; T.D. Isbell - sheriff. Rock structure, replacing wooden courthouse of 1886, was in use until 1935. (1967)
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
This cornerstone comes from the rock courthouse erected in Benjamin in 1891, when Judge J. J. Truscott and a handful of commissioners governed newly settled Knox County. The stone building replaced a wooden courthouse of 1886 and served the county until 1935. It survives as a tangible fragment of the county's first permanent seat of government.
Why it matters
Courthouses were the first monumental public buildings on the West Texas frontier, and this cornerstone records the moment a raw settlement organized itself into a functioning county.
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Related people
- · J. J. Truscott
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Knox County
Benjamin, TX
Created in 1858, reconstituted in 1876, and finally organized in 1886, this county honors General Henry Knox, the Continental Army's chief of artillery and the nation's first Secretary of War. A hero of the Revolution, Knox lent his name to a county on the distant Texas frontier long after his death. Benjamin serves as its county seat.
The Narrows
Benjamin, TX
This ridge is a continental divide, separating waters that flow to the Wichita and on to the Mississippi from those that feed the Brazos toward the Gulf. Rich in buffalo grass, springs, and wild mustangs, "The Narrows" was prized hunting country crossed by the Comanche, Wichita, Kiowa, Apache, Seminole, and Tonkawa, whose camps and battle sites are still found here. Later settlers followed the same worn paths, and today its canyons serve the ranches around them.
First Christian Church
Knox City, TX
Organized in 1907 under board chairman Sam Anderson, this congregation first met in the local schoolhouse until its own church was built in 1909, with W. C. Wright called as its first minister. It stands as the oldest church building in Knox City still in continuous use. The little sanctuary reflects the founding of civic and religious life in a young West Texas town.
Josselet Switch
Haskell, TX
Belgian immigrant Victor Josselet joined his brothers in coming to America in 1873, working as Chicago coal miners before farming in Texas, and in 1900 bought a large tract near Haskell to ranch and raise a family of nine. When the Wichita Valley Railroad reached Haskell in 1906, Josselet sold the line a strip for a siding, and "Josselet Switch" became an important cattle-shipping point to the Fort Worth and Kansas City stockyards. The switch gained a depot, store, and fuel station, and much of the original land is still worked by his descendants.