Simmons-Maxwell House
Denton, Denton County, Texas
Marker Inscription
This Arts and Crafts Mission Style home was built in 1915 by prominent civic leader, James W. Simmons, and his wife, Susan S. Gregg, granddaughter of Darius Gregg, Denton County pioneer and founder of Gregg Ranch. Reminiscent of the Greggs' heritage, the house is designed with an open floor plan, stucco walls, sunroom, pocket doors, a Mission-Style parapet, hemlock front door and leaded glass windows. Col. F.W. and Alice "Louise" Maxwell purchased the home in 1948. Col. Maxwell, wounded in the Battle of the Bulge, was a decorated veteran of WWI and WWII. Louise received the top service award from the American Red Cross for volunteer work from 1918-1958. RECORDED TEXAS HISTORIC LANDMARK - 2016
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Built in 1915 by civic leader James W. Simmons and his wife Susan—granddaughter of Denton County founder Darius Gregg—this Arts and Crafts Mission-style home reflects the era's taste for open plans, stucco walls, and leaded glass. In 1948 it passed to Colonel F.W. Maxwell, a decorated veteran of both World Wars who was wounded at the Battle of the Bulge, and his wife Louise, honored by the American Red Cross for four decades of volunteer service.
Why it matters
The house links Denton's pioneer founding families to the twentieth century's world wars and the home-front service that sustained them.
Own a business near here? Add it to the map.
Related people
- · James W. Simmons
- · Susan Gregg Simmons
- · F.W. Maxwell
- · Louise Maxwell
Related events
- · Battle of the Bulge
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Edna Westbrook Trigg in Denton County
Denton, TX
In 1915 Edna Westbrook Trigg became the first county home demonstration agent appointed in Texas, taking up her Denton County post the next February. For more than two decades she traveled the county teaching farm women gardening, canning, sewing, and household management, overcoming resistance to both government advice and a woman working in "a man's world." During World War I she pushed agricultural self-sufficiency, urged Liberty Bond purchases, and ran Saturday canning schools, even borrowing county funds to buy communal steam canners.
Beulah A. Harriss
Denton, TX
Beulah A. Harriss arrived in Denton from Nebraska in 1914 to become the first women's physical education teacher at the college that is now the University of North Texas. She coached its earliest women's athletic teams, organized its physical education department in 1918, and helped found the state and women's athletic associations that professionalized the field. She also started Texas's first Girl Scout troop in 1917 and devoted forty-six years to the youth of Denton before retiring in 1960.
Pioneer Woman
Denton, TX
This tribute honors the anonymous pioneer women who followed their families into the Texas frontier, meeting hardship and isolation with courage and quiet resourcefulness. Rather than commemorating one named figure, it celebrates the domestic and cultural labor — carrying homeland traditions into a raw new country — that sustained frontier settlement. The verse is credited to Jessie H. Humphries.
Annie Webb Blanton
Argyle, TX
Born in Houston in 1870, Annie Webb Blanton began teaching at 17 and rose to become an associate professor at North Texas State Normal College, where she wrote grammar textbooks used across the country. In 1916 she became the first woman president of the Texas State Teachers Association, and in 1918 she made history as the first woman elected to statewide office in Texas, serving as State Superintendent of Public Instruction. She later earned a doctorate, became a full professor, and helped found the Delta Kappa Gamma Society honoring women educators.