Site of Haynie-Cook House
Austin, Travis County, Texas
Marker Inscription
In 1852, noted Austin architect Abner Cook (1814-1884) built a home here for Dr Samuel Garner Haynie (1806-1877), who was elected Mayor of Austin four times (1850, 1851, 1863, and 1864). Cook, who was also working on the 1852-1854 Texas State Capitol around the same time, built the house with a Federal design, containing Greek Revival elements, The front façade featured a two-story portico with a pair of fluted Ionic columns flanked by outer Doric piers. Because of financial difficulties, Haynie was forced to sell the house to Cook shortly after its completion. The Cook family moved into the home by 1860 and lived there until Cook’s widow, Eliza (Logan) sold the property to former Austin Mayor Leander Brown in 1885. Brown occupied the home until he subdivided and sold the block in 1889. The Haynie-Cook House was eventually rolled on logs to the southern half of the block, Fannie M. Andrews operated a shop out of it from 1910 to 1953. The northern half of the block was obtained by Joseph Nalle around 1903; his son, Ernest, built a home on the site and lived there until World War I. Nelson Philips, associate justice of the Supreme Court of Texas, lived in the house from 1914 until 1920, when Nalle returned to the home. In 1933, Judge John H. Sharp, Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of Texas, bought the property. By 1953 both the Haynie-Cook Home and Nalle-Sharp House were demolished. The Lumbermen’s Association acquired this property for the Westgate, a residential-office high-rise designed in 1962. Today, the property remains a focal point of downtown Austin. (2010)
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
In 1852 the noted Austin architect Abner Cook—then also at work on the new Texas State Capitol—built a Federal-style home here for Dr. Samuel Garner Haynie, four-time mayor of Austin. Financial trouble soon forced Haynie to sell to Cook, and over the following century the house passed through the hands of mayors, state supreme court justices, and shopkeepers before being rolled on logs to make way for new development. Both it and the neighboring Nalle-Sharp House were demolished by 1953, and a mid-century high-rise rose in their place.
Why it matters
The site traces the layered evolution of downtown Austin, from the elegant homes of the young state capital's leaders to the office towers of the modern city.
Own a business near here? Add it to the map.
Related people
- · Abner Cook
- · Samuel Garner Haynie
- · Leander Brown
- · Nelson Phillips
- · John H. Sharp
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Original Site of First Baptist Church of Austin
Austin, TX
The First Baptist Church of Austin was organized in July 1847 by the Rev. R. H. Taliaferro, worshiping at first inside the Capitol and in borrowed frame buildings in the young frontier capital. The congregation built its first sanctuary on this site in 1857, remodeled it in the 1880s, and replaced it with a larger brick church in 1916. Many governors and prominent Austin families worshiped here before the congregation moved in 1970.
Henry Smith
Austin, TX
Henry Smith arrived in Texas in 1827 and quickly became a political leader in the Brazoria area as tensions with Santa Anna's centralist government mounted. In late 1835 he authored the plan for a provisional government and was elected the first provisional governor of Texas, serving through the eve of the revolution. He later held office in the Republic before joining the California Gold Rush, where he died in 1851 and was buried in an unmarked grave.
Site of Second Travis County Courthouse and Walton Building
Austin, TX
Built in 1875, the second Travis County Courthouse was a massive three-story Victorian limestone building whose fortress-like jail once held the writer William Sidney Porter, later famous as O. Henry, when he returned to Austin in 1897 to face embezzlement charges. The county traded away its long lease in 1931, the courthouse was demolished, and state offices moved in under the name Walton Building. That structure was itself razed in 1964.
The First Austin Capitol of the Republic of Texas
Austin, TX
This site marks where, in 1839, the young Republic of Texas built its first capitol after choosing the raw frontier settlement of Austin as its seat of government. Named for Stephen F. Austin, the new capital rose on the edge of Comanche country, a bold bet that a permanent government could take root in the Texas hill country. The modest early statehouse anchored a town that would grow into one of America's major capitals.