Site of the Town of Runnels
Ballinger, Runnels County, Texas
Marker Inscription
First county seat of Runnels County. Established in 1880 as Runnels City. Declined after removal of the county seat to Ballinger in 1888.
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Established in 1880 as Runnels City, this settlement served as the first seat of Runnels County during the early years of West Texas ranching and settlement. When the county government moved to Ballinger in 1888, the town lost its reason for being and faded away.
Why it matters
Runnels is another vanished frontier county seat, a reminder that in settling West Texas the location of the courthouse often decided a town's survival.
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Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Sylvester Adams
Ballinger, TX
Sylvester Adams came to Texas as a young man and threw himself behind the Confederate cause, serving at Galveston during the Civil War. Afterward he helped organize Runnels County and became its first county judge, serving in the 1880s. When drought struck in 1886–1887 he worked to arrange relief, even as many proud residents refused what they saw as charity.
St. Mary, Star of the Sea, Catholic Church
Ballinger, TX
Catholic worship reached the west Texas town of Ballinger through traveling missionaries who used a church built in 1895. In 1910 this Gothic Revival sanctuary was completed under the Rev. J. B. Frigon, built of native rock quarried nearby by local craftsmen. Its single square tower and three-part facade have made it a landmark of the Runnels County plains.
Site of Pickettville
Ballinger, TX
Founded in 1862, Pickettville was the first civilian settlement in Runnels County, named for the picket houses and corrals its frontier families built. Ranching households — the Guests, the Wylie brothers and their hands, the Gordons, and the Coffeys — banded together for protection amid the Indian raids that intensified during the Civil War. In 1866 they drove their cattle off to open range, and their old picket corrals later held the herds of trail drivers passing through.
Runnels County
Ballinger, TX
Carved from Bexar and Travis counties, Runnels County was created in 1858 and formally organized in 1880. It honors Hiram G. Runnels, a lawyer, Mississippi governor, and later Texas legislator. Its first county seat was Runnels City, but that role passed to Ballinger in 1888.