Tarrant County Courthouse
Fort Worth, Tarrant County, Texas
Marker Inscription
Designed by firm of Gunn & Curtis and built by the Probst Construction Company of Chicago, 1893-1895. This red Texas granite building, in Renaissance Revival style, closely resembles the Texas State Capital with the exception of the clock tower. The cost was $408,840 and citizens considered it such a public extravagance that a new County Commissioners' Court was elected in 1894.
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Built between 1893 and 1895 in red Texas granite, the Tarrant County Courthouse rose in the Renaissance Revival style, its designers deliberately echoing the Texas State Capitol save for the addition of a clock tower. Its $408,840 price tag struck many citizens as such an extravagance that voters turned out the County Commissioners' Court in 1894. The building nonetheless became an enduring civic landmark of Fort Worth as the city surged into the Gilded Age.
Why it matters
Grand county courthouses were statements of civic ambition in fast-growing Western cities, and the voter backlash here captures a very American tension between public grandeur and public thrift.
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