PALO PINTO COUNTY COURTHOUSE
County Seat - Palo Pinto, Texas

Palo Pinto County

Palo Pinto County has had three courthouses:
1857, 1882 and 1940

See Historical Marker

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Present Palo Pinto County Courthouse, Palo Pinto, Texas

The 1940 Palo Pinto County courthouse on US 180
Photo courtesy Terry Jeanson, April 2006

The Present Palo Pinto Courthouse

Date - 1940
Architect - Preston M. Geren and M. A. Howell
Style - Texas Renaissance
Material - Sandstone from the 1882 courthouse

Though not grandiose like the Romanesque courthouses built in the 1890s, this 1940 building has its own understated charm. It is an excellent example of a pre-War rural courthouse. With its brass doorknobs and eagle-encrusted light fixtures, if one was to imagine a young lawyer in a seersucker suit named Huey Piece Long defending an overall-clad client, then one would be horribly wrong. Huey Long never set foot in Palo Pinto County and besides he was killed before this courthouse was built.

Courthouses of Palo Pinto County Historical Marker on US 180
Photo courtesy Terry Jeanson, April 2006

Historical Marker

Courthouses of Palo Pinto County

Palo Pinto County was created in 1856 and named for a creek south of here that was perhaps named by Spanish explorers of the Brazos River Valley. The county seat of 320 acres was surveyed at its geographical center and was originally named Golconda.

A court session in 1857 called for the first courthouse to be built of wood frame construction, with two doors and three windows. The contract was awarded to a bid of $300. Shortly after, in 1859, the town name was changed to Palo Pinto.

In 1882, just after the Texas Legislature allowed counties to issue bonds for new courthouses, a large sandstone structure was built. It cost $35,000 and exhibited Second Empire styling with a central clock tower. A two story sandstone annex was added in 1906 and connected to the courthouse by an iron bridge. Sandstone for the buildings was quarried south of the city.

In 1940 these buildings were demolished and a new courthouse was erected by Work Projects Administration workers. The reinforced-concrete structure featured subtle classical detail and was clad with some of the sandstone from the old buildings. It was completed in 1942 at a cost of $250,000.
(1986)