| |
Caldwell
County Courthouse
©2007 Bill Morgan. All
rights reserved
CALDWELL COUNTY - Every time I drive through
Lockhart I make it a point to circle the courthouse, which is no hardship since
it's one block off the highway. In my opinion the courthouse at Lockhart and
its renovated twin about 140 miles to the southeast at Goliad rank among Alfred
Giles' masterpieces. Or not.
Giles was a proper English gentleman who
migrated to South Texas and built nine courthouses that still stand. Probably
his most memorable -- at least in his mind -- was the one he designed for
Gillespie County. Giles' design won him a $50 bonus, which helped make up for
his losses when his stagecoach from San Antonio was stopped and robbed on one
of his trips to the building site.
He also figured in one of the more
confusing Texas courthouse episodes. First, Giles was credited with designing
the Lockhart and Goliad landmarks, then credit went to his architectural firm
and now that may even be a stretch because the architect who designed the two
buildings wasn’t working for Giles when he designed them. For more
particulars on this bit of courthouse history, stay on my website and flip over
to the “Odds and Ends” section, then down near the end read the
section under the headline “Artists in Brick, Stone and Mortar.”
Almost every time I drive through Lockhart, I make it a point to stop
at one of Texas' best barbecue spots. That's more of a hardship because
Lockhart has three of them--Black's, Chisholm Trail and Kreuz Market. I heard
about them for years before I got the chance to try them all. So when I was in
town for a couple of days to sketch the courthouse and research county history,
I decided to rely on local knowledge. After all, who would have a better feel
for the best barbecue in Lockhart than somebody who lives in Lockhart?
The results were accurate, if not particularly helpful -- the verdict was that
one has the best potato salad, another has the best ribs and the third has the
best links. Where's the beef? It was agreed that all three serve a great
brisket. It's hard to argue with the experts around Lockhart. And when you have
three barbecue meals in a row in Lockhart, you find yourself wishing the town
had a fourth.
I learned to appreciate the Central Texas barbecue belt
in the early 1950s, before anybody thought of giving it that self-promoting
name. I was working on the newspaper in Gonzales, which on good days we got out
shortly after noon. A few days each week, the printers, the ad salesman and I
walked about 50 feet down the alley behind the paper office and in the back
door of the grocery store. A large, old German gentleman with a big red face
ran the butcher shop just inside the back door. He barbecued on a half-barrel
grill beside the refrigerated meat display case. We'd point to the cut of
barbecue we wanted and he'd hand it to us on white butcher paper, along with a
couple slices of white bread and a slice of pickle. We'd go up front and fish a
cold soda pop out of a No. 10 washtub, pay our tab, head out the back door and
dine al fresco in the alley.
My cardiologist would scream at that kind
of diet today; in 1953 he'd have been out in the alley chowing down with the
rest of us.
Buy A Print
11x17 prints
on sturdy stock of the Caldwell County Courthouse are available on my ordering
page. The cost is $20 for the first print and $16 for additional prints of
this, or any of the other 11 courthouses, purchased at the same time. (Add $3
for shipping) |
|
|
