1848 Denton County Seat

The Handbook of Texas records the grievances behind the last move. In 1856 residents complained that Alton was not in the center of the county, that standing pools in Hickory Creek were making families sick and that the town had developed poorly. That November, voters accepted a 100-acre offer for a new seat. The first seat, Pinckneyville, about a mile southeast of Denton's present center, never got a courthouse, and from 1848 the legal seat was the home of W. C. Baines, the only person living in Alton.

What the plaque says

1848 Denton County Seat Originally part of the Republic of Texas' Fannin County, Denton County was established in 1846, when the first legislature of the State of Texas created and organized thirty-one new counties. Efforts to colonize the area eventually resulted in Denton becoming the county seat in 1857. Before Denton the county had three other seats. In 1846, Pinckneyville was established in the geographic center of the county, however, many early settlers were located further southeast. The seat was moved in 1848 to the first Alton, which was on a ridge between present-day Pecan and Hickory Creeks, four miles south of Denton, near Corinth. The name was chosen by early settlers, brothers Enoch and Lorenzo Moore, who were from Alton, Illinois. William Creth Baines, the only resident of the town of Alton, used his home as the legal Denton County Seat. A post office was established in 1848, with Stephen A. Venters as the first postmaster. A well was dug at the site of the first Alton but was dry. Because of the problems associated with the lack of water, the town was moved in 1851 to the area of the residence of Alexander E. Cannon on Hickory Creek. This second Alton is now known as Old Alton. The new site drew water from nearby Hickory Creek and by 1855, had at least two stores, a post office and a hotel. In 1857, on the behest of citizens who were unhappy with the progress of Alton, the county seat was moved to a more central location in present-day Denton. Denton County voters accepted an offer from Hiram Cisco, William Loving and William Woodruff to provide 100 acres of property for a new county seat. The new town, near the center of the county, was named Denton in 1857. Nearby is the supposed site of the dry well of the first Alton site. (2016)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Denton County Courthouse-on-the-Square — 5.5 mi
  An 1896 courthouse by W. C. Dodson in Denton limestone, pink granite and two sandstones, restored in 2004, now a free county museum on a lawn holding the grave of John B. Denton.
• Fort Worth Stockyards — 29 mi
  The brick-street cattle market where Armour and Swift built packing plants in 1902, now a National Register district with a Coliseum, a museum and a longhorn drive twice a day.

More markers nearby

• Swisher Cemetery — 3.0 mi
• Chinn's Chapel Methodist Church — 4.7 mi
• Saint James African Methodist Episcopal Church — 5.2 mi
• John B. Denton — 5.5 mi