1894 Blanco County Jail

The jail served a town that fought fifteen years for the courthouse. In 1876 settlers along the Pedernales, among them James Polk Johnson, called an election to move the county seat closer to the center of the county and lost. They followed Johnson in founding a new town, on land he owned, where a post office opened in 1878. A petition for another election in 1879 also failed, but Johnson City kept growing with Johnson's two-story office building and hotel and the lots he gave for schools. A contested election in 1890 finally made it the county seat.

What the plaque says

1894 Blanco County Jail Noting the unhealthy dampness of the basement where prisoners were first kept after the Blanco County seat was moved to Johnson City, the commissioners court ordered the construction of this jail facility in 1893. Completed the following year, the jailhouse was built of limestone by J. E. L. (Kergie) Dildine (1853-1925), a rock mason who came to Blanco County from Kansas in the 1880s. Despite an 1897 jailbreak, the facility has continued in use, with interior modifications to meet state jail standards. Texas Sesquicentennial 1836-1986

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Lyndon B. Johnson National Historical Park — steps away
  The Johnson City district of the national park: the Victorian house where Lyndon Johnson grew up, and the stone barns his grandfather built in the Johnson Settlement.
• Pedernales Falls State Park — 10 mi
  The Pedernales stepping down over layered limestone east of Johnson City, a river that can turn from a placid stream to a torrent in minutes.
• Lyndon B. Johnson State Park and Historic Site — 13 mi
  A state park on the Pedernales opposite the LBJ Ranch, with a working Texas-German farm kept as it was around the First World War and the permit desk for the ranch tour.
• Luckenbach — 22 mi
  A store, saloon and dance hall on Grape Creek that a humorist bought in 1971, declared a free state of mind, and turned into a pilgrimage for Texas music.

More markers nearby

• Blanco County — steps away
• James Polk Johnson Building — steps away
• Dr. James F. Barnwell — steps away
• First Baptist Church of Johnson City — steps away