Fanthorp Inn

The inn the plaque dates to 1834 had its latest overhaul in 2023 and 2024. The Texas Historical Commission closed it in the fall of 2023 while Phoenix 1 Restoration and Construction replaced the siding with cypress boards cut to historic sizes, reset the original Fanthorp window glass and refinished the doors. Under the old boards the crew found notes left by the 1986 restorers, one reading "Hello future man." Panels now show nineteenth-century graffiti found in the work, all seven hotel rooms are open to view, and an 1850 Kirkman cottage piano stands in the dining hall.

What the plaque says

Fanthorp Inn Built in 1834 by Henry Fanthorp as a home for his bride, Rachel Kennard. Enlarged for hotel purpose. Served as first mercantile establishment and first post office (1835) in the region. Here Kenneth Lewis Anderson, vice-president of the Republic of Texas, died July 3, 1845. Stage lines from Houston to Old Springfield and Nacogdoches to Austin crossed here.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Fanthorp Inn State Historic Site — steps away
  A cedar-log dogtrot cabin of 1834 on the road through Anderson that grew into a seventeen-room inn and post office for travelers of the Republic, kept by one family until 1976.
• Navasota — 9.0 mi
  A railroad and cotton town where the La Bahia Road crossed the Navasota River, scarred by an 1865 explosion and yellow fever, and the home ground of the songster Mance Lipscomb.
• Star of the Republic Museum — 15 mi
  A star-shaped museum of the Republic of Texas years, 1836 to 1846, built at Washington-on-the-Brazos after a Brenham campaign and opened on March 1, 1970.
• Washington-on-the-Brazos State Historic Site — 15 mi
  The townsite on the Brazos where delegates met in a cold, unfinished hall in March 1836 to declare Texas independent, with Independence Hall rebuilt and Anson Jones's Barrington farm worked as in 1850.

More markers nearby

• Michael Moore Kennard — steps away
• Kenneth Lewis Anderson — steps away
• Orphans Friend Lodge No. 17 Ancient Free & Accepted Masons — 0.4 mi
• In Memory of Colonel Benjamin Fort Smith and All Other Pioneers — 0.4 mi