Homesite of Barry Benefield

Benefield's road out of Jefferson ran through Austin. He entered the University of Texas in 1898, won the Cactus short story prize in 1900-01 and graduated in 1902. After a year at the Dallas Morning News he moved to New York, worked for the Times, and later edited books for the Century Company. Fox bought the film rights to The Chicken-Wagon Family before it was published, and Woman's Home Companion paid $10,000 for the serial rights to Bugles in the Night. After his wife died in 1960 he sold their house and moved home to live with his sister.

What the plaque says

Homesite of Barry Benefield (May 12, 1877 - Sept. 22, 1971) Born while Jefferson was a dominant East Texas city, Barry Benefield learned well the character and lore of this region while working at his father's wagon yard, located beside this 1860s house the family had purchased in 1897. Upon his graduation from the University of Texas, Benefield became a journalist and later a novelist. Two of his works, "Chicken Wagon Family" (1925) and "Valiant Is the Word for Carrie" (1935), were made into movies and gave international fame to Jefferson. In retirement, Benefield again lived in this house until his death at the age of 94. (1984)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Jefferson Historical Museum — 0.2 mi
  A four-floor museum in Jefferson's 1888-90 federal post office and courthouse, with rooms for African-American history, Jewish heritage, the Caddo and Diamond Bessie, bought by the historical society in 1965 for $8,100.
• Excelsior House Hotel — 0.3 mi
  A brick-and-timber hotel at 211 West Austin that began as a river captain's boarding house in 1858 and was revived by a garden club in 1959, and still takes guests with rosewood furniture.
• Caddo Lake State Park — 11 mi
  A Civilian Conservation Corps park on the Texas shore of Caddo Lake, where the Caddo told of a lake made by wind-driven water and visitors now paddle Big Cypress Bayou past moss-hung bald cypress.
• Caddo Lake National Wildlife Refuge — 12 mi
  Wetlands and woods on part of a former ammunition plant, now a refuge for wood ducks, prothonotary warblers and alligator snapping turtles, with four easy trails and a free visitor center on a Ramsar lake.

More markers nearby

• George Webster Smith — steps away
• Sterne Fountain — 0.2 mi
• First Texas Artificial Gas Plant — 0.2 mi
• Captain William Perry — 0.2 mi