Site of John Bremond & Company

The family's homes still stand a few blocks west. The Bremond Block, bounded by West Seventh, West Eighth, Guadalupe and San Antonio streets, holds six houses built or enlarged for the families of brothers Eugene and John Bremond. The most admired is the 1886 Second Empire John Bremond house at Seventh and Guadalupe, with a crested mansard roof, polychrome slate and a cast-iron gallery. Walter Bremond's limestone house gained its mansard addition in 1887, and Pierre Bremond's tan-brick house of 1898 was the last of the series. The block is a National Register district.

What the plaque says

Site of John Bremond & Company New York native John Bremond (1813-1866) built a dry goods store at this site as early as 1847. Soon, his dry goods department faced Pecan (Sixth) Street, and the grocery department faced Brazos Street. Active civically, he served as a member of the group that encouraged the eventual construction of the Houston & Texas Central Railway, which was associated with Bremond's brother Paul. John Bremond, a former firefighter, was instrumental in establishing Austin's first hook and ladder company. His sons Eugene and John, Jr., who were also active in the city's firefighting, joined him as business partners in 1865, forming John Bremond & Company. After their father's death the next year, the sons continued the business. In a back room of the store, Eugene operated a private loan operation that would become the State National Bank, or "Bremond's Bank." He sold his share of the family business in 1870 but continued operating the bank, which received its charter in 1882. John, Jr. Then made his brother-in-law, John H. Robinson, Jr., a partner. The John Henry Robinson family, proprietors of the J.H. Robinson & Son General Merchandise Store on Congress Avenue, was closely linked to the Bremonds, with three marriages among the children. The Bremonds' store continued, shifting to wholesale operations after the railroad came to Austin in 1871. In 1905, it became one of the early companies to roast, grind and distribute its own coffee, eventually shipping its products across the state. The business moved a few blocks away in 1924 and finally closed its doors in 1967. At the time it was demolished in 1979, the two-story limestone building was reportedly the oldest commercial structure in Austin. (2003)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Texas State Capitol — 0.5 mi
  Austin's fourth statehouse, a Renaissance Revival capitol of 1888 that stands 311 feet to its Goddess of Liberty and was restored after the 1983 fire.
• French Legation State Historic Site — 0.6 mi
  A raised pine house built in 1840 and 1841 for France's envoy to the Republic of Texas, who left Austin in a rage over a neighbor's pigs before it was finished.
• Bullock Texas State History Museum — 0.9 mi
  The state's history museum at the head of Congress Avenue, built around the hull of La Salle's ship La Belle, raised from Matagorda Bay with 1.8 million artifacts.
• Texas State Cemetery — 0.9 mi
  A hill east of the Capitol that began with one general's grave in 1851 and now holds Stephen F. Austin, governors, Barbara Jordan and more than 2,000 Confederate veterans and widows.

More markers nearby

• Site of the Official Residence of Mirabeau B. Lamar — steps away
• Organization of First Protestant Worship in Austin — steps away
• Original Site of First Methodist Church of Austin — steps away
• Texas and the Civil War State Military Board — steps away