Site of Third County Courthouse

Before this building, Young County held court days in vacant rooms and small buildings, and in 1876 a two-story frame courthouse went up on the west side of the square. The Handbook of Texas describes the 1884 replacement as three stories of limestone and notes that its east door still stands in the middle of the square. The county it served had swung widely in population: 592 people, including ninety-three enslaved, in 1860; thirty-one enslaved people on the 1864 tax rolls; just 139 residents in 1870; and 4,709 by 1880, when 463 farms covered more than 94,000 acres.

What the plaque says

Young County was organized in 1856 with Belknap designated as county seat. After retreat of frontier troops during Civil War, county records were moved to Jacksboro 1865 during renewed Indian trouble. County was reorganized 1874 with Graham, county seat. Courthouse (of which only archway remains) was built 1884. Native sandstone for the two-story structure was quarried east of Graham by Irish workers. N. J. Rosenquist, a native of Sweden and builder of Texas courthouses, was chief stonemason. Building had two halls in form of Greek cross--a plan that followed points of the compass. (Archway belonged to east hall.) Officials at the time of construction were: County Judge, R. F.Arnold; Treasurer, J. W. Wadley; County Clerk, C. O. Joline; Tax Assessor, J. G. Hill; County Attorney, J. A. Woolfolk; Sheriff, W. T. Bunger; County Commissioners, W. C. Blakey, J. J. Hughes, J. . Mercer and H. D. Williams. Courthouse was razed in 1932 after completion of present structure. A. A. Morrison, fire marshal, led efforts to preserve historic archway during street improvements in 1936. During its existence, this Courthouse witnessed and preserved the records of many historic events of Young County. (1969)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Old Post Office Museum and Art Center — steps away
  Graham's 1936 Art Moderne post office, with a New Deal mural by Alexandre Hogue inside, now the free museum of Young County in the town where the Texas cattle raisers first organized.
• Fort Belknap — 9.3 mi
  The 1851 northern anchor of the first Texas frontier forts, on the Brazos below Newcastle, a Butterfield stop and the post beside the Brazos Reservation until its people were driven out in 1859.
• Fort Richardson State Park and Historic Site — 27 mi
  The northernmost post of the Texas frontier line, outside Jacksboro, where a stone hospital and six other buildings stand from 1867 and a later Guard unit became the Lost Battalion.

More markers nearby

• First National Bank in Graham — steps away
• An 1890 Bank Building — steps away
• Morrison Funeral Home — steps away
• Cattle Raisers Association Oak — steps away