The Original Building of Tivy School

The school's best-known pupil came to Kerrville as a boy. Chester Nimitz was born in Fredericksburg in 1885 after his father's death; in 1890 his mother married his uncle William Nimitz, who managed the St. Charles Hotel in Kerrville, where Chester became chief handyman. With little chance of college otherwise, he sought an appointment to West Point and, finding none open, applied to the Naval Academy instead. He graduated seventh of 114 at Annapolis on January 30, 1905. On Christmas Day, 1941, he took command of the Pacific Fleet.

What the plaque says

The Original Building of Tivy School Captain Joseph A. Tivy, a Canadian born in 1818, settled in Kerr County about 1870. He served as Kerrville's first mayor and as a Texas legislator. He surveyed most of the Kerrville area and gave land for a city park. In 1890, he gave 16 and 2/3 acres for a school on this site and 100 acres to be sold to build and furnish the school. Classes began October 1891. Among the early students was Fleet Admiral Chester W. Nimitz. The native stone building was severely damaged by fire in 1942 and the facade stuccoed. This building housed Tivy High School until 1967. (1978)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Schreiner Mansion — 0.5 mi
  The 1879 downtown home of Charles Schreiner, the Alsatian-born merchant, banker and rancher whose store and mohair trade built Kerrville.
• Treue der Union Monument — 14 mi
  An 1866 German-language monument in Comfort over the graves of Hill Country Unionists killed at the Nueces in 1862, its flag of thirty-six stars kept at half-staff.
• Old Tunnel State Park — 19 mi
  A railroad tunnel abandoned in 1942 that now shelters up to three million Mexican free-tailed bats, who fly out each evening from May through October.
• Fort Martin Scott — 22 mi
  An army post of 1848 on Barons Creek beside the German town, where soldiers kept the peace of a Comanche trade and paid the merchants in hard cash.

More markers nearby

• First Baptist Church of Kerrville — 0.2 mi
• Saint Peter's Episcopal Church — 0.3 mi
• Notre Dame Catholic School — 0.3 mi
• Notre Dame Catholic Church — 0.4 mi