W. S. Robson

The plaque calls Robson a charter member of the Texas Bar Association, a voluntary forerunner of today's State Bar. Sixty-nine lawyers met in Galveston on July 15, 1882, to organize it, and it was inaugurated that December 12 under Judge Thomas Jefferson Devine. Its charter aimed to advance jurisprudence and promote uniform legislation. Membership stayed thin: in 1900 only 315 of about 4,600 licensed Texas lawyers belonged, most of them urban, corporate and appellate men, which makes a La Grange county lawyer an unusual early member. The 1939 State Bar Act replaced it with the integrated bar.

What the plaque says

W. S. Robson (Feb. 4, 1851 - Oct. 7, 1905) Georgia native William Sion Robson migrated to Texas with his parents in 1852. After settling in Round Top (17 miles NE), the family moved to the La Grange area in 1863. After working as a butcher, Robson served in several public offices, including tax assessor and deputy district clerk. In 1880 he and his wife Lucy (Praetorius) (1854-1922) built the original section of this home. Robson became a lawyer and in 1890 was elected Fayette County Judge, a position he held for three terms. A charter member of Texas Bar Association, he was also active in political and fraternal groups. (1982)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Monument Hill and Kreische Brewery State Historic Sites — 1.4 mi
  A shared tomb on the Colorado River bluff for the men of the Dawson fight and the black bean lottery, beside the ruins of a German stonemason's spring-fed brewery.
• St. John the Baptist Catholic Church (Ammannsville) — 8.5 mi
  A wooden Carpenter Gothic church built in 1919 after storm and fire took two before it, its dusty-rose interior painted by an artist whose name was lost for decades.
• Saints Cyril and Methodius Catholic Church (Dubina) — 13 mi
  The church of Texas's first Czech settlement, under a sky-blue painted ceiling that was whitewashed in the 1950s and brought back from faint traces by its own parishioners.
• Nativity of Mary, Blessed Virgin Catholic Church (High Hill) — 14 mi
  A red brick Gothic Revival church of 1906 in a German farm settlement, where two San Antonio painters spent 1912 faking marble columns and stone vaults on wood.

More markers nearby

• The First U. S. Postal Rural Mail Route in Texas — 0.2 mi
• Site of a Twin Blockhouse — 0.4 mi
• Birthplace of the SPJST — 0.4 mi
• Old City Cemetery — 0.4 mi