Hamilton County Courthouse

Hamilton County's early government met in stores, a rustic school, a former livery stable, a two-story building and, briefly, a saloon. Fire destroyed two of those improvised courthouses, and the first permanent one, built in 1878, burned in 1886. Outlaws were so numerous, one account says, that guards were hired to protect visiting judges.

The present courthouse is native limestone, quarried about two miles east of town. The Texas Historical Commission dates the original building to 1887; Texas Escapes reads the cornerstone as 1886 and the builders as Lovell, Hood and McLeod. Sources disagree on the architect: the cornerstone names E. D. Williams, and other accounts name Mason, Martin, Byrnes and Johnston. A remodel in 1931 or 1932, designed by E. M. Miles, added wings, crenellated towers and columned porticos.

The Commission describes crenellated square turrets, round-arch windows, pedimented porticoes with fluted columns, a mission-inspired tower, and cast stone medallions over four secondary entries showing a cowboy, sheep and a shorthorn cow. The first-floor hallway works as a small museum of photographs, documents and artifacts. Some believe the courtroom sculpture above the bench depicts Athena rather than Themis. A restoration enlarged the courtroom, and the building was rededicated on April 28, 2012.