Farmer's State Bank - Main Street Historic District - Chappell Hill, TX
Posted by: 
Raven
N 30° 08.546 W 096° 15.434
14R E 764205 N 3337745
Constructed in 1907, the Farmer's State Bank of Chappell Hill, TX was the town's first banking institution and is one of the 26 "Contributing" buildings within its NRHP-designated Main Street Historic District.
Waymark Code: WMME37
Location: Texas, United States
Date Posted: 09/07/2014
Views: 3
Chappell Hill's NRHP Main Street Historic District is an area covering 36 buildings, most of them built between 1850 and 1915 and reflecting the many variations in architectural style within that period in history. For more information on this particular Historic District, please see the following waymark: (
visit link)
The founding of the town of Chappell Hill is contributed to Mary Hargrove Haller who purchased a 100-acre site in this part of Texas on February 2, 1847 and subsequently commissioned a survey and the plotting of town lots. Just three years later, Mary Haller and her husband Jacob began building a two-story frame house now known as the "Stagecoach Inn" at the northwest corner of the center of that new town.
The Farmer's State Bank, located just a block South of the "Stagecoach Inn", was built 70 years after the town's founding, and is thus considered to be a "late period" structure within the overall 1850-1915 timeline. Per its nearby Texas Historical Marker:
"Chappell Hill began as an agricultural community in 1847 but had no bank until a population boom in the early 1900s brought wealth and economic prosperity. Farmers State Bank organized in March 1907 and opened in September of that year with J. J. Shaver as president. Alex Griffin of Brenham was awarded the contract for the construction of a fireproof building. The one-story bank features large storefront panels and transoms and a plaster over brick finish. The bank, renamed Chappell Hill Bank in 1986, also acquired the 1878 W. R. Reinstein Store, a one-story, four-bay brick building with arched entry doors, a stepped parapet and decorative brick corbelling."
Per the official NRHP records, the building is a:
"One-story masonry commercial building displaying original cast-iron and wooden store front with large glass panels and transoms above. Central entrance contains characteristic French doors with narrow glass panels. Originally, cornice featured simple corbeled brickwork with a panel above. This crowning panel was destroyed by 1915 storm and never rebuilt. Plaster panel applied over corbeled brick cornice sometime before 1950s. Damaged by smoke in 1974 fire, interior was restored to original appearance. Dropped ceiling and paneled walls were gutted to reveal original ceiling and wall finish. New interior flooring installed. Awning with standing-seam metal roof supported by four square wooden posts replaced a flat canopy with thin iron posts in 1974. The elaborate interior oak and brass teller's cage and vault with cast iron architecture are original. Brick north annex containing double casement windows with segmented relieving arches constructed in 1981 does not contribute."