The beautifully restored Old Mercantile Building hosts historic marker detailing this building's importance to the development of Sonora.
In 2015 is has been revitalized as the Mercantile Garden, a collection of several cute specialty shops, also an initiative of the Sonora Economic Development Corporation. See: (
visit link)
The Old Mercantile Building is located at the corner of S Water Street and Main Street in downtown Sonora, across from the Sutton County Courthouse.
The historic marker reads as follows:
'OLD MERCANTILE BUILDING
Kentucky native Ed R. Jackson (1860-1911), a prominent local rancher and banker, had this two-story Italianate commercial building constructed in 1902-03. Located on the site of an early hotel and a later mercantile store, both of which were destroyed by fire, the limestone structure features an ornate facade of cast iron and pressed tin. First occupied by a mercantile store on the ground floor, it also provided second floor space for offices and a community hall. Other occupants included early lawyers and doctors, and the first established telephone exchange in Sonora.
Recorded Texas Historic Landmark--1981"
From the National Register Nomination form on file with the Texas Historical Commission:
"Narrative
When completed in 1903 the 2-story old Mercantile Building was constructed of rubble limestone, with limestone lintels bridging the two over two windows of the second story on either side of the building and the four over four windows on the rear of the building facing Poplar St. The richly detailed Victorian cast-iron and pressed-tin facade with one over one windows to the floor framed by ionic pilasters and rosettes featured a bracketed cornice crowned with a central inscribed pediment and finials on each corner.
A second story gallery with turned balustrade ran the full width of the facade, forming a canopy for the ground floor sidewalk. The style of the facade was coordinated with the three one- story buildings beside it which also were built in 1903 and faced with cast iron from Mesker Bros., St. Louis. The 48' x 88' building contained eight offices and a 28' x 56' hall on the second floor, with space for a mercantile company on the ground floor. The masonry work is said to have been done by Mexican labor which angered local Anglo laborers. The style and scale of the building provided a proper frame for the fine Ruffini Courthouse looking up Main St. toward the Courthouse Square.
By the 1920's the wood balustrade for the second floor gallery and the two metal finials had been removed from the building. The gallery floor which provided a canopy for the ground floor sidewalk was removed a few years later and interior partitions have been altered by various owners. Within the last fifteen years heavy rains and a leaking roof caused the central portion of the rear wall, facing Poplar St., to collapse. A temporary wall of concrete block was erected immediately to prevent further damage to the structure.
The present owners of the building, Dorothy and Walter Pope, plan to restore the exterior to its original appearance, in keeping with the feeling and style of the Courthouse Square. The ground floor will be utilized for commercial space and multi-purpose rooms will be located on the second floor. This restoration will be a significant factor in the rejuvenation of the old central business district of the county seat.
The Old Mercantile Building played a significant role in the early history of Sonora having been occupied over the years by commercial and professional concerns of importance to the community. The building is located at the terminus of Main St. with the courthouse square and it serves to maintain the architectural scale of the block adjacent to the stone Victorian courthouse, designed in 1891 by Oscar Ruffini.
The Sowell Hotel was located on the site of the Old Mercantile Building at the time the courthouse was being constructed. This frame structure burned in 1893 and was replaced by the Hagerlund Brothers Mercantile, another frame structure. The Bank of Sonora, which only consisted of a bank vault or safe, was housed in the frame building.
On December 8, 1900, Ed R. Jackson bought the frame building from Hagerlund Bros., the same year he founded the First National Bank of Sonora. Two years later, on September 12, 1902, the building again caught fire, and this time took the whole block of frame buildings with it. The only survivor on the block was the masonry First National Bank building. Within a year, Jackson, a successful banker and rancher, who by this time had founded the London National Bank in San Angelo, had hired a builder named C. J. Nichols to replace the burned buildings with cast-iron faced masonry buildings. He also repaired the stone bank building.
On October 11, 1902, Devil's River News account describes the "probable dimension" of the three new buildings to be "on the corner a 2 story 48' x 88' building, with a double store on the ground floor and 8 office rooms and a hall 28' x 50', and two stores, 42' x 70', one story high." The "corner" store was the Old Mercantile Building. By December 20, 1902 the iron fronts for the Jackson's buildings, manufactured by Mesker Bros. of St. Louis, were on their way to Sonora. The masonry work was expected to be completed by January 15, 1903. They must have finished very close to that date, as Mayfield Bros. store advertised a sale in the new building on January 23, 1903 in the Sonora Sun.
This attractive building is said to have housed several "firsts" for Sonora in it's initial year of operation. These included the first telephone exchange, the first lawyers (later Judges Cornell and Wardlaw), and the first "real" doctor, Dr. H. Guernsey Jones. The upstairs hall was the scene of Christmas "hops", as well as other community social affairs and weddings from its earliest days, while the offices were popular due to their excellent location on the Courthouse Square.
The ground floor portion continued to be used as a mercantile or dry-goods store from 1905 through the 1920's by the Mayfield Bros., the Sonora Mercantile Co. and W. O. Hightower & Co. By 1935 the ground floor had changed to a car dealership owned by F. B. Williams. For the last twenty years the building has been vacant.
The man responsible for rebuilding on this important corner lot after the fire of 1902, Ed R. Jackson, was born in Kentucky in 1890 and came to Texas about 1875. Working his way to Sonora as a freight hand, painter, ranch hand and finally ranch foreman, he was able to purchase his own ranch in 1896. In 1899 he had sold the ranch and the next year organized the First National Bank of Sonora and bought the three buildings next to his new bank. After the devastating fire in 1902, he rebuilt in the more permanent style and founded another bank as well, the London National Bank of San Angelo. A keen businessman of good judgment, it's been said that he sold his own gloves for a 25.00 profit and suffered from the cold. At the time of his death, December 23, 1911, he had amassed a considerable fortune. The bank he founded in 1900 is successful to this day.
BIBLIOGRAPHY ON FILE IN THE NATIONAL REGISTRY"