ONLY - Bluebonnet Tourist Camp - Austin, TX
Posted by: 
WalksfarTX
N 30° 18.612 W 097° 43.993
14R E 621801 N 3353838
Although numerous courts and campgrounds were constructed in Austin during the 1930s, the Bluebonnet Tourist Camp is the only remaining example in Austin of such facilities.
Waymark Code: WMVKGH
Location: Texas, United States
Date Posted: 04/29/2017
Views: 4
National Register of Historic Places
Arranged around an open courtyard, the tourist camp is comprised of two detached buildings. Each contains a series of small 1-room units separated by covered spaces in which to park automobiles.
Of frame construction, the buildings are generally rectangular in plan and are surmounted by low-pitched, front-gabled roofs. The primary (west) facades face Guadalupe Street and are fronted with petrified rock, a popular local building trend in the late 1920s and 1930s. Walls on the courtyard side are sheathed in 117/121 wood siding, while those exterior walls are clad in asbestos siding that is nearly obscured by vegetation and new construction on adjacent lots. Each "camp" includes a single room marked by a single door and paired double-hung wood sash with 4/4 lights.
A unique example of its property type in Hyde Park, the Bluebonnet Tourist Camp was constructed during the period of greatest building activity in Hyde Park. Built on the primary route to cities north of Austin, the tourist camp developed to serve increasing number of tourists who came to Central Texas to take advantage of recreational opportunities afforded by the lakes being dammed by Depression-era public works projects.