Centennial Monument - First Shot Monuments Historic District - Cost, Texas - NRHP Historic Districts - Contributing Buildings on Waymarking.com

Centennial Monument (contributing object)
The centerpiece of the park is the First Shot Centennial Monument, a collaboration between the architectural firm of Raymond Phelps and George Dahl Dewees and sculptor Waldine Tauch, which was installed and dedicated in 1937. The monument is sixteen feet and two inches wide, thirteen and a half feet tall, and three feet and ten inches in depth. The monument has a three-part composition, with the large central panel dominated by a bronze bas relief depicting six Texians behind a small cannon. Flanking the central panel are bas relief figures carved in granite. On the left is a woman holding a laurel branch, representing victory, and on the right is a woman holding a book with her finger marking a page, possibly representing the First Shot’s place in history. The monument base is inscribed as follows:

NEAR HERE ON OCTOBER 2,1835 WAS FIRED THE FIRST SHOT OF THE TEXAS REVOLUTION OF 1835-36.
THE SHOT HEARD ROUND THE WORLD. AT GONZALES THE TEXANS DEFIED THE MEXICAN
GOVERNMENT AND REFUSED THEIR DEMAND FOR THE GONZALES CANNON WITH THE “COME AND
TAKE IT” CHALLENGE UNTIL REINFORCEMENTS ARRIVED FROM OTHER PARTS OF DEWITT'S COLONY
AND FROM THE COLONIES ON THE COLORADO AND BRAZOS. THEY THEN PURSUED THE MEXICANS
FROM GONZALES TO NEAR THIS POINT AND FIRED UPON THEM WITH THIS CANNON, DRIVING THEM
BACK TO BEXAR.
THIS SHOT STARTED THE REVOLUTION AND WAS DIRECTLY RESPONSIBLE FOR ADDING MORE
TERRITORY TO THE UNITED STATES THAN WAS ACQUIRED BY THE FREEING OF THE ORIGINAL
THIRTEEN COLONIES FROM ENGLAND.

The backside of the monument is unadorned, and reveals the stone block composition of the object. The monument is topped by a low granite entablature with a plain pediment over the central panel.