City Hall - Seguin, TX
Posted by: 
WalksfarTX
N 29° 34.193 W 097° 57.821
14R E 600381 N 3271575
A 1935 WPA project. It is a 2-story Art Moderne design created by architect Louis Wirtz.
Waymark Code: WMZFJK
Location: Texas, United States
Date Posted: 11/03/2018
Views: 0
NRHP Nomination Form
Two-story stone Art Moderne governmental building at 205 N River Street. It has symmetrical facades with recessed quadripartite windows; central entrance bay behind stepped recess with decorative metalwork around entrance and above central second-story window.
The site of Seguin is part of a Spanish land grant of 1831 to Humphries Branch, a settler brought from Missouri to Gonzales by Empresario Green Dewitt. Branch sold his grant in two parts to Joseph S. Martin and Thomas R. Miller in 1834. They and a few others settled the land, but abandoned it upon the approach of Santa Anna's army in 1836. Two years later, Martin laid plans to found a town on his half of the grant. Miller had died at the Alamo. Martin and three partners (Arthur Swift, James Campbell and Matthew Caldwell) split the 2214-acre site into 44 shares, 40 of which were to be sold with the proviso that the purchaser move onto his share and build within a certain period of time.
The townsite was surveyed in a regular grid pattern, north from the Guadalupe River, with blocks 200 feet square between 70-foot-wide streets. The residential and business section of "town lots" was laid out in eight tiers of seven blocks, 56 in all, near shade and natural springs. Two adjacent blocks were reserved for public use (present Courthouse and Park Squares). The blocks immediately surrounding the squares were divided into ten lots each, the remaining blocks into eight lots each. Forty-eight "acre" or garden lots surrounded the town lots; south of the acre lots and extending to the river were 21 timber lots. Farm lots lay to the north of the town. This pattern of blocks and streets has survived almost unchanged in the district, which consists of portions of both the town lots (north to Walnut St.) and the acre lots (the four-square block area between Walnut and Ireland Streets).
In February 1839 the name of the town was changed from Walnut Springs to Seguin in honor of Juan Nepomuceno Seguin. The town grew steadily, and in 1846 was named the seat of newly formed Guadalupe County.