Legends & Lore of the Texas Capitol

by Mike Cox

  The grave of Treasurer R.M. Love in his native Limestone County. Ironically, he came from Tehuacana, which early on had been in the running as the seat of government instead of Austin. While serving as comptroller, Love was gunned down inside the capitol. Photo by the author.

  In 1962, an Austin man named C.D. Greer self-published a booklet containing a poem called “The Phantom Capitol.” As Greer explained in a note at the end of the poem,

  The phenomenon alluded to…is accounted for in this manner: Mighty floodlights are turned on the capitol dome at night, and are left focused until twelve o’clock. When there are low-hanging banks of clouds above the capitol, these serve as a background upon which the shadow of the capitol dome is projected. Since floodlights are focused on the dome from all four sides, you may see the “phantom” from as many directions as you may choose to look.

  Some say another capitol ghost is that of a man buried in an unmarked grave on the capitol grounds. The only problem with that story is that there isn’t anyone buried at the Texas Capitol Complex. But there is a lost-grave story connected to Austin’s first statehouse, the one-story frame structure built for the government of the Republic of Texas and used from 1839 to 1853. The intersection of Colorado and Eighth Streets now covers the site.

  According to the State Preservation Board, descendants of one John Ballantyne contacted the agency in June 2000 to say they had heard their forebear’s unmarked grave lay somewhere on the capitol grounds. They said they had found that Ballantyne, who died in 1846, had been buried “near the river…on the capitol Grounds.” Since the site of the present capitol was only an undeveloped hill top in 1846, the preservation board realized the burial must have occurred near the first capitol. Why officials of the day saw fit to allow Ballantyne’s burial on state property remains a mystery.

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  MORE CAPITOL MYTHS

  The statehouse has no shortage of tales best not taken for granted. Here’s a rundown of some of them.

  IT’S NOT PINK

  For years, practically everything written about the capitol would have readers believe the statehouse was built of pink Texas granite. Unfortunately for those who think pink, that’s wrong. The correct color is red, sunset red to be exact.

  Not that there isn’t such a thing as pink granite. That’s the type of stone that comes from a quarry near the Burnet County community of Granite Shoals, but the stone for the capitol was not quarried there. Starting in late 1885, all the rock hauled to the capitol construction site came from Granite Mountain west of Marble Falls, which affords sunset red granite.

  Who first decided to gentle a bold, Texas-sounding color like red to wimpy pink is not known, but vintage capitol postcards from the first decade of the twentieth century correctly refer to the capitol granite as red. Red granite or pink, there’s actually more limestone in the building than granite.

  WHY THE CAPITOL FACES SOUTH

  Myth has it that the main entrance of the capitol faces south as a snub to the North, a reflection of the degree of sectional animosity that still existed when construction of the new statehouse began nearly two decades after the Civil War. Of course, the 1853 capitol, built eight years before the Civil War, also faced south. So did many buildings in the days before air conditioning, since south-facing structures caught more cooling breeze.

  The other part of the facing-south myth is that the placement honored the memory of the 342 men massacred at Goliad on March 27, 1836, during the Texas Revolution, but no documentation has been found to support that. The truth is that having the capitol’s main entrance on the south side was an obvious choice. In addition to being able to take advantage of the prevailing winds, the Colorado River and Congress Avenue was the logical area the building should face.

  The only reason the capitol faces south is to afford a view of downtown Austin and the Colorado River (now Lady Bird Lake). Author’s collection.

  THE TWIN SISTERS ARE NOT THE TWIN SISTERS

  Since 1910, two short-barreled cannons have flanked the main entrance of the capitol. Known as the Twin Sisters, the twenty-four-pounders were among six pieces ordered by Major General Thomas Jefferson Chambers during the revolution against Mexico in 1836. Unfortunately, they did not arrive until April 1837, a year after the fighting ended. (Contrary to legend, Chambers did not use his own money to buy the cannons and did not give them to Texas; he just picked them up when they reached New Orleans from the foundry in Pittsburgh.) Though popularly known as the Twin Sisters, they are not the Twin Sisters—two matching artillery pieces donated by the citizens of Cincinnati, Ohio—used to such devastating effect in the pivotal Battle of San Jacinto on April 21, 1836. Those historic guns disappeared after the Civil War and have never been located.

  THE CAPITOL HAS CANNONBALLS IN ITS WALLS

  The State Preservation Board shoots this myth down on its website, theorizing it is probably based on a misreading of the capitol’s architectural plans. A notation in Exhibit F, Appendix to the Memorandum of Agreement (October 20, 1884), says that “five eight inch round iron shall be substituted for one inch by one quarter flat iron for the anchors in the exterior walls.” That refers not to cannonballs, but metal anchors used to affix ornamental granite stone to the base wall. And no, the anchors are not old nautical anchors.

  ALL THE BUILDING MATERIALS CAME FROM TEXAS

  The limestone and granite in the building is native to the Lone Star State, as well as some of the iron and some of the interior wood, but not all of it. Some of the wood, not to mention everything from nails to the ornate brass door hinges labeled “Texas Capitol,” was shipped to Austin by rail. Much of the construction material was procured in Chicago, since that’s where the Capitol Syndicate had its office.

  THE WASHINGTON MONUMENT COULD FIT INSIDE

  Somehow, reflective of Texas braggadocio, the story got started that the Washington Monument could stand inside the rotunda and not touch the inside of the dome. But the monument in D.C. is 555 feet and 5⅛ inches tall—more than 200 feet higher than the Texas Capitol.

  THE CAPITOL HAS SECRET TUNNELS

  Legend has it that secret tunnels large enough to accommodate horses extend from the statehouse to what is now Lady Bird Lake. The capitol did have tunnels, but they were for utilities and neither secret nor intended as escape routes. One of those tunnels, though not nearly large enough for man or beast, was dug to carry sewage to the Colorado River. Fortunately for the environmental health of the river, the tunnel extending from the statehouse was later tied in to a city sewage line for proper treatment. Building plans also included a tunnel five feet high and three feet wide connecting the capitol to the powerhouse that once stood northeast of the building. That tunnel held steam lines for heating and electric lines.

  THE CAPITOL BASEMENT ONCE ACCOMMODATED HORSES

  Horses were still the primary motive power when the capitol opened in 1888, but contrary to the myth that the basement had a stable, visitors and lawmakers kept their horses tied outside. For one thing, how would folks have gotten horses in and out? Surely nineteenth-century officials knew that such an extravagance as a below-ground horse parking would have led to way too many jokes about horse manure piling up in the statehouse.

  THE CAPITOL HAD AUSTIN’S FIRST TELEPHONE

  Even the capitol that the present capitol replaced had a telephone by the time it burned down in 1881. In fact, Austin’s volunteer fire department got alerted to the blaze by telephone. The temporary capitol also had a telephone installed in 1887, the city’s twenty-fourth.

  FAMOUS FURNITURE THAT ISN’T

  As anyone who grew up in the 1950s can attest, Davy Crockett, King of the Wild Frontier (and ill-fated Alamo defender), was “born on a mountaintop in Tennessee.” The Governor’s Public Reception Room in the capitol has a table that legend says is made of cherry wood from the old Crockett place back in the Volunteer State. Also, its marble top supposedly was smoothed by one of Crockett’s relatives. In truth, the table is merely one of hundreds
of pieces of Victorian-era furniture bought for the capitol in the 1880s from A.H. Andrews and Company of Chicago, the top maker of office furniture in the late nineteenth century.

  Another unusual piece in the second-floor room is an S-shaped tête-a-tête chair supposedly made of Texas mesquite by prisoners in Huntsville. Again, not true. In the same room, the capitol’s fanciest, hangs a fifteen-foot-tall mirror supposedly given to Texas by the people of France on the occasion of the new statehouse’s dedication. Alas, it came from Chicago, another lowbid state purchase. Nor is it one of only three perfect mirrors in the world, as has been occasionally claimed. Finally, legend held that the velvet drapes in the room came from Persia. Actually, they also probably came from much less exotic Chicago.

  For years, many believed a desk in the secretary of state’s office once belonged to Texas colonizer Stephen F. Austin. Another story has it having been used by Sam Houston. Research has been unable to verify either claim, though the desk is believed to be older than the capitol.

  On the other hand, an odd-looking colonial-style chair with a large, extended right arm (that part reminiscent of a school desk) that sits in the Legislative Reference Library does have a provenance connecting it to Mexican dictator General Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna. He used it while a prisoner for a time in the residence of Dr. James Phelps following the Battle of San Jacinto. Phelps’s descendants later presented the piece of furniture to the state.

  THE CAPITOL’S WATER COMES FROM AN ARTESIAN WELL

  Two wells were drilled on the capitol grounds way back, and there was an artesian well that got covered when the building went up, but when state employees, legislators and visitors get thirsty and head for a water fountain, they drink city water.

  Restored artesian water fountain near the south entrance of the capitol. Photo by the author.

  SYMBOLIC STEPS TO THE SENATE

  The first flight of the back stairs leading to the Senate between the first and second floors on the east wing of the capitol has thirty-one steps—one for each senator. The second flight contains eight steps. That used to be the number of Texas constitutional offices: governor, attorney general, land commissioner, comptroller, treasurer and three railroad commissioners. Those two coincidences led to speculation that the number of steps might have been intentionally symbolic, but the railroad commission was not created until after the capitol was built. (And in 1996, the duties of the treasurer were folded into the Comptroller’s Office.)

  THE GODDESS OF LIBERTY IS PREGNANT

  Somehow, a story got started that the Goddess of Liberty is “with child,” as they used to say in proper Victorian times. The figure does seem to have a bit of a tummy under that long robe, but no documentation exists to support that she was intended to look like a mom-to-be.

  Detail of capitol architectural drawing showing the Goddess of Liberty statue on top of the dome. No, she wasn’t intended to look pregnant. Author’s collection.

  NO LADIES RESTROOM UNTIL 1966?

  While it’s not true that women did not get a place in the capitol where they could powder their noses until three years into the LBJ administration, it is true that it is easier for a woman to find a restroom in the capitol than it used to be. But the original plans did provide for a “Ladies Retiring Room” on the third floor next to several other “water closets,” which was a Victorian era euphemism for restroom.

  The late Curtis Tunnell, when executive director of the Texas Historical Commission, put the matter of capitol folklore in perspective in 1995: “Texas has a unique heritage, a certain mystique, and people tend to fill in the blanks with their own stories—more so, I think, than other states. There are so many real, incredible stories about the capitol, it follows there would be a lot of good ones that were not true.”

  Indeed, truth has never been an essential element when it comes to a good story.

  “Texas loves the capitol, and it loves the stories about it,” said Dealey Herndon when she headed the State Preservation Board, “even if they aren’t true.”

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  MORE TRUE TALES

  WHEN PIGS FLY

  During its construction, as the granite building rose story by story, someone suggested, presumably somewhat tongue-in-jowl, that a pig should grace the top of the new capitol. This porcine proposition traced to an incident during the days of the Republic of Texas, when someone in Austin killed a hog belonging to the French charges d’affaires. That would have amounted to nothing more than an unpleasantness between the Frenchman and the hog shooter had it not been for the fact that the financially strapped republic had been trying to negotiate a much-needed $5 million loan from France. The pig incident proved to be the huff and the puff that blew the deal. But one historian later concluded the French loan would have been a pig in a poke, in that some of its provisions would have given the European power a toehold that might have ended in Texas becoming a French colony. In other words, a pig might have given its life for Texas and therefore deserved remembrance at the new capitol.

  GOING UP?

  If the elevator in the capitol when it opened in 1888 was not the first mechanical lift in the state, it was the fanciest by far—at least on paper.

  That first capitol elevator was hydraulic, operated with water pumped from cisterns to an attic tank on the fifth level. The original architectural drawings had specified two such elevators, but only one was built at first. Architect Myers had envisioned quite the elegant lift, more like a small private railway car than an elevator. As designed, it would feature fifteen mirrors set into panels of butternut and maple with some cherry wood thrown in for good measure. Leather seats stuffed with horsehair and springs would line the sides as well. Interior columns would be of mahogany. But practicality (and cost considerations) ended up trumping art, and what the state had built was a fairly plain wooden lift.

  The Austin Weekly Statesman commented on the new elevator in June 1888. “A young man named Tollman is doing the escorting business [operating the lift], and yesterday the elevator made a great many trips up and down. This will prove a great improvement on the climbing-up-stairs business, especially during the hot weather.”

  A second elevator (on the north wing) was not installed until 1907. That was an electric elevator, and the first elevator, which was near the main entrance on the south wing, was converted to electric power at that time.

  Roger Pinckney, a descendent of Governor James Pinckney Henderson, was a capitol elevator operator in 1961–62, working for the old state board of control after school and on weekends. Getting proficient at running the elevator, he recalled, was like learning to drive an automobile. The trick was in being able to stop the car so it was even with each floor. “You didn’t want the governor to trip and fall,” he laughed. If he stopped between floors and opened the door, he could read graffiti left on the limestone interior walls by construction workers in the early 1880s. By the late 1960s, the building’s elevators had been automated.

  TEXAS’S TALLEST BUILDING UNTIL 1929

  Not only is the capitol taller than the nation’s capitol, for forty-one years after its dedication, it stood as the highest building in Texas.

  Given the generally accepted architectural standard that one floor equals 10 feet, to the tip of the Goddess of Liberty’s star, the capitol is slightly taller than a thirty-story skyscraper. Calculated solely on building height, not the number of floors with usable space, the capitol remained Texas’s tallest structure until 1929 when Houston’s 430-foot Gulf Building opened.

  For years, the capitol also stood as the tallest of the state capitols. These days, five state capitols are taller than the one in Austin.

  Before Austin became known for its music, barbecue and other modern attractions, the capitol was the city’s prime tourist draw. A big bragging point was the building’s size, mentioned in this early promotional piece. Author’s collection.

  HOME UNDER THE DOME

  Since completion of the two-story governor’s mansion across Eleven
th Street from the capitol in 1856, the state has provided a residence for its chief executive. Not to be outdone, the lieutenant governor and Speaker of the House live in apartments behind their respective chambers, at least during legislative sessions.

  Architectural drawings for the capitol included two rooms each for the lieutenant governor (the presiding officer of the Senate) and the Speaker of the House, but they were not intended as living quarters. While it is not clear how soon those officials began living in their respective rooms (the best guess is the early 1900s), judges of the state’s two highest courts—the court of criminal appeals and the supreme court—lived in the capitol near their respective courtrooms from the time the building opened until the two high courts moved to a separate state building in 1959.

  By the 1890s, chafing at their paltry per diem, to cut costs some senators and House members also took to living in the capitol during legislative sessions. Observing that the public often saw “red blankets and soiled sheets aired in the windows,” in 1891, the Austin Statesman complained that the new statehouse had been converted into a “cheap John boarding house,” with lawmakers sleeping “in different offices, corridors, garrets and in any corner they can find room for a cot.”

  Even though the lieutenant governor and speaker had been living in the statehouse for decades, it did not become legal until 1943. In fact, before then, a state statute prohibited using any portion of the capitol as a bedroom. Despite the eventual repeal of that law, a senator who argued that the free lodging was unconstitutional in that it amounted to extra compensation, tried in 1957 to evict Lieutenant Governor Ben Ramsey and Speaker Waggoner Carr from their capitol quarters. The effort failed.