Belknap Place

Duane's take

The official marker's the word on this one, folks — here's how Duane tells it. Now, most streets don't get to brag about much. They just lie there, getting driven on, patched up, forgotten.

But there's a street tucked into the Monte Vista historic district of San Antonio that's been quietly holding a record for over a hundred years, and hardly anybody knows it. That street is Belknap Place. And what makes it something worth pulling over for?

It is the oldest existing concrete pavement in the state of Texas. Let that settle in a moment. Every mile of highway you've rolled across today — this little stretch got there first.

Here's the setup. At the turn of the twentieth century, America was changing fast. Cities were growing, motorized vehicles were multiplying, and the roads of the day just weren't keeping up.

Dirt and mud weren't cutting it anymore. The country needed something tougher, something that could take a beating and ask for more. The very first concrete street in the United States was placed in 1891, over in Bellefontaine, Ohio — and that type of concrete road was developed by a pair of men named George Bartholomew and James C.

Wonders. Bartholomew, for his part, learned about cement production at the Alamo Portland and Roman Cement Company, which holds its own distinction as the first cement manufacturer west of the Mississippi. So the roots of this story run deep, and they run through San Antonio.

Now fast-forward to 1914. Mayor Clinton S. Brown approves the construction of Belknap Place, and the plan is straightforward enough on paper — start at Dewey Place, end at West Agarita Avenue, a stretch of about seven-tenths of a mile.

The contract came to thirty-seven thousand, six hundred and eighty-five dollars and sixty-six cents, paid to the Texas Granitoid Company, and the cost was split between the city and the property owners along the route. But here's where it gets interesting. The builders didn't just pour concrete and call it a day.

They used an innovative patented process — and it had a name worth remembering — granitoid. Two layers of concrete, placed one on top of the other, with a stamped brick pattern on the surface that gave horses' hooves something to grip. A non-slip road built for the era when horseshoes and horseless carriages were still sharing the same pavement.

That two-layer method, that patented granitoid process, is the reason this street survived a hundred years without significant repair. A hundred years. No major patching.

No wholesale reconstruction. Just Belknap Place, doing its job, decade after decade, while the city grew up around it. It's still fully functional today.

Still right there in Monte Vista, one of the oldest surviving concrete streets in the entire United States. People drive over it without a second thought — and maybe that's the highest compliment a road can ever receive. The best engineering doesn't announce itself.

It just holds.

What the marker says

This street, located in the Monte Vista historic district of San Antonio, is the oldest existing concrete pavement in Texas and a significant civil engineering achievement. At the turn of the 20th century, the U.S. was urbanizing and new, more durable roads were needed for the increased number of motorized vehicles. In 1891, the first concrete street was placed in the U.S. in Bellefontaine, Ohio. This type of concrete road was developed by George Bartholomew and James C. Wonders. Bartholomew learned about cement production at the Alamo Portland and Roman Cement Company, which was the first cement manufacturer west of the Mississippi. Built in 1914, Belknap place was at the forefront of the new pavement technology. It was constructed with an innovative patented process called “granitoid” which used a two-layer placement of concrete. This process has enabled the street to survive 100 years without significant repair. The stamped brick pattern of the road provided a non-slip surface for horseshoes. Construction of the street was approved in 1914 by Mayor Clinton S. Brown and was to start at Dewey Place and end at West Agarita Avenue (0.7 miles). The construction contract of $37,685.66, paid to the Texas Granitoid Company, was split by the city and property owners. This significant piece of engineering history, and one of the oldest surviving concrete streets in the United States, is still fully functional and is a reminder of the era of burgeoning automotive transportation and innovative construction technology. (2014)