Dripping Springs Academy

Duane's take

Here's how the official marker tells it, and I'll do my best to do it justice. Out here in Hays County, some buildings just refuse to be only one thing. The old Dripping Springs Academy is exactly that kind of building.

W. M. Jordan, a noted Baptist preacher, founded it in 1881.

Now that's a beginning with some gravity to it. A man of the cloth, putting up a place of learning. But the story doesn't stay still for long.

By 1883, that stone building, and you notice I said stone, not wood, not something temporary, stone, was given to the Pedernales Baptist Association. Six years after that, in 1889, it passed again, this time to the public school district. So already this building has been a founder's dream, a Baptist institution, and a public school, all before the nineteenth century is even finished.

Then comes 1920, and somebody looks at that sturdy stone structure and decides there's more to be had. A second floor goes up. The building reaches higher, literally.

Now here's where the story takes one more turn nobody would have predicted back in 1881. In 1952, the old academy became the property of Rambo Lodge number 426, A.F. and A.M. A preacher's school, handed off and handed off again, landing at last with the Masons.

Some buildings in Texas just keep finding new callings. This one's been findin' them since 1881.

What the marker says

Founded 1881 by W. M. Jordan, noted Baptist preacher. Its stone building was given to Pedernales Baptist Association 1883; then to public school district, 1889. Second floor was added, 1920. It became property Rambo Lodge #426 A.F. & A.M., 1952. Recorded Texas Historic Landmark - 1967