DUANE
Duane's take
Here's how the official marker tells it, and I'll do my best to do it justice. Now, in Athens, Henderson County, there's a two-story brick building that's seen more law, commerce, and community than most structures twice its size — and it's got the names to prove it. This is the story of the Faulk-Gauntt Building.
Let's back up a little. Before this building ever drew a breath, an earlier structure stood on this very spot, and it housed the law offices of Senator J. J.
Faulk and Judge W. L. Faulk.
Two men, one name, shared walls and presumably more than a few heated opinions about Henderson County. Then, in the early 1890s, a local businessman named J. R.
Gauntt came along and purchased the site. Now, J. R.
Gauntt was no stranger to this corner of Texas. He was the son of pioneer area settlers — the kind of roots that go down deep — and he and his brother R. L.
Gauntt ran a mercantile store called the Chany Tree. Say that name out loud. The Chany Tree.
There's a whole atmosphere in just those two words. Later, Gauntt moved into the monument business, which, depending on your disposition, you might find poetic or just practical. But here's where J.
R. Gauntt made his most lasting mark on Athens. In 1896, he commissioned the Hawn Lumber Company to build a two-story brick commercial structure right near the rail lines.
Now, in the early days of Athens, being near the rail lines wasn't a detail — it was the whole point. That was the beating heart of commerce, and Gauntt put his building right up next to it. The upstairs of this new structure was first occupied by attorneys W.
L. and J. J. Faulk — the very same legal minds who'd worked the earlier building on this ground.
It's like the address had a gravitational pull on those two. So let's meet them properly, because they deserve it. William Levin Faulk was a native of Alabama who made Henderson County his arena.
He served as Henderson County judge, district clerk, and director of the Guaranty State Bank of Athens. That's a man who had his hands in the law, the records, and the money — which, when you think about it, is just about everything that matters in a county seat. His cousin James J.
Faulk — born in Louisiana, so these two came to Texas from different directions — was something else entirely. James served as county attorney, state representative, district attorney, state senator, special justice of the Texas Court of Civil Appeals, and — here's the capstone — the first mayor of the City of Athens. The first.
You only get to be first once, and James J. Faulk was it. Now, while those two were holding court upstairs, the ground floor had its own story going.
The downstairs first housed the grocery store of Tom Barber, keeping the building grounded in the everyday needs of Athens folks. Over the years, other tenants made their mark too — dentists Dr. Dudley Payne and Dr.
Thomas Matthews both hung their shingles in the Faulk-Gauntt Building. And when all was said and done, the structure passed into the hands of descendants of W. L.
Faulk himself, the name coming full circle right back to the brick and mortar. One building. One corner in Athens.
A mercantile man who saw an opportunity near the rail lines, a lumber company that built something meant to last, two cousins who between them touched nearly every branch of Texas civic life. The Faulk-Gauntt Building held all of it — and it's still standing.
What the marker says
An earlier building at this location housed the law offices of Senator J. J. Faulk and Judge W. L. Faulk. In the early 1890s the site was purchased by J. R. Gauntt, a local businessman. The son of pioneer area settlers, he operated a mercantile store, the Chany Tree, with his brother R. L. Gauntt, and later ran a monument business. In 1896 he commissioned the Hawn Lumber Company to build this two-story brick commercial structure near the rail lines, a primary business location in the early days of Athens. The upstairs area was first occupied by attorneys W. L. and J. J. Faulk. A native of Alabama, William Levin Faulk served as Henderson County judge, district clerk, and director of the Guaranty State Bank of Athens. His cousin James J. Faulk, born in Louisiana, served as county attorney, state representative, district attorney, state senator, special justice of the Texas Court of Civil Appeals, and the first mayor of the City of Athens. The downstairs area first housed the grocery store of Tom Barber. Other tenants in the Faulk-Gauntt Building have included dentists Dr. Dudley Payne and Dr. Thomas Matthews. The structure was later owned by descendants of W. L. Faulk. Recorded Texas Historic Landmark - 1981