Fort Worth Stock Yards Entrance

Duane's take

Here's how the official marker tells it, and I'll pass it right along to you. Now, Exchange Avenue in Fort Worth has seen a whole lot of history roll down its length, but let me tell you about the thing that's been standin' guard over the entrance to the Fort Worth Stock Yards since nineteen ten. That's over a hundred years of watching cattle drives, cowboys, and curious visitors pass underneath without so much as flinching.

That gateway — that grand concrete gateway — was constructed by the Topeka Bridge and Land Company, built for the Fort Worth Stock Yards Company, and when it was finished in 1910, folks took note. See, concrete work of that scale was no small thing for that era. This wasn't just slapping some posts in the ground and calling it a day.

The columns rise twenty-two feet high and measure thirteen feet in circumference. You stop and really think about that — thirteen feet around. These aren't columns you'd squeeze past without feeling a little humbled.

And spanning the whole thing, that sign stretches thirty-six feet long and four feet high, hanging up there above Exchange Avenue like it owns the place — which, in a manner of speaking, it does. It has spanned that avenue for well over a century now, marking the entrance to one of the most storied corners of Fort Worth. The marker calls it a significant landmark in this historic area, and standing underneath those columns, it's hard to argue the point.

Some things earn their place just by refusing to come down.

What the marker says

Spanning Exchange Avenue, this gateway to the Fort Worth Stock Yard was completed in 1910. Constructed by the Topeka Bridge & Land Co. for the Fort Worth Stock Yards Co., it was a significant feat of concrete work for that era. The columns are 22 feet high and 13 feet in circumference. The sign is 36 feet long and 4 feet high. The entrance is a significant landmark in this historic area of Fort Worth. Recorded Texas Historic Landmark-1985.