Market Square

Duane's take

Here's how the official marker tells it, and I'll do my best to do it justice. Now, you'd think a town square would know its own name. But Gonzales, Texas, being Gonzales, Texas, had a little more personality than that.

Back in 1825, two squares got mapped out. One was called Jail Square. The other was called Market Square.

Simple enough. Except somewhere between 1825 and 1836, those two squares looked each other over, and swapped. The one that started life as Jail Square became Market Square, and has served that purpose ever since.

And the one that was first mapped as Market Square, well, it became Jail Square. Now the marker doesn't say who made the call, or how the argument went, or whether anybody put up a fuss. It just states the fact, cool and plain, the way Gonzales tends to do things.

Two squares. Two names. Traded.

And both of them have been exactly what they became ever since. Sometimes the most remarkable thing about a place isn't what happened there. It's that it knew, eventually, what it was supposed to be.

What the marker says

First mapped in 1825 as "Jail Square," but became Market Square prior to 1836, and has served this purpose ever since; while that block, first mapped as "Market Square," became "Jail Square." The squares of Gonzales. Recorded Texas Historic Landmark, 1966