McCrary House

Duane's take

Here's how the official marker tells it, and here's how I'm gonna tell it to you. The story of the McCrary House, Comanche County, Texas. Now settle in, because this one's got deep roots.

James Madison McCrary, born in 1845, showed up in Comanche around 1870. And he didn't come alone. He had his father and his brother with him, and together those three men set up a mercantile right on the town square.

But if you think a general store was the full measure of James Madison McCrary's ambition, well, you'd be mistaken. He also started the county's first cotton gin. The county's first.

That's the kind of man you remember. He married Ella Griffith in 1872, and four years later, he started building something meant to last. Not a rough-hewn cabin.

Not a slapdash plank house. He brought in limestone quarried near Austin and built a proper central-hall structure, with segmental arches and gable-end chimneys. The kind of house that makes a town sit up a little straighter just by standing there.

Now here's where the story gets interesting, because a man like McCrary doesn't sit still for long. He was a recognized horticulturist, and in 1910 he packed up and moved to a farm east of Comanche. Traded the town square for the soil.

But that limestone house kept waiting. Patient as the stone it was cut from. Then, in 1926, James Madison McCrary, born back in 1845, came home.

Came back to retire inside the very walls he'd raised fifty years before. He passed in 1932, and the house stayed in McCrary hands, held by his descendants, all the way until 1987. Over a century of one family's story, written in limestone quarried near Austin, standing right there in Comanche County.

Some houses are just buildings. This one was a homecoming.

What the marker says

James Madison McCrary (1845-1932) came to Comanche about 1870. With his father and brother he operated a mercantile on the town square and began the county's first cotton gin. He married Ella Griffith in 1872 and began construction of this house in 1876. Built of limestone quarried near Austin, the central-hall structure features segmental arches and gable-end chimneys. A recognized horticulturist, McCrary moved to a farm east of Comanche in 1910. He returned here to retire in 1926. The home was owned by McCrary descendants until 1987. Recorded Texas Historic Landmark - 1989