DUANE
Duane's take
Here's my telling of what the official marker has to say about the Patton-Buchanan Building in Crockett, Houston County. Now, some buildings just stand there. And some buildings have the nerve to outlast everything around them.
The Patton-Buchanan Building is that second kind. William Monroe Patton — born 1855, died 1915 — was a Crockett merchant with a vision, and apparently the ambition to match it. Around 1903, he put up this commercial structure.
That might sound like a modest achievement, but here's the thing: this wasn't his first rodeo, and it wasn't his last. This building was the fourth of six — six — that Patton constructed in the same stretch of Crockett. Six buildings, all his, all in a row.
People started calling it the Patton Block, and you can see why. Now, of those six buildings, only this one — this stubborn, dignified survivor — still wears its original Mesker Bros. pressed metal storefront. The others?
Gone, altered, moved on. This one held firm. The story doesn't end with Patton, though.
In 1926, a Crockett mechanic and businessman by the name of Wade Hampton Buchanan — born 1894, died 1978 — bought the building. And then he did something quietly remarkable: he leased it to a variety of local businesses, year after year, all the way until 1976. Fifty years of commerce flowing through those doors.
Fifty years of Crockett life happening right here. One merchant's block. One pressed metal storefront that refused to change.
And a building that just kept showing up for this town, decade after decade.
What the marker says
Crockett merchant William Monroe Patton (1855-1915) built this commercial structure about 1903. It was the fourth of six buildings he constructed on what became known as the Patton Block and is the only one that retains its original Mesker Bros. pressed metal storefront. In 1926 Wade Hampton Buchanan (1894-1978), a Crockett mechanic and businessman, bought the building and leased it until 1976 to a variety of local businesses. Recorded Texas Historic Landmark - 1982