DUANE
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Duane's take
Here's how the official marker tells it, and I'll do my best to do it justice. Way back in 1831, a man named J. Francisco Madero, appointed by the Mexican government to grant land titles, sat down and platted the Liberty town tract.
Forty-nine squares in the inner city, laid out with care and intention. Now, five of those squares were set aside for public usage, and this one, right here, has always been the site of municipal buildings. Always.
That's not nothing. That's a thread that runs unbroken from 1831 to today. In May of that same year, 1831, the people elected an ayuntamiento, which is to say a city council, and with it came the first alcalde, the first mayor, a man by the name of Hugh B.
Johnston. Fresh government, new city, big hopes. And then.
Well. That same year, a man named Juan D. Bradburn, the garrison commander of Anahuac, dissolved that city government entirely.
Just like that, the ayuntamiento was gone. Hugh B. Johnston's tenure as the first mayor of Liberty, measured not in years but in months.
History doesn't always let a good thing breathe. The square itself, though, kept right on being what Madero intended. The north portion of the present city hall went up in 1939, and the south part followed in 1959.
Two halves of one building, separated by twenty years, standing together on the same ground that was set aside before Texas was Texas. Some squares, it turns out, hold more than buildings. They hold the whole argument about who gets to govern, and who gets to say so.
What the marker says
J. Francisco Madero, appointed by Mexican government to grant land titles, platted Liberty town tract, 1831, with 49 squares in inner city. Five were set aside for public usage-- this square has always been site of municipal buildings. In May 1831, an ayuntamiento (city council) was elected; also the first alcalde (mayor), Hugh B. Johnston. This city government was dissolved that same year by Juan D. Bradburn, the garrison commander of Anahuac. The north portion of present city hall was constructed, 1939; the south part, 1959.