DUANE
Duane's take
Here's my telling of what the official marker says about the Robert B. Evans Home in Bexar County. Now settle in, because this one's got gold in it — literally.
We're talkin' about a stone house built in 1882, and the stone itself didn't come from just down the road. It came from Buda, forty-five miles to the northeast. Somebody wanted that particular stone bad enough to haul it all that way, and that somebody was Robert B.
Evans. Born in Tennessee in 1821, Evans left his home state in 1847 — and if you know your history, you know what was just around the corner. Two years later, in 1849, he was in California, pan in hand, working the gold fields.
Now most men who chased that rush came home with nothing but sore backs and tall tales. Evans? He panned enough gold to actually buy land.
This land. He made that purchase in 1865, and on the east side of the property, also dating to 1865, stands a smokehouse built of stone. So before the main house ever went up, before a single block of Buda stone made that forty-five mile journey, Evans already had his smokehouse standing.
The big house came in 1882. And between those walls, Evans and his wife Rebecca — she was a Murchison before she married him — raised nine children. Nine.
Robert B. Evans lived until 1905. That Tennessee boy who went west with a gold pan and came back to Texas with a dream ended up leaving behind a stone house, a stone smokehouse, and a family deep enough to fill both.
What the marker says
Built in 1882 of stone from Buda (45 mi. NE). On east side is an 1865 smokehouse. Evans (1821-1905) left his native Tennessee in 1847; went to California in 1849, where he panned enough gold to buy this land, 1865. He and his wife Rebecca (Murchison) reared nine children here. Recorded Texas Historic Landmark - 1969