DUANE
Duane's take
The official marker for the San Augustine County Jail is the story I'm about to tell you, in my own way. Now, if you want to talk about a building that has seen some things — a building with layers, literally and figuratively — pull up a chair, because the San Augustine County Jail has been holding secrets, and holding people, for a good long while. It starts in 1882.
That first jail goes up, red and buff brick, iron bars set hard into the mortar. Solid. The kind of construction that says we mean business.
But time has a way of changing what a county needs, and by 1919, San Augustine was ready for something bigger. So what do they do? They don't just tear the old place down and start from scratch.
No. They pull the bars right out of the brick — pulled from their moorings by teams of horses — and they fold those old bones into something new. A two-story rectangular building, symmetrical facades, minimal classical detailing.
The old jail doesn't disappear. It just becomes part of the next chapter. The 1919 jailhouse stands straight and sturdy.
Red and buff brick, same as its predecessor. Decades roll by. Then, somewhere in the 1950s, Sheriff N.L.
Tindall decides the place needs more room, and he goes and purchases additional cells all the way from San Antonio. The sheriff is making sure San Augustine County is equipped. Now here's where it gets a little peculiar.
In 1973, somebody decided that all that honest red and buff brick needed to be hidden — covered up under two layers of stucco-like concrete. Two layers. Whether that decision seemed like a good idea at the time, well, the marker doesn't say.
What it does say is that when the 2016 restoration came along, those two layers came right back off. The brick breathed again. The building kept doing its job as a county jail all the way until the year 2000.
And in 2002, the 1919 jail was named in honor of Sheriff N.L. Tindall. So there it stands — a building assembled from the bones of 1882, expanded by a sheriff with vision, buried under concrete for decades, and finally restored to what it always was underneath.
Some things, it turns out, are harder to cover up than others.
What the marker says
This 1919 County Jailhouse is a two-story rectangular building with symmetrical facades and minimal classical detailing. It was built from portions of an earlier 1882 jail including its bars, pulled from their brick moorings by teams of horses, and jail cells. By the 1950s, additional cells were purchased from San Antonio by Sheriff N.L. Tindall. Originally built of red and buff brick, in 1973, the jail was coated with 2 layers of stucco like concrete which were removed in the 2016 restoration. The building continued to be used as a county jail until 2000. The 1919 jail was named in honor of Sheriff Tindall in 2002. Recorded Texas Historic Landmark - 2017