DUANE
Duane's take
Here's how the official marker tells it — and it's a story worth telling right. Somewhere in Harris County, Texas, there's a piece of ground that's seen more history than most counties can claim on a good day. It's the site of the Old Houston Academy, founded in 1856, and from that single address, you can trace the arc of war, grief, reinvention, and the long stubborn life of a Texas institution.
The Academy came up in 1856, a place of learning in a young and growing city. But the Civil War has a way of emptying schoolrooms. The Academy lost most of its male students to the Confederate army — not a few, not a handful, most of them.
And then, as if to mark the transformation, the building itself stopped being a school and became an army hospital in 1864 and into 1865. Where boys once studied, the wounded came to mend. Now here's where the story deepens.
In 1867, this same building became the site for the lying-in-state of General Albert Sidney Johnston — a man who had lived near Houston, and whose life was about as tangled up with history as any Texan's ever was. Johnston had served as a secretary of war for the Republic of Texas. He was a veteran of the Black Hawk War, the Texas Revolution, and the Mexican War.
By any measure, that is a resume that commands respect. But General Johnston died in 1862, at the Civil War Battle of Shiloh. And five years after that battle, his body came to rest, for a time, in that very building on that very spot.
The whole city would have felt the weight of that. The ground didn't stay still after the war, of course. By 1881, the old Academy site had become the Clopper Institute.
And it kept on changing — moving into the city school system, known at various points as Central High and as Sam Houston High School, before eventually settling into use as school district headquarters. From academy to hospital, from a general's lying-in-state to a school and then another school and then the headquarters of learning itself — that ground has carried a lot. Some sites just seem to attract history.
This one didn't have to go looking for it.
What the marker says
Founded 1856. Lost most of its male students to Confederate army in Civil War. In 1864-1865 building was used as an army hospital. Was site in 1867 for the lying-in-state of body of General Albert Sidney Johnston, who had lived near Houston. (A secretary of war, Republic of Texas; veteran of Black Hawk War, Texas Revolution, Mexican War; Gen. Johnston died in 1862 Civil War Battle of Shiloh.) Became Clopper Institute, 1881. In city school system, has been known as Central High and Sam Houston High School before use as school district headquarters.