DUANE
Duane's take
Here's how the official marker tells it — the story of the Llano County Jail. Now, every town worth its salt has a building with a nickname, and Llano, Texas is no exception. This one earned its name the hard way — from the people who knew it best from the inside.
The jail was erected in 1895, built by the Pauly Jail Building and Manufacturing Co. out of St. Louis, Missouri. And right away you get a sense that somebody meant business.
The exterior was clad in gray granite, quarried right there in Llano County itself — local stone for a local institution. But the granite wasn't what people remembered. What they remembered was the roof.
That roof was red. Bright, unmistakable red, sitting atop a Romanesque revival design that rose four floors above the Texas Hill Country. And the prisoners — well, they had a gift for understatement.
They took to calling the place the Red Top. Not the Iron House, not the Gray Walls, not anything that might suggest what awaited them inside. Just the Red Top.
Almost sounds like somewhere you'd want to stay. Almost. Let's talk about what was actually inside.
The first floor belonged to the jailer — his office and his living quarters both, which means the man lived at work in a way most of us would not envy. The second floor held four cells and two drunk tanks. Practical, utilitarian, doing what a county jail does.
Then you get to the third and fourth floors. That's where the gallows were housed. Two full floors for the gallows.
The building didn't let you forget, not for a single story, what the top of the Red Top was for. So the next time you pass through Llano and catch a glimpse of that gray granite and that red roof, just remember — the nickname was chosen by the guests. And some of them never came back down.
What the marker says
This building was erected in 1895 by the Pauly Jail Building and Manufacturing Co. of St. Louis, Mo. The gray granite for the exterior was quarried in the county. The red roof of the Romanesque revival jail provided the building its nickname, and prisoners often spoke of staying over at the "Red Top." The first floor was used by the jailer for his office and living quarters. The second floor had four cells and two drunk tanks. The third and fourth floors housed the gallows. Recorded Texas Historic Landmark - 1979