Brigham House

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The Brigham House, a two-story wood-frame building, was built by Percy T. and Annie Cox Brigham (and their children Ben and Bessie) in 1914 for their home. Percy Brigham was an attorney from 1907 to 1964 and was long-time president of the Blanco National Bank. His father, Col. Ben Brigham, after his wife’s death lived here until his own death in 1935. Later the Brigham’s great nephew Jack Harney also lived here after his mother’s death, and Bessie Brigham lived the rest of her life in the house.

One day in the early 1930s Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow were seen on “Lover’s Lane” off Farm Road 165. Realizing they were recognized, they raced north through town. A law officer took a shot at them and missed, but put a bullet hole in the Brigham House. No one was hit, but traces of the bullet hole can still be seen.

The Brigham family had been living in this house for 82 years when Bessie, the last member, passed away in 1996. “Miss Bessie” had taught school in the area for forty-five years. The Brighams had been the only family ever to have lived in this house, which had always been a gathering place for family and friends. After Bessie died, the home was sold for an antique shop, but in 1997 it again became a home. If the Brighams could know, they probably would be pleased.

A fine example of American vernacular architecture, the Brigham House is essentially a “gabled ell” (or “upright and wing”), characterized by a gable-front main structure, a side-gabled wing, and entry through the porch in the “ell.” It clearly departs from the ornate ornamentation of the Victorian era and partakes of a more restrained 20th-century style.