Capital Support Program
Protecting Historic Sites Across the State
The Texas Historical Commission (THC) preserves and operates 36 historic sites throughout the state. These unique places honor Texas history and inspire an understanding of what it means to be a Texan.
From Native American sites, plantations, and frontier forts to battlegrounds, common and elegant historic homes, and the leaders and statesmen who lived in them, these sites enrich people’s lives by sharing a history integral to the Texas we know today.
As the Friends of the THC, we support the preservation of these sites and help raise the funds and awareness to make preservation, restoration, and interpretation possible. Place-based education is core to the THC’s work, and we believe that the best way to share the unique and important stories of these historic sites is to bring these places and the people who inhabited them to life and make them accessible to all.
Acton Cemetery
Towering over Acton Cemetery, a statue of Elizabeth Crockett marks the burial site of folk hero Davy Crockett’s second wife.
Learn MoreFrench Legation
The French Legation began in 1841 as a private home for the French chargé d’affaires to the Republic of Texas.
Learn MoreOld Socorro Mission
This 1682 mission served Spanish and Native American communities displaced during the Pueblo Revolt.
Learn MoreBarrington Plantation
This Washington site was the final home of Anson Jones, the last president of the Republic of Texas.
Learn MoreFulton Mansion
Rising above the Aransas Bay and surrounded by stately live oaks, this mansion sits in the resort area of Rockport-Fulton.
Learn MorePalmito Ranch
This was the location of The Battle of Palmito Ranch: the final land battle of the American Civil War.
Learn MoreCaddo Mounds
These mounds are what is left of a village and ceremonial center built over 1,200 years ago by a group of Caddo Hasinai Indians.
Learn MoreGoodnight Ranch
In 1887, Charles Goodnight built a Victorian-style ranch house and established the Goodnight-Thayer Cattle Company.
Learn MorePort Isabel Lighthouse
The last Texas lighthouse open to the public, this historic structure was built in 1852 and was lit until the early 1900s.
Learn MoreCasa Navarro
Explore interactive exhibits in the restored 19th-century home of one of Texas’s most influential leaders: José Antonio Navarro.
Learn MoreKreische Brewery
In the 1860s, Heinrich Kreische built his home and one of the earliest commercial breweries in Texas.
Learn MoreSabine Pass Battleground
This is where a brief but decisive Confederate victory prevented Union forces from penetrating the Texas interior.
Learn MoreConfederate Reunion Grounds
On the banks of the Navasota River lies a gathering place where Civil War veterans met for reunions from 1889–1946.
Learn MoreLandmark Inn
As a roadside tavern, store, hotel, residence, and mill, this inn tells the story of Texas migration, industry, and preservation.
Learn MoreSam Bell Maxey
Built during the height of Reconstruction, this 1868 home tells the story of the Maxey family as they lived in a changing nation.
Learn MoreEisenhower’s Birthplace
This modest house is where the 34th U.S. president and WWII commander, Dwight David “Ike” Eisenhower, was born in 1890.
Learn MoreLevi Jordan Plantation
This site is important to understanding the plantation economy and culture it supported in the antebellum period of slavery.
Learn MoreSam Rayburn House
One of the most influential politicians of the 20th century, Sam Rayburn’s 1916 home holds original furnishings and memorabilia.
Learn MoreFannin Battleground
This site memorializes the brave soldiers who fought and lost the Battle of Coleto Creek in the Texas War for Independence.
Learn MoreLipantitlan
Named after the Lipan Apaches that camped nearby, this site played a role in Texas’s Independence.
Learn MoreSan Felipe de Austin
This site preserves the location of the first Anglo-American settlement and provisional capital of Texas.
Learn MoreFanthorp Inn
This historic hotel was built in 1834 and owned by Henry Fanthorp, postmaster of the Provisional Texas Government.
Learn MoreMagoffin Home
This 1875 home explores the stories of a multicultural family who impacted the early development of the Southwest borderlands.
Learn MoreSan Jacinto Battleground
This 1,200-acre park marks the location of the Battle of San Jacinto, which resulted in Texas’s independence in 1836.
Learn MoreFort Griffin
One in a line of western defense forts from 1867–1881, remnants remain today. It’s also home to the Texas Longhorn Herd.
Learn MoreMission Dolores
This Spanish mission shares the experience Native Americans had with Texas’s earliest European settlers.
Learn MoreStar of the Republic Museum
This star-shaped museum commemorates the site of the signing of the Texas Declaration of Independence.
Learn MoreFort Lancaster
Here lie remnants of one of four U.S. Army posts created in 1855 to protect the route between San Antonio and El Paso.
Learn MoreMonument Hill
This site memorializes the Texans killed in the Dawson Massacre and the Black Bean Episode (death lottery) of 1843.
Learn MoreStarr Family Home
This site maintains elegant structures, period furnishings, clothing, and antiques that map the 150-year history of the Starr family.
Learn MoreFort McKavett
This 150-year-old West Texas fort is one of the best-preserved examples of a Texas Indian Wars military post.
Learn MoreNational Museum of the Pacific War
The only institution in the continental U.S. dedicated to telling the story of the Pacific Theater in World War II.
Learn MoreVarner-Hogg Plantation
This site tells the stories of multiple families, free and enslaved, who lived, worked, and built a community here for over 130 years.
Learn MoreWashington-on-the-Brazos
Called “the birthplace of Texas,” it was on this site that Texas delegates announced Texas’s intention to separate from Mexico.
Learn MoreHelp Support Our State’s Historic Sites
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