Main Street/Market Square Historic District

Main Street/Market Square Historic District
U.S. National Register of Historic Places
U.S. Historic district
Location	Roughly bounded by Buffalo Bayou, Fannin, Texas, and Milam streets Houston, Texas
Built	1858
Architect	Multiple
Architectural style	various
NRHP Reference #	83004471[1]
Added to NRHP	July 18, 1983

Main Street/Market Square Historic District is a historic district in Houston that includes the Market Square Park. It includes buildings nearby, as well as the square itself. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1983.^[1]

The Main Street Market Square District has irregular boundaries. The district includes all of the blocks between Travis and Main from Texas Street to the northern boundary of University of Houstown-Downtown. From the southern edge of Market Square at Preston Street, it captures all of the blocks northward until Buffalo Bayou. It includes three and a half blocks between Main and Fannin Streets, running south from Franklin Street. A wedge-shaped, partial block at Milam falls within the district, as well as a partial block east of Main Street at the base of the viaduct.^[2]

One Main Building (formerly the Merchants and Manufacturers Building), located on the campus of the University of Houston–Downtown

The University of Houston–Downtown (UHD) is a four-year state university, located within the Main Street/Market Square Historic District. Founded in 1974, it is one of four separate and distinct institutions in the University of Houston System. UHD has an enrollment of 12,900 students—making it the 13th largest public university in Texas and the second-largest university in the Houston area.^[3]

One of the anchors of the district is Market Square Park, so-named because this site previously hosted four Houston City Halls and City Markets. Adjacent to the park are three nineteenth-century structures: the Fox-Kuhlman Building at 305-307 Travis, the Baker-Meyer Building at 315 Travis, and the Kennedy Bakery Building at 813 Congress. Like the Kennedy Bakery Building, the property at 214 Travis had been owned by Irish-born baker, John Kennedy. He started a building there in 1860. WL Foley Dry Goods commissioned Eugene Heiner to enlarge the structure in 1889. Across the street at 201 Travis is the Houston National Bank, once owned by Ross S. Sterling. Houston Ice and Brewing Company built the Magnolia Brewery Building at 110 Milam and the Magnolia Ballroom an adjacent facility at 715 Franklin.^[4]

Eugene Heiner designed two other buildings in the district: the 1882 Henry Brashear Building at 910 Prairie, and the Sweeney and Coombs Building at 310 Main. Other historic buildings in the district along Main Street include the Rice Hotel, the Barringer-Norton Building, the Scanlan Building (Houston), the adjacent Stuart and Sterne Buildings, the Sweeney, Coombs, and Fredericks Building, and the Union National Bank Building.^[4]

Gallery

• 
  Main Street looking south from Dallas Avenue, Houston, Texas (postcard, circa 1909)
• 
  Main Street looking south Houston, Texas (postcard, circa 1904)
• 
  Main Street looking south, Houston, Texas (postcard, circa 1908)
• 
  Main Street Viaduct and Ship Channel (postcard, circa 1913)
• 
  Main Street, north from Preston Avenue, Houston (postcard, circa 1905-1907)
• 
  Morris building which was located on Main Street on the east side of the 300 block, c. 1869
• 
  Market Square Park, SW corner of Congress @ Travis, 2012

See also

• National Register of Historic Places listings in Harris County, Texas

References

Coordinates: 29°45′43″N 95°21′43″W / 29.762°N 95.362°W / 29.762; -95.362

National Register of Historic Places in Texas
Lists by county	Anderson Andrews Angelina Aransas Archer Armstrong Atascosa Austin Bailey Bandera Bastrop Baylor Bee Bell Bexar Blanco Borden Bosque Bowie Brazoria Brazos Brewster Briscoe Brooks Brown Burleson Burnet Caldwell Calhoun Callahan Cameron Camp Carson Cass Castro Chambers Cherokee Childress Clay Cochran Coke Coleman Collin Collingsworth Colorado Comal Comanche Concho Cooke Coryell Cottle Crane Crockett Crosby Culberson Dallam Dallas Dawson Deaf Smith Delta Denton DeWitt Dickens Dimmit Donley Duval Eastland Ector Edwards El Paso Ellis Erath Falls Fannin Fayette Fisher Floyd Foard Fort Bend Franklin Freestone Frio Gaines Galveston Garza Gillespie Glasscock Goliad Gonzales Gray Grayson Gregg Grimes Guadalupe Hale Hall Hamilton Hansford Hardeman Hardin Harris Harrison Haskell Hartley Hays Hemphill Henderson Hidalgo Hill Hockley Hood Hopkins Houston Howard Hudspeth Hunt Hutchinson Irion Jack Jackson Jasper Jeff Davis Jefferson Jim Hogg Jim Wells Johnson Jones Karnes Kaufman Kendall Kenedy Kent Kerr Kimble King Kinney Kleberg Knox La Salle Lamar Lamb Lampasas Lavaca Lee Leon Liberty Limestone Lipscomb Live Oak Llano Loving Lubbock Lynn Madison Marion Martin Mason Matagorda Maverick McCulloch McLennan McMullen Medina Menard Midland Milam Mills Mitchell Montague Montgomery Moore Morris Motley Nacogdoches Navarro Newton Nolan Nueces Ochiltree Oldham Orange Palo Pinto Panola Parker Parmer Pecos Polk Potter Presidio Rains Randall Reagan Real Red River Reeves Refugio Roberts Robertson Rockwall Runnels Rusk Sabine San Augustine San Jacinto San Patricio San Saba Schleicher Scurry Shackelford Shelby Sherman Smith Somervell Starr Stephens Sterling Stonewall Sutton Swisher Tarrant Taylor Terrell Terry Throckmorton Titus Tom Green Travis Trinity Tyler Upshur Upton Uvalde Val Verde Van Zandt Victoria Walker Waller Ward Washington Webb Wharton Wheeler Wichita Wilbarger Willacy Williamson Wilson Winkler Wise Wood Yoakum Young Zapata Zavala
National Parks	Big Bend National Park Guadalupe Mountains National Park
Other lists	Bridges National Historic Landmarks National Natural Landmarks Recorded Texas Historic Landmarks
Keeper of the Register History of the National Register of Historic Places Property types Historic district Contributing property