Oakville, the seat of Live Oak County from 1856 to 1919, first called "On the Sulphur," stood near a Nueces River crossing known as Puente de la Piedra, or Rock Crossing. Joseph Bartlett built a stone courthouse and attached log jail in 1857 as a center of authority. After the Civil War, the county became part of the growing cattle industry, and Oakville served as a commerce hub for freight wagons and a place where ranchers bought supplies. With sheriff headquarters, the jail helped make the town seem safer. During the 1870s, J.S. Campbell oversaw rebuilding the courthouse with the jail placed inside. By 1887, Oakville had built a free-standing two-story stone Italianate-style jail that held frontier criminals from bar fighters to horse thieves. In 1919, after Oakville lost a railway bid, a county election chose George West as the new county seat, and the old jail became one of the few standing structures in Oakville. Built of sandstone from a nearby quarry and corniced with heavy sandstone, the jail has stone facades and corners covered in white stucco, surviving window sills that show period ventilation, a first floor with a reception room, office, and living quarters, and a second floor with jail cells, including three for general holding and a fourth for women and juveniles. It also has two corbelled chimneys and a metal cistern at the rear. Its design came from the Diebold Lock and Safe Company of Canton, Ohio, and it and its twin in Mills County are listed in the National Register of Historic Places.