Besson Building

In 1893, Madame Martha Fontaine-Besson, after encountering promotion of La Porte at the World's Fair, traveled from Chicago to La Porte on an excursion train to investigate Texas and invested in several local properties, including a cottage at Sylvan Beach, a farm in Lomax, and a town lot at Main and Second Street. She remained long enough to oversee the beginning of construction of a three-story brick building on that lot, then returned to England and never visited La Porte again, though agents managed her property. Built with brick manufactured at brick yards north of town, the building later housed a number of businesses, served as the site where the first Board of Trade, later the Chamber of Commerce, was organized, and provided a general meeting room on the third floor for different groups. In 1915, a tenant operated the Quick Service Garage in the back part of the first floor, which was half shell and half wood, and on June 5, 1915, a spark ignited a container of gasoline there, causing the worst fire the city had ever had. The fire destroyed not only the building but most of downtown La Porte, and as townspeople began rebuilding, the Great Storm of 1915 destroyed their efforts before the town was rebuilt.

La Porte, Texas · United States