Site of Early Belton House

A large building erected here 1850, by Mrs. Sarah Lawler (1807-1890). In this structure, little more than a shed, Mrs. Lawler boarded workmen who were surveying and building Nolanville (later renamed Belton), county seat of newly-created Bell County. Tents, brush arbors, log cabins, and clapboard shanties dotted the landscape; and people moved in before the town was entirely laid out. Mrs. Lawler, born in Tennessee, came to Texas 1837 with husband Eli and their four children. After his death, 1838, she took in boarders, helping to pioneer county development. (1968)