Home to a succession of businesses since its construction in 1894, the two buildings have now merged and are occupied by the Red Door Bed & Breakfast. It is a time capsule of Mason's commercial growth as it tried to shake its dangerous reputation at the dawn of the new century. The following focuses on a few chapters of the building's history, looking most closely at its occupants at the turn of the 20th century.

James Ranck, who is often regarded as the "father of Mason,” embraced this effort. Ranck was a Union sympathizer from Indiana who settled in Mason in the late 1850s. His vision for Mason and his dedication to its improvement are evidenced in gestures like his support for establishing a Methodist Church in town. Despite not being formally religious himself and going as far as to express a hatred for priestcraft, he believed enough in the civilizing influences of the church. (Source: Mason County Communities. Mason, Tex.: Mason County Sesquicentennial Committee, 1986.)


Though not especially adept or lucky in matters of business, Ranck quickly bought up land in Mason County and began to establish the hallmarks of a modern town, including an imposing two-story store on the corner of the square. This building sitting two doors down from the Red Door, is the oldest surviving retail structure on the square, and the third-oldest extant building in Mason.

If a town dance or large social event was happening in Mason between 1910 and the early 1920s, it happened at the C. C. Smith Hall. During the first decades of the twentieth century, the local newspaper reported regularly on social affairs that took place here, whether it was a Grand Masquerade Ball (Mason County News, January 27, 1911) or the Valentine's Day party held for Miss Ruth Martin and her 75 closest friends (Mason County News, February 17, 1921).


In addition to its central location on Courthouse Square, the hall's popularity was in part due to the prominence of its owner, C.C. Smith, a local rancher. In 1885, Smith, along with other sons of Mason like Ben F. Gooch and William Koock, was a trustee for the new grammar school, which still stands today as a Texas Historic Landmark that now houses the Mason County Museum. With Smith's endorsement, the hall was no doubt deemed a reputable establishment, of concern to those who were mindful of reforming Mason's unruly behavior of decades past.

It was around 1915 and recording technology was in its infancy. Jazz and blues were still cooking between the downbeats. But ragtime was everywhere, including in Texas, where Euday Bowman of the Fort Worth area was composing pieces in unusual rhythms and melodies that would go on to influence some of the greatest jazz artists of the 20th century. Were the people of Mason playing "Twelfth Street Rag" during their dances?

Or perhaps it was Austin group, Jimmie Joys' St. Anthony Hotel Orchestra, that added a stop in Mason on their tour of the hill country. At that time, dance halls often booked what were called territory bands, or, small orchestras that were mostly confined to a single region. The hall was known to book jazz acts (or "jass," as it was originally spelled), so it's possible!

From now on, when you hear tales of tough Texas women, inured to the hardships of 19th-century frontier life, you should picture Anna Martin.

Dragged to Texas in 1858 by her mother, who fled in shame over her husband's financial ruin back home in Germany, a 15-year-old Anna must have been shocked at these new circumstances. Once the daughter of a wealthy textile salesman and aristocratic mother, she was now just another penniless immigrant arriving by ship to a crowded dock in Galveston. A year later, she was married to her cousin, Charles, and learning how to carve out a living in the hill country wilderness.

They had joined their Uncle Louis, who was among the first Germans to buy up land under the terms of the Meusebach Treaty, and settled ten miles southeast of Mason, near the Llano River and just off of a well-known Native trail that would eventually become a popular stagecoach line. They called the land Hedwig's Hill.

Charles and Anna ran a store in Hedwig's Hill, dealing in the necessities of frontier life, including wool, cotton, cattle, hogs, and sheep, which no respectable farm could do without. In 1864, Charles fell ill with rheumatism, a common affliction in the 19th century, and was bedridden until he died in 1879. Even without Charles' illness, the Martins were in dire straits. With the nearby Fort Mason abandoned during the Civil War, local banditry was on the uptick. The store was the frequent target of lootings and had endured repeated attacks by local confederates who resented the Martin's Union sympathies. To add insult to injury, the Confederate dollar, which the Martins had no choice but to accept, had become worthless after the war. The Martins were penniless, and Anna, who was only 21 at the time, had no choice but to eventually commandeer her husband's business affairs. Source.


But then a funny thing happened, funny at least for how exceptional it was at the time: Anna found herself to be quite the savvy businesswoman. She foresaw the eventual supremacy of barbed wire on the ranch. (Her store was the first to carry it in Mason County.) Over time, along with her sons, Anna developed their family's freighting business and by the 1890s, her name was appearing in papers alongside cattlemen like J. W. White. In 1893, the major Texas newspaper The Galveston Daily News
reported that Martin had shipped "thirty carloads of cattle to Chicago," (September 30, 1893). You don't have to know much about cattle to know that 30 carloads is nothing to sneeze at.

Photos courtesy of the Mason County Historical Commission.