National Historic Landmarks are nationally significant historic places designated by the Secretary of the Interior because they possess exceptional value or quality in illustrating or interpreting the heritage of the United States.
The NHL program draws upon the expertise of National Park Service staff who work to nominate new landmarks and provide assistance to existing landmarks. The Texas Historical Commission reviews and comments on all proposed NHLs in Texas. The National Park Service has designated over 45 sites in Texas as landmarks, scattered across twenty-nine counties. Not surprisingly, San Antonio’s Alamo, Houston’s Apollo Mission Control Center, the Dealey Plaza Historic District in Dallas, and the Texas State Capitol are all among the list of Texas icons that have achieved landmark status.
The National Monuments designation was created under the Antiquities Act of 1906, which authorizes the President to create such monuments on federal land containing historic landmarks, historic or prehistoric structures, or other objects of historic or scientific interest. Congress may also designate landmarks under its own authority. The Texas Historical Commission has no role in the designation of National Monuments. Texas does have one national monument to date – the Alibates Flint Quarries located in the Texas Panhandle. Here, for 12,000 years, people quarried flint for toolmaking.
National Natural Landmarks are also included in this theme category with 20 sites located within the state of Texas. Natural features represented include several highly decorated cave systems exhibiting a variety of rare speleothems, including the Caverns of Sonora and Boerne's Cave Without a Name. Spectacular places such as Palo Duro Canyon State Park and rare one like Odessa's Meteor Crater are also recognized on this list. Ownership of these sites is as diverse as the features represented and include U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, state parks and private organizations and individuals.
NATIONAL PARK STYLIN’ The stone cabins of Bastrop State Park appear to rise from the ground organically, as if germinated from seeds much like the loblolly pine surrounding them. Their native rock…
NOT JUST BIG... IT’S MAMMOTH! In 1978, two fossil hunters working their way cross-country near the Bosque River discovered a large bone protruding out an eroded ravine. The bone was delivered to…
In a small town called Gladys City just south of Beaumont, the first year of the new 20th century hadn’t delivered much promise. The Texas coastline suffered a devastating hurricane, taking the…
Fort Belknap was established in 1851 as a northern anchor on the Texas frontier line of defense. The garrison safeguarded travelers along a network of frontier trails, most notably the Butterfield Overland…
Fort Concho, established in 1867 on the banks of the Concho River, served as regimental headquarters for some of the most recognized frontier units in Texas history, including the 10th Cavalry, better…
Fort Richardson, established in 1868 as the northernmost army outpost in Texas, anchored the defensive line of fortifications built across the Texas frontier. During its 10-year history, the Fort, located just outside…
MISSION SAN ANTONIO DE VALERO Spain’s interest in the New World, including the territory that would one day become Texas, included colonization and expansion of Spanish rule, important instruments in achieving political…
The museum is located in the house that served as John Nance Garner's home for more than thirty years and tells the stories of the remarkable lives of John Nance "Cactus Jack"…
Casa Navarro State Historic Site, a Texas Historical Commission property, is situated in the heart of old San Antonio, in what used to be a thriving Tejano neighborhood known as Laredito. The…
Cave Without A Name is one of nature's magnificent masterpieces, the underground contains six cavernous rooms filled with enormous clusters of stalactites and stalagmites, delicate soda straws, rimstone dams, and unique flowstone…
Enchanted Rock was designated a National Natural Landmark in 1970 and was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1984. The Rock is a huge, pink granite exfoliation dome, that…
The city’s first permanent U.S. military installation, Fort Sam Houston, is a National Historic Landmark and home of the Fort Sam Houston Museum. Housed in a 1905 mess hall, the museum’s artifacts…
GREEK REVIVAL REVIVED The Governor’s Mansion, official residence of the state’s chief executive, was constructed of local Austin brick between 1854 and 1856 for $14,500, with an additional $2,500 appropriated for interior…
Longhorn Cavern State Park is a scenic park in the rugged Hill Country. The state park opened on Thanksgiving Day in 1932 and was dedicated as a natural landmark in 1971. In…
Visitors enjoy picnicking, camping, backpacking, sightseeing, hiking, photography, bird watching, fishing, swimming and nature study. People should stay on designated trails, because maples have a shallow root system, and soil compaction from…
THE WORLD IS WELCOME The original birthplace of the 36th President of the United States, a board and batten dog-trot, had no modern conveniences and a bare dirt yard (kept “swept” in…
IN ALL ITS MAJESTY Regardless of whatever current production might be occupying its stage, the historic Majestic Theatre in downtown San Antonio usually manages to steal the show, at least when the…
In the course of fulfilling its mission, the National Museum of the Pacific War grew from its original home as the Nimitz Museum, housed in Fredericksburg’s unique 1890 Nimitz Steamboat Hotel, to…
SPELUNKERS’ SPECIAL Flowstones, stalactites, chandeliers, stalagmites, and soda straws are all terms for the formations you’ll see in one of the most stunning show caves in Texas. Natural Bridge Caverns, located between…
Dedicated in 1930, Randolph Air Force Base quickly gained the moniker “West Point of the Air,” training thousands of cadets and instructors across almost a century of service. Towering over the Spanish…
NOT JUST A CHURCH BUT A MISSION Four of the five surviving Spanish colonial missions in and around San Antonio comprise the San Antonio Missions National Historical Park. With the National Park…
The circa 1749 Spanish Governor’s Palace served as the headquarters and residence of the presidio of San Antonio de Bexar’s captain, the ranking representative of the king of Spain in the absence…
RED GRANITE MOUNTAIN Take a free guided tour of our state Capitol building, its native red granite making it one of the most impressive public buildings in the nation, and you’ll see…
The Battleship Texas is currently closed for a major repair project. The USS Texas holds the distinguished designation of a National Historic Landmark and a National Mechanical Engineering Landmark. Commissioned in 1914…
The grand 1886 Bishop’s Palace was designed by noted architect Nicholas Clayton for prominent politician, businessman and former Confederate Col. Walter Gresham. The Galveston Houston Diocese of the Catholic Church later purchased…
The massive structure of Hangar 9 at Brooks City Base is a National Historic Landmark – and believed to be the only surviving wooden airplane hangar from World War I in its…
FORT DEFIANCE Presidio La Bahia, a Spanish fort near Goliad, had already been around for a while by the time its walls echoed the sounds of the Goliad Massacre of 1836. First…
On a chilly April afternoon in 1836, this strip of coastal prairie rang with the boom of cannon, crack of musket fire and shouts of “Remember the Alamo!” and “Remember Goliad!” Despite…
ASTRONAUT CENTRAL Established as the Manned Spacecraft Center by NASA in 1961 and named in honor of the thirty-sixth president, the Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center has been the global leader of…
THE STRAND Galveston’s historic Strand began as just one humble street, formerly known as Avenue B according the city’s original 1830’s plat. The name change, a switch from the mundane to the…
Galveston’s remarkable 1877 tall ship, Elissa, began its life as a British cargo ship, specializing in voyages to smaller ports of the Caribbean and the Gulf of Mexico, and she twice loaded…
The city’s most-visited heritage site, Dealey Plaza Historic District, is also a National Historic Landmark. The plaza was built from 1934 to 1940 as the western gateway to downtown. Tragedy made it…
Dinosaur Valley State Park, located just northwest of Glen Rose in Somervell County, is a 1524.72-acre, scenic park set astride the Paluxy River. The land for the park was acquired from private…
BIG TEX, BIGGER STAR Fair Park, home to the 1936 Texas Centennial and the annual Texas State Fair, offers visitors eight museums, six performance facilities, the country’s largest collection of Art Deco…
Step into the warm and welcoming world of one of Texas’ best known statesmen, Sam Rayburn. One of the most powerful and influential politicians in the 20th century, Rayburn served in the…
For more than 100 years a continuous debate over the land known as the Chamizal - 600 acres between the bed of the Rio Grande in 1852 and the present channel of…
A FRONTIER DEFENSE The frontier post of Fort Davis, established in 1854 and serving the Texas frontier until 1891, provided a strategic factor in the defense system of the American Southwest. The…
A unique geology and a relative abundance of water made the Hueco Tanks site a refuge for nature and humans for over ten thousand years. Formed thirty four million years ago when…
BEAUTY UNDERGROUND Co-founder of the National Speleological Society Bill Stephenson once said of the stunning environment found in the Caverns of Sonora that “…its beauty cannot be exaggerated, even by Texans”. It’s…
BAT SPECTACULAR The Devil’s Sinkhole, located a few miles northeast of Rocksprings along State Highway 377, is a National Natural Landmark and believed to be the largest known single-room cave in the…
IT CAME FROM OUTERSPACE The Odessa Meteor Crater, location of a catastrophic mash-up from space, offers an interpretive center full of science fact alongside a giant hole in the ground that may…
At the Alibates Flint Quarries located in the Texas Panhandle, people quarried flint for toolmaking as early as 12,000 years ago. The stone, highly valued by early hunters occupying a pre-statehood Texas…
AN ANCIENT WATERING HOLE Lubbock Lake National Historic Landmark is a unique archaeological site— the only one in North America that preserves a complete record of nearly 12,000 years of human history…
Established in 1935, Muleshoe National Wildlife Refuge is the oldest National Wildlife Refuge in Texas. The refuge includes several intermittent salinas, or salt lakes, some of which have been modified to extend…
WHERE THE CLIFF SINGS AND THE CANYONS DANCE Palo Duro Canyon, considered the “Grand Canyon of Texas” for its geological variation and rich color, is 120 miles long and 800 feet deep…
FROM PROTECTION TO EDUCATION Fort Brown, located in Brownsville, served as fortification against Mexican soldiers, Native American incursions, the Confederacy, the Union Army, as well as providing a front for the battle…
150 YEAR OLD SUNDIAL STILL TELLS TIME: BATTERIES NOT INCLUDED The 19th century fortified complex of the Treviño-Uribe Rancho, built on a bluff overlooking the Rio Grande River in 1830, is one…
"IT'S GOOD TO BE KING" Captain Richard King (he earned his captain's title driving steamboats) created a legacy from the grasslands of Texas' Wild Horse Desert, the stretch of southern coastal plains…
The Longest Stretch of Undeveloped Barrier Island in the World Padre Island National Seashore is a barrier island separating the Gulf of Mexico from the Laguna Madre. The park protects 66 miles…
The Battle of Palmito Ranch was the final land battle of the American Civil War. It was fought May 12–13, 1865, along the banks of the Rio Grande, 13 miles east of…
OPENING THE U.S.-MEXICO WAR Site of the first salvo launched in the U.S.-Mexican War of 1846, the Palo Alto Battlefield still retains its natural character over 150 years later. This coastal prairie…
SMALL RIVER TOWN, BIG RIVER HISTORY Over two centuries of Texas borderland heritage surrounds the plaza in the historic river town of Roma. Assigned National Historic Landmark status in 1993, the plaza’s…
Naval enthusiasts climb aboard a World War II aircraft carrier at the USS Lexington Museum on the Bay. Known as the "Blue Ghost" and “Lady Lex,” this ship served in nearly every…
State Historic Sites
From western forts and adobe structures to Victorian mansions and pivotal battlegrounds, the Texas Historical…
Museums
Museums and the artifacts they keep safe help bridge the span between past and present…
Arts and Culture
So you think you can dance? Texas does too! The state celebrates its music, arts…
Historic Trails And Highways
Antique horse trails aren't the only discovery options for historic routes in Texas. We've got…
