Pursley's Jitney Service

1915. Kerr County Historical Commission collection.

Here I am, off on a tangent again.  I saw this photo in the Kerr County Historical Commission collection and was curious as to where it was taken. I thought it might be on Water Street, but turns out it's not. I now know that most of the buildings in the photo no longer stand. They were in the 200 block of Mountain Street (now Earl Garrett Street) and have been replaced by the Baehre Building. The only building that still survives is the rock building, a corner of which is on the far right in the photo. That building is the Weston Building, home to Francisco's restaurant.

On the bottom of the photo is written  "Pursley's Service Line 'Kerrville's Pride'."
From March 1915 to June 1916 W. W. Pursley "The Man that Put 'Jitneys' in Kerrville. Fare is 10 cents.  Will do jitney service out of town." advertised that his office and station were "next to" the Post Office.  Research shows that it was near, not next to, the Post Office.  In June 1916 he sold the business to Henry James.
During this time period the Post Office was in the Masonic Building on Mountain Street so that is where I began looking for the jitney office location.

This photo appears to show two wood frame buildings and a brick building.

The Sanborn fire insurance map was an important help to figure this out. To the left is a clip from the 1916 Sanborn map showing the stretch of Mountain Street between the Masonic building at the top and the Weston building at the bottom.  In between are three small buildings between the vacant Masonic Building and the Weston Building. Two of the buildings were frame, the one between was an iron-clad frame building. So the one that appears to be brick in the photo is not brick. The  map shows that two of these buildings were jewelers. That would mean that the remaining small building, labeled "office" must be the jitney location. From the photo above it is clear that the one right next to the jitney service office is a jeweler. (Note the watch-shaped clock outside.)  The other is probably A. E. Self's jewelry store.  It closely matches other photos of Self's.

I have uploaded the photo to http://www.whatwasthere.com.  You can go there to see a comparison of the stretch in 1915 and today.  There are other Kerrville buildings there too.  To simplify the search, enter the zip code 78028 where it says "Where to."  Have fun!