Archaeologist Jim Warren of George West presented a program about the excavation work at Fort Ramirez, believed to be the oldest extant building in Live Oak County, at the Oct. 26 meeting of the Bee County Historical Society.

Warren explained that José Antonio Ramírez was given two leagues of land by the Spanish government in a 1790s land grant.

The structure, which was actually a fortified ranch house, rather than a military fort, was built around 1800. The walls, three-foot thick and 11-12 feet high, were of white caliche blocks, with a thatched roof covered with “chipichillo,” a mortar made of lime and dirt. For better defense, there were no window openings.

Evidently several ranch hands lived in the large, one-room building. They raised horses and mules, which were sold first in Louisiana and later in Corpus Christi. The ranch’s cattle and goats roamed free in the area, and were rounded up by the cowboys every few days for branding. A tannery was another part of the ranch operations.

When the Spanish government pulled out their troops in 1810 to fight the rebels fighting for independence in Mexico, Fort Ramírez was abandoned. Indians moved in and ransacked the house, cutting left-behind metal into pieces for their rattles.

In the early 20th century, the family of Southwestern writer J. Frank Dobie purchased the land on which the ruins of Fort Ramírez still stood. When the Houston Natural Gas Company was building a pipeline through the Dobie Ranch, they had difficulty getting their trucks through the muddy crossing on Ramireño Creek. Unfortunately, they solved the problem by “borrowing” stones from the walls of the old fort. Mrs. Dobie was furious with the gas company for destroying the historic walls, and eventually was paid some $1,200 in recompense.

Warren and his archaeology assistants have excavated Fort Ramírez thoroughly, locating the original foundations of the walls and preserving all the artifacts in the immediate area. He showed pictures of the ruins and the most interesting artifacts to the audience.