A blast to the past: County officials seeking old photos

By Barry Porterfield

Snapshots into the past are what some officials are looking for when it comes to a look no longer seen at the Garvin County Courthouse.

With an eye on an elevator project still in the planning stages, county officials are hoping the public can help out with some old interior photos of the facility in Pauls Valley.

The idea is to again find the old time look of the pre-elevator days at the courthouse and bring it to the present.

The best way to do that is with photos from those days — a problem for officials involved in the planning of a new elevator since they don’t access to any of those old photos.

“We’re looking for pictures before the elevator was installed in the courthouse and there was still an open rotunda,” County Clerk Gina Mann said adding she was unsure when that installation took place.

“The original plans showed the first through third floors are open all the way up.”

There’s also a fourth floor now used for storage after once being the home of the county jail.

“We’re looking to the public to see if they have any photos,” she said.

“Any floor would be helpful.”

With no photos in hand Mann said plans of the building are all that’s available.

Those plans and a closer look show a circular shaped area that was later used for the placement of the current elevator.

Another reason for the photos of that earlier time is more on the historical side of things.

“We want to present our case to the (state) Historical Society,” Mann said.

“The courthouse is on the historical register. We’re trying to get their blessings for the renovations,” she said about the elevator project.

Anyone with photos or information about the early days of the courthouse should contact Mann or her staff at the county clerk’s office in that same county facility in Pauls Valley.

It was just last month when county officials were notified the OK had been given to a six-figure grant going toward the project that will someday bring a brand new elevator to the courthouse.

The $150,000 in grant funds, combined with other grants, and funds from a relatively new county sales tax will pay for the project that includes a total price tag of $373,000.

The current elevator is located directly in the middle of the courthouse building.

Plans are to move a new elevator to the annex portion of the facility, which when constructed in the 1970s included an elevator shaft with the anticipation second and third floors would eventually be added.

Those additional floors never came as the annex elevator shaft has been used only as a storage area.

The idea now is to place a new elevator there and take it up to the building’s fourth floor.

In this scenario the new elevator would not be directly connected to the courthouse structure.

Instead, a tower would be constructed right next to it as elevator riders would use a “walk over” to access the courthouse level they need.