Literary Site: O. Henry House - San Antonio, TX

O. Henry House 

San Antonio, TX

GPS: N 29° 25.461; W 098° 29.843

Short Description:

The O. Henry House is located at the corner of Laredo and Dolorosa Streets in San Antonio, TX.

Long Description:

From the plaque outside the house:

O. Henry was born at Polecat Creek, North Carolina and moved to

Cotulla, texas in 1882 for health reasons. he then came to San

Antonio and rented this house for $6.00 a month. Fascinated by San

Antonio's multi-cultural community, O. henry chronicled the

languages and culture of the native populations, spending many happy

and productive hours in "cantinas" (saloons) wjich onec stood on this

site. O. Henry published a humorous, tabloid newspaper, called The

Rolling Stone, which he filmed with poems, stories and charactures of

people and races, and for which he was admonished by early German

settlers, causing the newspaper to have grave financial problems. San

Antonio was the setting of several of O. Henry's stories including A

Fog in Santone, The Higher Abduction and Hygela of Solito.

Moving to Austin in 1898, O. Henry worked as a teller in a bank to
argument his income, at which time he was convicted of
embezzlement. He served three years in prison where he wrote
prodigiously and memorized every word in the dictionary.

O. Henry was gifted in his ability to capture the essence of a city by
understanding the hearts of people in all walks if life. His wit, skill
with words, unusual plot twists and surprise endings brought him 
international fame. He died in New York in 1910.


In 1998, Wallace and mary Freidrich Rogers regained ownership of 
her grandfather's old Buckhorn Saloon Museum (which included the 
historic O. henry House) from the lone Star Brewing Company. The 
Rogers then donated this house as a charitable contribution to the Lee
and Zachry Carter Memorial Fund of the San Antonio Area
Foundation.

Chief probation Officer L. Caesar Garcia of the Bexar County Adult
Probation Department is helping his probationers by using O. henry's
life example as a teaching aid. Probationers get credit for doing their
Community Services by acting as docents in the O. henry House.
Following O. Henry's example of using his own jail time to sharpen
his writing skills, the docents utilize their probation period in a
constructive way, perhaps discovering their own latent talents.

O. Henry House

Typical of the homes of early German settlers, this two-room dwelling was built by John Kush about 1855. It originally stood on south Presa Street. It was occupied in 1895-96 by William Sidney Porter, who gained national renown as the short story writer O. Henry. Here he issued a weekly humorous newspaper, "The Rolling Stone". In 1960 the structure was moved to this location by the Kush Family and the Lone Star Brewing Company.