Normangee

According to Nelda Pierson (age 90) and Pat Martin, both residents of Normangee, there was a small one-story calaboose in Normangee, Texas behind Normangee State Bank on Main Street facing south. The actual jail was a metal cage that had been fastened to a cement slab and enclosed in a brick building. There was a door in the front and two windows with bars on either side. They estimate the size as 10-12 feet across the front and 10-18 feet on the sides. There were no beds or amenities such as electricity or plumbing. Ed Parker was the Night Watchman who was responsible for locking people up in the calaboose. Nelda said that when someone was in there everyone in town knew about it. Her best recollection is that it was torn down sometime after 1940 when she left for college in Waco. Based on other similar calabooses the roof could have been flat and created by pouring concrete into a form or it could have had wooden rafters covered with tin much like the one in Jewett (see Calabooses). If the latter is the case it is possible that the same person made both calabooses. When the calaboose was demolished the metal cage was moved to another location but Nelda and Pat do not know if it still exists. No Sanborn maps for Normangee were available at the time of this study.