AUSTIN / THE MAP ARCHIVE
Austin's 1853 City Plan
The 1853 plan still runs on Congress Avenue, Capitol Square, Waller Creek, Shoal Creek and the Colorado River. Around that familiar grid, the map now names a hospital, market, U.S. armory, academy and University block, all tucked into the same tight downtown frame.
Explore the mapTHE MAP AT A GLANCE
A closer look
at 1853.
Dates, details and the people behind the drawing.
- Map date
- 1853
The TSLAC Austin map index lists Plan of the City of Austin as map number 00928 with an 1853 date.
- Cartographer
- Robert Creuzbaur
The TexasFreeway source wrapper lists Robert Creuzbaur as cartographer.
- Scale note
- 1 in. = 500 ft.
The map itself includes the printed note 500 feet to the Inch near the title.
- Civic center
- Capitol Square
Capitol Square remains the dominant public block; Texas completed a limestone Capitol on the site in 1852.
1853 · Austin
Drag to explore. Use the zoom buttons or pinch with two fingers. Keyboard: focus the map, then use arrow keys to move, +/− to zoom and Home to reset.
LOOK CLOSER / EDITORIAL NOTES
Find it on the map.
The old grid still does the work
Congress Avenue, Capitol Square and the numbered blocks remain the structure. Fourteen years after the 1839 plat, the city still reads from the same disciplined framework.
New labels appear at the edges
Hospital, Academy, University, U.S. Armory, Market and Willow Street are visible on this version. Those labels show how the map had begun to carry later civic ambitions and uses beyond the original capital layout.
A university label before the campus
The map labels a University block, but the University of Texas did not begin instruction until 1883. Here the word is a map label, not evidence of the later campus already operating.
AUSTIN / HISTORICAL CONTEXT
Austin Between Plan and Permanent Capital
By 1853, Austin had survived a rough first chapter. TSHA records that the city lost its political function for a time after the government moved away in the 1840s, then formally became the state capital in 1846. Its population had recovered to 854 by 1850, and the state capital vote that year helped secure Austin's role for the next twenty years.
That background changes how the map reads. Capitol Square is still the big square on the Congress Avenue line, but by this date it also sits beside a newly completed limestone Capitol; the State Preservation Board places that building on the site in 1852. The hospital, market, academy and U.S. armory labels show the map carrying more public uses than a street-and-lot diagram. The University block still needs careful handling as a label, without turning every label into a completed building. Together, those labels give the reader a clean way to read Austin after statehood.
PRESERVED FROM THE HISTORICAL WEBSITE
Plan of the City of Austin, 1853
Created 09-July-2004
Publisher: Lithographed by J. Manouvrier, New Orleans.
Cartographer: Creuzbaur, Robert
Courtesy of the Texas State Library and Archives Commission
Sources & further reading
- Texas State Archives Map Collection: Austin, city of records including Plan of the City of Austin, 1853 (opens in a new tab) ↗
- TSHA Handbook of Texas: Austin, TX (Travis County) (opens in a new tab) ↗
- State Preservation Board: History of the Capitol Grounds (opens in a new tab) ↗
New editorial notes accompany the preserved archive description. The viewer uses the original map tiles; the full-size JPG assembles those tiles into one image.