SAN ANGELO, TX - On this day, July 16, 1870, army officer John Porter Hatch began an experiment to manufacture and use adobe bricks as inexpensive construction material at Fort Concho, according to information from the Texas State Historical Association.
Hatch, born in New York in 1822, fought in the Mexican War and in the Civil War. As a major with the Fourth United States Cavalry, he ordered the commander of Fort Chadbourne, Capt. George C. Huntt, to move his unit to the site of Fort Concho in 1867.
The adobe experiment was judged a failure after Hatch and twenty enlisted men had produced only 10,000 usable bricks by September 2, 1870, but it did earn Hatch the nickname "Dobe," which he bore until his death in 1901.
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When I was a boy my family lived in what we were told was the old officers quarters. It was a single story located in the center of the block where all the two story barracks are. The old Ft Concho elementary was located right across the street where the parade ground is now. I haven't been there in many years but last time I saw our old home it had been torn down and small fence like rock or maybe brick walls were there instead.
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