{"nrhp_refnum":"11000424","name":"Hardscramble","other_names":["Ranger Cabin, Ben and Henry McCulloch Cabin"],"category":"building","location":{"address":"1806 Tschoepe Rd.","address_restricted":false,"city":"Seguin","county":"Guadalupe County","state":"TX","lat":29.637978165500044,"lon":-97.87976051215173,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"2011-07-06","is_nhl":false,"nhl_designated_date":null,"areas_of_significance":["Exploration/Settlement","Military"],"significance_levels":["state"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"Hardscramble is a one-room stone cabin on private land off Tschoepe Road, about six miles northeast of Seguin in Guadalupe County, Texas. It was built around 1841 by Ben and Henry McCulloch and has a 1936 Texas Centennial marker, a well and surrounding ranchland.","why_significant":"The cabin is tied to Texas Rangers Ben and Henry McCulloch, both later Confederate generals, and to later Ranger occupants Nathaniel Benton and Elijah V. Dale. It is argued to represent mid-nineteenth-century frontier homesteads in central Texas. The 1936 Centennial marker is also significant as an early effort to commemorate historic places and people.","narrative":"Hardscramble is a small stone cabin on private ranchland northeast of Seguin, Guadalupe County, Texas. Built around 1841 by Texas Rangers Ben and Henry McCulloch, it has uncut stone walls 18 inches thick, a single room, a projecting stone chimney, a metal shed roof and a cellar reached by a trap door in the plank floor. A stone well and a 1936 Texas Centennial marker stand nearby. After the McCullochs, the cabin housed Rangers Nathaniel Benton and Elijah V. Dale, whose family lived there for about twenty-five years. Ben McCulloch fought at San Jacinto and became a Confederate general, and Henry McCulloch also rose to brigadier general. The cabin was recognized for its association with these frontier figures and as an example of mid-nineteenth-century homesteads in central Texas. The Centennial marker is also valued as part of early efforts to commemorate historic places. The cabin has been altered but still conveys a sense of frontier isolation. It is now vacant.","period_of_significance":"ca. 1841-1896, 1936","architect_builder":"Ben McCulloch; State of Texas","architectural_style":"OTHER/Stone Cabin; NONE","criteria":["A","B"],"status_note":"The cabin is described as vacant and not in use. It has been altered, including a replaced metal shed roof, concrete steps and repaired stonework, but is said to retain sufficient integrity.","vacant_flag":true,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-sonnet-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.0-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 02:54:23.304762-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/opastorage/live/27/9722/40972227/content/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_TX/11000424.pdf"},"photo":{"url_800":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/11000424/0883eda61a-800.webp","url_1600":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/11000424/0883eda61a-1600.webp","licence":"CC BY-SA 4.0","author":"Ehunter702","credit_html":"<a href=\"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Hardscramble_Cabin_Seguin_Texas.jpg\" rel=\"noopener\">Ehunter702</a>, <a href=\"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0\" rel=\"license noopener\">CC BY-SA 4.0</a>, via Wikimedia Commons","source_page":"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Hardscramble_Cabin_Seguin_Texas.jpg"},"district":null,"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/40972227","wikipedia":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hardscramble","wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q5656318"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/texas/guadalupe-county/hardscramble-11000424/"}