Overview

​Scope and Content

Collection contains contracts between the City of Dallas and the Texas Bitulithic Company related to paving streets in downtown Dallas.

The Texas Bitulithic Company opened on April 18, 1906, with Carleton. H. Wells as its president.  It operated in Texas, New Mexico, and Mexico with Dallas, Texas, as its headquarters.  The company was a licensee of the Warren Brothers Company in Boston, which was the inventor and owner of Bitulithic pavement patents. Frederick J. Warren filed a patent for “Bitulithic” pavement, a mixture of bitumen and crushed stone.  Warren coined the words Bitulithic from bitumen (asphalt) and lithic from lithos the Greek word for rock.

These contracts relate to some of the earliest paved roads in Dallas, which marked the modernization of Dallas streets.  Starting with compacted dirt downtown in the mid-1800s, Dallas streets were then covered in varying distances of wooden planks, bois d'arc blocks, bricks, and macadam.  By 1910, Dallas had 33.12 miles of paved streets, 11.12 miles of bois d’arc, 20 miles of macadamized paving, and both 10 blocks on Main Street and one mile on Elm Street of Bitulithic paving.

Organization

The collection is organized alphabetically.

Access​

Permission to publish, reproduce, distribute, or use by any and all other current or future methods or procedures must be obtained in writing from the Dallas Municipal Archives. All rights are reserved and retained regardless of current or future development or laws that may apply to fair use standards.

Citation

Street Paving Contracts - Texas Bitulithic Company, 1904-1909 (Box <x>, Folder <y>), Dallas Municipal Archives

Related Materials

None

Index Terms

​Dallas -- Texas -- History
Pavements -- Contracts and specifications -- Texas

Container List​