About this tour
The north end of Congress Avenue is where Texas keeps its official memory in stone: a pink-granite capitol taller than the one in Washington, the archives that guard the state's founding documents, the history museum with a giant bronze Lone Star out front, the governor's Greek Revival home, and a saved-from-the-wrecking-ball bakery. This short walk drops downhill from the Bob Bullock museum to the Old Bakery, passing four of the buildings where Texas governs itself and tells its own story. It is less than a mile, but it runs through the civic heart of the capital — a place designed, from its sunset-red granite to its Goddess of Liberty, to make a young state look permanent.