Sonora was designated the county seat when Sutton County was formed in 1887. Oscar Ruffini’s courthouse is the earliest extant that he designed after his brother Frederick’s death. It is a two-story Second Empire limestone building on a raised basement and virtually identical to the Concho County Courthouse (SS31) of 1886. Its most prominent feature is a tall red metal-shingled mansard roof with circular dormers and cresting set on a bracketed cornice. Offices occupy the first floor, and a courtroom is at the center of the second floor. The courthouse was rehabilitated with funding from the Texas Historic Courthouse Preservation Program, and floral-pattered gold stenciling was discovered around the upper corridor and courtroom walls during the rehabilitation.
The Pauly Jail Building Company of St. Louis built the Sutton County Jail (1891) on the north corner of the courthouse square. The two-story, rock-faced limestone jail has segmental-arched windows and a hipped roof, with a jailer’s apartment on the ground floor and patented cells on the second. It was in use until 1980.
Located across from the jail at 307 E. Oak is the board-and-batten Isaac Miers House (1889), now the Miers Home Museum. The house was the fifth structure built in Sonora, constructed with milled lumber brought by wagon from San Angelo.