Confederate Museum in a Water Tower
Columbus, Texas
Built in 1883 with 400,000 bricks, the tower originally supported a big tank filled with water used to douse downtown fires. When Columbus got a water system, the tank was taken off the top of the tower and the town tried to blow up the tower with dynamite. Its three-foot-thick walls wouldn't budge. Now looking like a wayward tower from a medieval castle, it was turned over to The United Daughters of the Confederacy, which used it as their meeting place. In 1962 -- during the battle years of segregation -- it officially became the Columbus Confederate Memorial Museum. One exhibit of note: a three-barrel shotgun.