Part 4m - House & Land

RAISIN'

HOUSE & LAND

Log House

Another group of structures on the place consist of the old log house, smoke house, corncrib and double mule stall. The original split log cabin portion of the house was once the kitchen out behind the old house.

After Grand Paw added a kitchen to the house, the cabin was torn down, piece by piece and rebuilt down under the hill. A large room was added to the West side of the log portion and a "shed room" added across the back, North side. The bedroom was built with one by twelve, rough sawn boards with three-inch battens at each crack. All the floors and roof sheathing in the house were also one by twelves. The shed room was divided into two rooms, one was sometimes used as a dining area or a sleeping area, and the other was the kitchen/dining area, with a small wood-burning iron stove. The original, cabin room was used as a sitting area by the fireplace at the East side, and as a sleeping room.

There was a porch all across the front (South) side of the house. The water bucket and dipper were kept hanging on the porch.

There was a dug well about 30 feet outside the kitchen door. One side caved in. Daddy had bought enough 30-inch concrete pipes to "encase" it in, but Cousin Bob McLean (CB) never had it installed, so the well was filled up with trash, etc. over the years. The water in that well had a large amount of lime in it and was not the greatest tasting for drinking, but was real good for bathing, watering chickens, etc.

To the west of the old well was a log structure that was about 10 by 20 feet. It was divided into two rooms. The south room was used as a smokehouse and the north room used for storage.

North and west of the smokehouse was a chicken house, built out of small poles.

North of the chicken house was the corncrib, also made of pine logs. A very small "One seater" outhouse was built onto the North wall of the crib.

Then, North of the crib, CB built a double mule stall. I remember when he built the stall.

About a hundred feet east of the corncrib, were a couple of hog pens. Yep! You guessed it.....they were built of log rails.

To the south side of the hog pens and to the East side of the house was a pretty good-sized garden. Nope! It had a wire fence around it!

To the West and North sides of the house and crib was about a three or four acre pasture.

The house was primarily lived-in by folks that worked, or helped out in various ways around the farm. I remember talk of Tommy and Florence Land living there at the time the old house burned. Then, I can remember Mr. Ira and Mrs. Catherine Holston, with their six children lived there, followed by "Cousin" James and Zella Brown and the first of their large family. Later, CB, Mrs. Pearl (MP) and Robert A. McLean moved into the house in about 1943. They lived there until after MP and, later, CB died. They were the last to live there.

On June 5, 1998, a bad windstorm (probably with tornadic winds) blew a very large sweet gum tree top onto the log portion and porch that damaged the house and chimney so badly that it was cost prohibitive to make repairs.

I told Willie Taylor that if he would tear down the house and all the other buildings and clean it up, he could have any good materials in them for his labor. During the summer of 1999, all of the house had been pushed up into a pile and the other buildings' roofs have been torn off and ready to burn it all.