Wichita Falls' oldest landmark in danger of falling to the wrecking ball
It has weathered wind, ice, rain, heat, hail, drought and vandals for 131 years, but a storm is brewing that it may not survive.
The old Victorian home at 1400 Travis Street has been placed on the city’s hazardous structures list. Time and options are running out to save the historic structure.
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The home is one of the oldest – if not the oldest – houses in Wichita Falls. It is a true Victorian, built when Queen Victoria ruled England and England ruled the world.
For decades it has been known as the Berry Brown House.
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Legend had it the home was a “kit house” bought from Montgomery Ward and erected on location. Marcia McCoy, who owns the house with her brother, David, disputes that. She said the family has researched the structure through both Montgomery Ward and Sears and found no evidence of it being a kit.
“It’s unique,” she said.
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The lot on which the redwood-sided house stands was owned by a Who’s Who of Wichita Falls’ early history, including J.H. Barwise, regarded as the first white settler in Wichita Falls before the city’s formal founding. Marcia said Barwise installed a community water well on the property.
The house was built by C.M. Bryan. One of its earliest owners was H.B Hatton, an area farmer and road builder. In 1940, Hatton rented and later sold the home to Berry Brown, a tax consultant for oil organizations who served on the Wichita Falls City Council and was credited with being instrumental in the city’s expansion after World War II.
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After 83 years, Brown’s descendants still own it.
Marcia McCoy said she has struggled for years to save her grandparents’ house from falling into ruin.
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“I love that house. I did everything I could. For 15 years it was a full-time career,” she said.
After Berry Brown died in 1968, his wife, Pansy, stayed in the home until failing health forced her to leave. She lived to be 97.
Marcia recalls her grandfather as a devout Christian but fun-loving man who became an Elvis Presley fan who would flirt and dance with his wife when he arrived home.
In its earliest lemonade and lace days, the neighborhood was idyllic. A newspaper ad offered a surrey and carriage for sale at the address in 1912 when horses were still more common than cars. Margaret Hatton grew an award-winning 121-inch American Beauty Royalty rose stem in 1921. Housekeepers were given a room and $5 a week. In those days, only a missing mule and stolen milk bottles made headlines.
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But that would change. As Wichita Falls spread beyond its central district, many older neighborhoods fell into decline.
Marcia said near the end of her grandmother’s time in the house, her nights were marred by strangers banging on the door and stealing money and property. She blames the trouble on the Faith Mission that was built right across 14th Street from the house.
“With all the break-ins, drugs and prostitution, your career is basically trying to save the house,” Marcia said. She shows where teeth are missing from an attack by a stranger on the property.
She rented it out a few times and her brother stayed in the house for a short while. But nobody stayed long.
Marcia said she has sought help to save the house.
“I went through everybody in town, the chain of command, not once, not twice, but three times. I did not stop saying I was trying to get it restored,” she said.
She said she had offers to buy the house, but potential buyers “didn’t want to pay anything” because of the cost of renovation and security.
At 68, Marcia said she has exhausted her savings and energy on the old place. She no longer mows the yard or tries to maintain the structure.
On a cloudy Monday she became emotional and hesitant to enter the home that holds so many treasured memories.
The house is no longer elegant. The floors are weak and have dangerous gaps, the windows are broken, a large hole in the roof lets the elements in. A stained mattress blocks the doorway between living and dining rooms. Every inch is covered by bottles, cans and trash. It’s obvious the stairway from the entry was once gracious and inviting, but it can no longer be trusted to take a visitor up to the front balcony Marcia’s mother once treasured. The chimney still stands tall and proud, but the facings have been torn from the three hearths it served.
Karen Montgomery-Gagne with the Wichita Falls Planning Department is a champion of historic preservation. She said it makes her sad to know what the near future probably holds for the house.
“The last thing you want to see is a designated historic treasure that's recognized as having value in our community and we must move forward through the process of it being considered a dangerous or dilapidated structure. That's the last thing you ever want to have happen, but for various reasons we're very close to that point,” she said.
Montgomery-Gagne said several historic buildings have been saved at the last minute, including some in downtown’s Depot Square, but those were commercial structures that qualified for incentives to repurpose them for business use.
Residential structures like the Berry Brown House are a different story.
“They don't qualify for some of the incentives that may be available for commercial-use properties,” Montgomery said.
Short of a private sale to someone who’s willing to sink a lot of money into a restoration, the only glimmer of hope seems to be a sale to someone who would repurpose it into a business that could qualify for historic tax credits.
Various groups have worked over the years to save the house. It was designated a Wichita Falls Landmark in 1987 and the Wichita County Heritage Society and the Wichita County Archives successfully nominated it for the Texas Most Endangered List. That extended its life – but won’t save it if it’s deemed too dangerous to remain.
The Wichita Falls City Council considers structures to condemn several times a year and the Berry Brown House has not been placed on the demolition list. But time for the house that has lasted more than a century may now be measured in weeks or months.
Marcia knows the house is in sad shape and its future is bleak, but she still clings to hope.
“The bones are good,” she said.
This article originally appeared on Wichita Falls Times Record News: Wichita Falls' oldest landmark in danger of falling to the wrecking ball
