Category: The Sunday porch

The Sunday porch: Cherry Spring, Texas

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North (back) side of Rode-Kothe House, Cherry Spring, Gillespie County, Texas, May 29, 1936, by Richard MacAllister for an Historic American Buildings Survey (HABS), via Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division (all three photos).

South (front) side of house.

The HABS says the limestone house was at least partly built in 1855 by German immigrant Dietrich Rode. (He completed it in 1879.) Rode was one of the founders of nearby Fredericksburg, as well as Cherry Spring.  He was also a lay Lutheran minister and a teacher, first in his students’ homes at night and then on the second floor of his ranchhouse shown here.

Detail of front porch.

The house may still stand near Christ Lutheran Church, which Rode helped found, but I cannot find a current picture of it.

The HABS says the building was “[s]ited to dominate its surroundings.”

The Sunday porch: Dallas, North Carolina

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Mason House, near Dallas, North Carolina, 1938, by Frances Benjamin Johnston, via
Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division.

A narrow porch for a narrow house. I think those are cannas at the bases of the columns.

This picture was published in The Early Architecture of North Carolina by Johnston and Thomas Tileston Waterman in 1941, but I can’t find out anything else about the building.

The Sunday porch: Georgia

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House with picket fence, man and dog seated on the porch.“[H]ouse with picket fence, man and dog seated on porch and a dog lying on the sidewalk,” Georgia, ca. 1899, photographer unknown, via Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division.

This photo was in one of the several albums depicting African-American life that W. E. B. Du Bois compiled to exhibit at the 1900 Paris World’s Fair.

Click on the image for a little better view.

The Sunday porch: Mothers’ Day

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“Woman holding baby on outdoor porch,” ca. 1915, an autochrome by unknown photographer, via George Eastman Museum Commons on flickr.

The porches look as if they are facing out to a beach.

The Sunday porch: Montgomery, Alabama

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“Early dwelling, 222 S. Perry St.,” Montgomery, Alabama, 1939, by Frances Benjamin Johnston, via Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division.

The porch woodwork pattern is echoed in the little attic windows. Click to enlarge.

A huge vine is growing beside the steps, but it seems to go up into the tree on the left, rather than onto the porch.

The sidewalk is tiled in a simple geometric pattern. The effect, with the arches of the porch and basement windows, is a little Moroccan/Andalusian.

The house no longer stands.