Beazley House

Duane's take

Here's my telling of what the official marker has to say about the Beazley House. Now settle in, because this one starts long before that little cottage ever had a nail in it. We're talking Republic of Texas land grant territory, out in Houston County.

The original grantee was Andrew Edwards Gossett, a veteran of the Battle of San Jacinto. That's about as deep as Texas roots go. This was his land.

Around the turn of the century, that same ground became part of a real estate development, and a new Crockett residential area opened up right there. The land had traveled a long road from republic grant to town lots, and it wasn't done yet. In 1912, a man named Charles Harrison Beazley, born in 1850, came along and purchased this property.

Now Charles didn't just call up a contractor and write a check. He used wood from his own farm. Had it cut at the family sawmill.

Then he erected this cottage, dressed up with elaborate Victorian trim. A man building his own home with his own timber, down to the sawing of it. That's a certain kind of intention.

Charles and his wife Margaret Elizabeth, known as Bettie, she was born in 1863, and their two sons packed up and moved into town. The reason the marker gives you is a good one: so the boys could be near better schools. Bettie Beazley, born 1863, lived all the way to 1960.

She outlasted her husband by decades. Charles passed in 1929. The house he built with his own wood, trimmed up fine in the Victorian style, stood as the monument to a decision a family made: come to town, get the boys educated, put down roots the right way.

Started with a San Jacinto veteran's land grant, ended with a cottage and two boys walking to school. Not a bad arc for one piece of Texas ground.

What the marker says

This site was originally part of a Republic of Texas land grant to Andrew Edwards Gossett, a veteran of the Battle of San Jacinto. Around the turn of the century it became part of a real estate development which opened a new Crockett residential area. Charles Harrison Beazley (1850-1929) purchased this property in 1912 and erected this cottage with elaborate victorian trim. He used wood from his farm and had it cut at the family sawmill. He and his wife Margaret Elizabeth "Bettie" (Lively) (1863-1960) and two sons moved into town so the boys could be near better schools.