Bland-Bazzano House

Duane's take

The way I tell it, I'm drawing straight from the words on the official marker for this one, so let's see what it says. Now, Orange County has its share of houses that have seen a few families come and go, but this one on the marker kept passing from hand to hand in a way that tells you something about a community pulling together over time. It starts in 1902, when John Horace Bland and his wife Edna built the place.

You can picture it, a proper turn-of-the-century home with all that Victorian styling and Queen Anne influences, the kind of craftsmanship that says these folks intended to stay a while. But in 1910, a man named John Michael Dullahan bought it. Now Dullahan didn't move in alone.

He lived there with his parents, the three of them settling into those Victorian walls until 1917. Two years after that, the house found the family that would really put its name on it. Louis Phillip Bazzano, a local cobbler, and his wife Annie Drucilla, born a Wilson, they took ownership of the place.

The marker calls them leaders of the community and of the First Baptist Church, and that kind of reputation doesn't come easy. It's earned, slow and steady, the way good leather work is earned. The Bazzanos held onto that home, and then in 1937, they conveyed it to their daughter Opal.

Passed it right down to the next generation, which is maybe the most natural thing a house like this could hope for. So what you're looking at is a Victorian beauty with Queen Anne touches, built in 1902, that moved through three families and landed right where it belonged. Some houses, they just have that kind of gravity.

What the marker says

John Horace Bland and his wife Edna built this home in 1902. In 1910 John Michael Dullahan bought it and lived here with his parents until 1917. Two years later it was sold to Louis Phillip Bazzano, a local cobbler, and his wife Annie Drucilla (Wilson), leaders of the community and the First Baptist Church. They conveyed the house to their daughter Opal in 1937. Typical of other local turn-of-the-century homes, it features Victorian styling with Queen Anne influences. Recorded Texas Historic Landmark - 1981