Denny-Holliday House

Duane's take

Here's how the official marker tells it, and I'll do my best to do it justice. Somewhere in Travis County stands a house that's been quietly collecting stories since before most of Texas had caught its breath after the Civil War. The Denny-Holliday House.

And the marker gives us just enough to make it worth pullin' over. Charles Denny built the original structure between 1869 and 1871. One story, limestone, solid and plain the way working buildings tend to be when people are more worried about survival than style.

It stood like that for a good while, doing what limestone houses do, holding the heat out and the family in. Then 1898 arrives, and so does Mrs. N.

L. Holliday. A widow, six children in tow, and she buys this house.

Now that right there is a sentence worth sitting with. A widow with six children does not purchase a house on a whim. She purchases it with intention.

And she had plenty of it. Because in 1906, Mrs. Holliday added a second floor.

Just decided the place needed to grow, and so it did. The house that Charles Denny built as one story became something more, something that could hold a larger life. Later, the residence passed to her daughter Margaret, who died in 1921, and who had been a local physician.

A woman doctor in that era, in Travis County. The marker notes it matter-of-factly, and maybe that's the right way to hold it. Margaret and her husband, Dr.

Simon J. Clark, renovated the house around 1920. They added an elaborate entryway on the north side, and they stuccoed the exterior walls.

So the old limestone, Denny's plain and practical limestone, got dressed up a little near the end of Margaret's life. A house that started as one story of rock ended up with two floors, a new face, and the fingerprints of at least three distinct people who each decided it was worth improving. That's not a bad legacy for a building.

Not bad at all.

What the marker says

The structure originated as a one-story limestone dwelling, built between 1869 and 1871 by Charles Denny. Mrs. N. L. Holliday, a widow with six children, purchased the house in1898 and added the second floor in 1906. The residence was later occupied by her daughter, Margaret (d. 1921), a local physician. Margaret and her husband Dr. Simon J. Clark renovated the house about 1920. They added an elaborate entryway on the north side and stuccoed the exterior wall. Recorded Texas Historic Landmark - 1978