Harkey - Payne House

Duane's take

Here's how the official marker tells it, and I'll pass it along just the same. Now, out in Ellis County, there's a house with a story that comes in layers, just like the house itself. It started out modest enough: four rooms, a south porch, an east porch, and the honest work of a man named D.

H. Harkey. Harkey was a carpenter and a blacksmith, and around 1870 he built this place with his own two trades behind him.

Cypress wood, not the easiest thing to come by, but when you build in cypress, you're building to last. And last it did. Then, in 1896, a Dr.

J. M. Johnson bought the property, and apparently four rooms and two porches weren't quite enough for the doctor's vision.

He went up. Added a second story, and threw in colonial revival style columns for good measure. Now the place had some presence.

But here's where the story turns again; just one year later, 1897, the house changed hands once more. This time it went to a Confederate veteran by the name of John Payne, a man who ran a successful mercantile business over in Palmer. John Payne knew a good piece of work when he saw it, and his family held onto that cypress house all the way until 1906.

Three owners, two stories, one porch for each direction the wind blows, and every bit of it still standing on account of a blacksmith who knew how to pick his lumber.

What the marker says

Originally a four-room house with south and east porches, this home was built about 1870 by carpenter and blacksmith D. H. Harkey. Dr. J. M. Johnson bought the property in 1896 and added the second story and the colonial revival style columns. In 1897 the house was sold to Confederate veteran John Payne, who ran a successful mercantile business in Palmer. Built of cypress, the home remained in the Payne family until 1906.