DUANE
Duane's take
Here's my telling of what the official marker has to say about the original site of the Joseph R. Rice Log Cabin, out in Houston County. Now, 1828 is about as early as you can plant roots in Texas and still live to tell about it.
Joseph Redmond Rice was born in Tennessee in 1805, his wife Willie Masters Rice in Kentucky in 1809, and together — two young people from two different states — they picked a clearing in what would become Houston County and put up a one-room log cabin. One room. That's it.
That's the whole house. How'd they build it? Well, the marker gives us just enough detail to picture it, and the picture is something.
The men — Rice's brothers and his father-in-law, Jacob Masters, probably among them — went into the woods and cut the logs. Then Willie Rice, the Kentucky woman, took the reins of a team and drove it herself, snaking those logs out of the trees and into the clearing for the house raising. Let that settle for a moment.
The men did the cutting. Willie Rice moved the timber. But this was not a peaceful frontier.
The Rices were menaced by hostile Indians, and at some point the danger was enough that they fled — all the way to Louisiana. They left. Most folks, you'd understand if they didn't come back.
The Rices came back. In the 1830s, they returned to that same clearing, that same one-room cabin, and they got to work. Over the ensuing years, they enlarged the cabin.
They also enlarged their family — all the way to eleven children. Eleven. That one-room log house had some growing to do, and apparently it did.
And word got around, because in the days of the Republic of Texas, the Rice place became known as a stopping point on the San Antonio Road, right between Nacogdoches and Crockett. Travelers could lodge there. They could take a meal.
In a time when the road between those two towns could be a long and lonesome stretch, the Rice cabin was a place where you could rest. Joseph Redmond Rice died in 1866. Willie Masters Rice lived on until 1881.
And even after they were gone, the family stayed. Descendants lived in that log house all the way until 1919 — nearly a century after the first log was cut. It was a grandson who finally made the change: he shifted the old cabin about three hundred feet off its original footprint and built a new frame house right where the log cabin had stood.
After that, the historic house settled into quieter duty — storing grain, sheltering farm implements, and keeping the family automobile out of the weather. In 1936, the Texas Centennial Commission commemorated the Rice Homesite. Then in 1973, the old log house was given to the State.
They relocated it to Tejas Mission Park, sixteen miles to the northeast, where it's been restored and placed on exhibition as a relic of frontier days. So the original site — right here — is where it all started. One clearing.
One room. A woman driving a team through the woods, and two people stubborn enough to flee a dangerous frontier and then turn right around and come back to it. The cabin itself is sixteen miles up the road now, but the story starts here.
What the marker says
Joseph Redmond Rice (1805-1866) and his wife, Willie Masters Rice (1809-1881), natives of Tennessee and Kentucky, built a one-room log cabin on this site in 1828. Rice's brothers and his father-in-law, Jacob Masters, probably helped with the building. The men cut logs in the woods, and Willie Rice drove a team that snaked them to the clearing for the house raising. Menaced by hostile Indians, the Rices fled to Louisiana, but returned in the 1830s. Over ensuing years, they enlarged the cabin and increased their family to eleven children. Their dwelling became known in the Republic of Texas as a place to lodge or take meals on the San Antonio Road, between the towns of Nacogdoches and Crockett. After Joseph and Willie Rice died, descendants lived in the log house until 1919, when a grandson shifted it some 300 feet and built a new frame house on the original site. The historic house was then used to store grain and shelter farm implements and the family automobile. The Rice Homesite was commemorated in 1936 by the Texas Centennial Commission, and in 1973 the old log house was given to the State. Relocated in Tejas Mission Park (16 mi. NE.), it has been restored and is on exhibition as a relic of frontier days. (1976)