The Davison Home

Duane's take

The way the marker tells it, here's the story of the Davison Home in Montgomery County. Now, most Texas houses from the 1880s grew up out of local timber, local sweat, local stubbornness. But this one arrived differently.

R.A. Corry built the place between 1887 and 1888, and the parts for it, they didn't come from down the road. They came from St.

Louis. Shipped in. The whole thing was prefabricated, and that made it something the county had never seen before.

Its first prefabricated house. Let that settle for a moment. While neighbors were hauling lumber from the nearest stand of trees, someone was waiting on a delivery from Missouri.

Now, you might expect a house that arrived in pieces to feel a little assembled, a little plain. But whoever put this together had an eye for beauty. The wainscot is hand-carved.

The staircase is hand-carved. The mantels are hand-carved. And the wood throughout is cypress, which has a way of holding its dignity across the decades.

Then there are the doors. The original doors, with their original hardware, are still in use. Not replaced, not retired to a barn somewhere.

Still working, still turning, still swinging open the way they did in the late 1800s. The Davison family came into the picture in 1889, and the home has stayed in the family of C.H. Davison from that year forward.

A house that traveled all the way from St. Louis, that was shaped and carved with careful hands, and then found a family that saw fit to keep every last piece of it. That's a kind of loyalty that doesn't need any embellishment.

What the marker says

County's first prefabricated house. Built 1887-88 by R.A. Corry. Parts were shipped from St. Louis. Hand-carved wainscot, staircase, mantels. Wood is cypress. Original doors and hardware are still in use. In family of C.H. Davison since 1889. Recorded Texas Historic Landmark - 1966