Wallace - Holme House

Duane's take

Here's how the official marker tells it, and here's how I'm gonna pass it along to you. Somewhere in Bastrop County, there's a house that has been quietly outlasting everybody's expectations since about 1840. That's when it went up, during the ownership of a man named Dr.

L. B. Harris.

Now, the house didn't arrive in the world fully formed. It grew, adapted, changed with the times and changed with its people, the way a good house does when it's lucky enough to have good people in it. By 1887, it had settled into its basic appearance.

Then, about 1900, somebody decided the place needed a wraparound porch with jigsawn trim, and you know what, they were right. Once you put a wraparound porch on a house, that house has arrived. Among the souls who called this place home, you've got Harriet and James P.

Wallace. James was an early Texas Ranger and a soldier in the Republic of Texas army. That's the kind of resume that earns a man some quiet on a porch.

Then came Mollie and James S. Holme. James S. was a brickmason, and not just any brickmason.

He supervised Civilian Conservation Corps work at Bastrop State Park in the 1930s, which means his hands helped shape something that's still standing too. Rangers, soldiers, brickmasons, and the women alongside them, all of them moving through the same rooms, looking out from the same porch. A house built about 1840 has a way of collecting stories, and this one in Bastrop County, it's been collecting ever since.

What the marker says

Built about 1840 during the ownership of Dr. L. B. Harris, this house evolved over the years to meet the needs of its owners. It had assumed its basic appearance by 1887, and the wraparound porch with jigsawn trim was constructed about 1900. Owners and residents of the house have included Harriet and James P. Wallace, an early Texas Ranger and soldier in the Republic of Texas army; and Mollie and James S. Holme, a brickmason who supervised Civilian Conservation Corps work at Bastrop State Park in the 1930s. Recorded Texas Historic Landmark - 1991