Features / Living
John Watson: Paluxy Heritage Park plans open house
The merchants of Glen Rose along with the Somervell County Historical Commission are planning an open house for the Paluxy Heritage Park on the second and third weekends in December.
The historic structures within the park will be decorated for Christmas and open for public inspection.
Among the buildings open for tours will be the Lanham Mill Schoolhouse.
This is a one-room school built in 1901 by residents of the Lanham Mill School District, about five miles from Glen Rose.
The schoolhouse stood on the high bank of the Paluxy River above the popular swimming spot called “Blue Hole,” now in Dinosaur Valley State Park. The building doubled as a church and community center.
Emmett and Elsie McFall, a local farm family, rescued the building in the early 1960s.
Not wanting the building to be torn down, the McFalls bought and moved it to their farm on the Paluxy River, one mile from its original site.
In 2002 Emmett and Elsie’s grandson, Robert C. McFall, who was a Johnson County commissioner at the time, and his family donated it to Somervell County to be preserved.
R. C. attended church in the building as a child, and his father, Jacob McFall, attended school in the building.
Another building here is the telephone building.
The Farmers & Merchants Mutual Independent Telephone Co. owned this property from 1910-26.
Local folks can recall this being one of the earliest telephone companies operating out of a dwelling.
The switchboard was located in one corner of a room and adequately served its customers.
“Central” or “Operator” was usually the person living in the dwelling at the time.
The operator lived in the house to be available to answer the switchboard 24 hours a day.
One ring from the hand-cranked telephones would notify the switchboard operator.
The telephone system was sold in 1928 for $12,000.
Several old telephones will be on display, but so far no one has been able to locate an old switchboard for display. Does anyone know of one being available?
The Wheeler-Epps-McMahon Cabin was donated to Somervell County in 1996 by the Dr. Mike Jones family.
The house was formerly located on their farm on “Shotgun Road,” County Road 301.
The log room was built during the 1860s or 1870s.
The logs are oak and cedar, hewn by hand with wooden pegs driven into corners. Square corner notches indicate a Southern influence.
The second room was added in the early 1880s, when pine lumber was available and plentiful.
The W.T. Wheeler family purchased the property in 1880. The brook that flowed nearby is still called Wheeler Branch.
A two-story rock house known as the J.J. Farr House was thought to be one of the earliest permanent dwellings in Glen Rose.
Who built the house is unknown, but Capt. J.J. Farr, a lawyer and Confederate veteran, was the first person recorded to live in the house.
The house is built of native limestone and has a full basement. Making it water tight took considerable engineering know-how.
All the historic buildings in Heritage Park will be decked out in period Christmas decorations to welcome visitors on the weekends of Dec. 11-12 and 18-19.
Refreshments will be served, and music and lights with activities will take place from 5:30-8:30 p.m. each night.
The buildings will be furnished with period furnishings, and all the volunteers welcoming guests will be dressed in period attire. This will give you a chance to see what holiday life was like in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
Choirs from some of the churches will sing Christmas carols.
The Somervell County Antique Tractor Club will have some of their antique tractors to pull trailers with hay carrying people from the park to the square and back around to the park.
To visit the park during this time you may park anywhere near downtown Glen Rose and ride one of these shuttle wagons to the park.
If you are a fan of “Little House on the Prairie,” drive over to Glen Rose and visit the Paluxy Heritage Park and look over some of these restored buildings during the open house and see what life was like in the early days.
There is no charge for this tour of historic buildings. For information, call Billy Huckaby of the Glen Rose Convention & Visitors Bureau at 254-897-3081.
John Watson is a Cleburne resident who can be reached at texastraveler@sbcglobal.net.
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