Hoover House Reading Book Reduced

Behind the paired rooms of the original dogtrot was a back porch which was partly taken over in the 1870s by
the addition of a kitchen. The Hoovers extended and incorporated this porch into the house as a large
sunroom, inviting light all the way into the interior adjoining rooms.
Attention is drawn in the kitchen to a pair of towering armoire doors that tuck away generous pantries.
They are matched by two others, one serving as the entry to the adjoining former 1870s kitchen-turned-bedroom,
the other as a pantry.
Since the lot slopes toward a wet weather creek behind the house, Tommy found enough headroom underneath
the rear of the house to create an intimate wine cellar and cushiony sitting space. The room is walled
by bricks salvaged from the only one of the dogtrot’s four original chimneys left standing. The space looks
up at the masterful fit of joists, beams and floorboards laid in the years just after the Texas Revolution and
now giving support into yet another century.
“People just rolled their eyes when we brought in the two sections of this old house,” remembers Tommy.
“They thought we’d reached the bottom of the barrel.”
“As the house was being rolled through town someone was overheard commenting: ‘Well, I wonder what the
Hoovers are gonna do with that pile of sticks,’” Judi adds with a wink.
At the end of a two-year labor of love, the Hoovers earned a house that retains the texture of time with its rich
woods and the shine of patina on old-time hardware. Its paneled doors, age-rippled window glass, simple antiques
and an assortment of found objects from over the years blend comfortably in rooms adapted for
modern lives.
In the years to follow, Wilson Street became the new addresses for other Hoover move-ins. Bringing
in an historic home to be restored sometimes meant buying a lot for it that was occupied by a more
contemporary structure. As was often the case, the modern house gets hauled to a younger and more
fitting neighborhood while the antique structure takes its place and settles in among its venerable contemporaries.
In both examples, the neighborhoods get “elevated,” Judi explains.
The slope of the land allowed us to create
a wine cellar under the back bedroom..