Dont Forget the Wife and Kids! by Gretchen Brock, National Register & Survey Program Manager
"Documenting all the residents of your historic house
Celebrating Women's History month in March is a fairly recent phenomenon. Just a little over 30 years ago, the National Women's History Project (NWHP) was created to bring attention to the absence of womens history in the countrys K-12 curriculum and in the publics general knowledge. President Jimmy Carter signed the first National Women's History Week proclamation on March 8, 1980, and in 1987, March was designated as National Women's History Month.
In honoring this years theme, Writing Women Back into History, it is appropriate to explore the importance of documenting the women and children of a household when researching the history of your historic house.
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The architectural style of the Bulloch Family Home in Warm Springs in Meriwether County (listed January 11, 2002) is a direct result of the female residents updating the house to a more modern style. The house was built in 1892 for Cyprian Bulloch, Jr., as a two-story Folk Victorian-style house.
From 1887 to 1903, Cyprian Bulloch, Jr., was the co-founder, real estate developer, business-owner, promoter, establisher of the first U.S. fish hatchery, and entrepreneur of the community of Bullochville (renamed Warm Springs in 1924). After his death in 1903, his business interests were handled jointly by his wife, Julia Parkman Bulloch, and their two sons, both of whom died at an early age. By 1928, Julia Bulloch (1853-1936) assumed the role of matriarch for the family businesses, which included a general store, a business block with several storefronts, and several farms. Her four daughters, Mattie Bulloch, Minnie Bulloch, Ira Gene Bulloch Worth, and Mabel Bulloch Harry, lived with their mother in the family house. In 1927, the women had the house remodeled into the new fashionable Craftsman style. The house demonstrates the rapid change in architectural fashions from the ornate late 19th-century Folk Victorian style to the simpler Arts and Crafts Movement in the early 20th centuryto the point where the family remodeled a perfectly good house just to keep current.
The lives of the Bulloch daughters are all remarkable in their own right. Mattie was a college-educated teacher and traveled extensively along the east and west coasts, unusual for a single Southern woman at the time. Minnie assumed direct control of many of the family businesses after the death of her mother in 1936. Minnie also bought and sold land throughout the county and was celebrated in her obituary in 1961 as a prominent Warm Springs businesswoman. Ira Gene moved back into the family home after the death of her husband in 1931. She also managed the family businesses and was prominent in the local womens club and helped host social events in the community, including events where Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt were guests and speakers. Mabel suffered from life-long health problems and moved into the house with her husband in 1930, but she still taught school and participated in womens club activities. Although Cyprian Bulloch started the town, for 62 years, the history of Warm Springs (Bullochville) and a large part of Meriwether County was directly shaped and influenced by the Bulloch women"
Comment:
All the Bulloch girls had college educations.
Sometime after her sons died, Julia Bulloch asked Mabel and family to return to help her. Granddaddy Harry was the pastor of a church in Gastonia, NC close to his family. He probably would have be pleased to remain in North Carolina. However, Mabel missed being surrounded by family and her mother wanted her nearby.
There probably was not a really good way for Granddaddy to help on the business side. Minnie was self assured and capable. Several years had passed by and the older sisters stepped in to fill the gaps created by their brothers deaths. Mabel was 14 years younger than Minnie; so she may have always seemed less capable to an older sibling. Her role was mother to three children, wife to a pastor and daughter.
As for Mabel being sickly, to the best of my knowledge she became ill around 1950 and was hospitalized at Emory with a high fever and complications for about six weeks. She never recovered from that illness. Prior to that she had been active and involved in the community, first graduating from college in Milledgeville, teaching, parenting and supporting her husband as the wife of a minister and mayor of Warm Springs.
