Western Travel - Minor-Porter Log House in Lewisville, Texas

LLELA (Lewisville Lake Environmental Learning Area) presents an open house for the Minor-Porter Log House every third Saturday (except during the hot summer months). It costs $5/car to enter the park. From the Cicada Pavilion parking lot, it is a quarter-mile walk along the Cottonwood Trail to the historic area.

The best part of this open house are the knowledgeable guides who are dressed in period clothes and can answer most of your questions. There is also a featured craft for kids. During December, the craft is a pinecone bird feeder.

Originally, the house was built in the area of Highland Village by William Tipton Minor and his wife, Mary, in 1869. After Mary died (in 1879), William married her sister, Vesta, and they had two children - Alice and Beecher. Vesta died in 1895. Alice married Clarence Olin Porter in 1901 and expanded around the log house - adding rooms, a dining room, and a kitchen. William died in 1926. Alice's five children eventually sold the property (late 1990's/early 2000s) to developers who had planned to demolish it. The log house was found inside and donated to the City of Lewisville. The city moved the house to LLELA in 2005 and restored it.

This placard shows you the skills and techniques for building a log cabin.

On the outside back wall of the cabin are several tools representing the ones that may have been used to construct this cabin.

The house is stocked with lots of antiques from this period such as this chair and basin.

Here is a view inside the house of the dining table and fireplace. Notice the yarn-winder in the back corner.

A neat little sitting-bed for guests or children. Large holes were drilled into the wall to insert the poles (and to remove when the bed was not needed).

Up a scary set of steep stairs with no railing, you can peek into the loft where younger children would have slept.

Barn/workshop

Smokehouse

For more information on the house, check out LLELA's site