Abandoned house GA before restoration
Stephen D Cowen House, Acworth Georgia
Stephen D. Cowen was born in 1824 and by 1850 was farming in Jackson County, Georgia. In the early 1850s, he moved to Acworth with his wife, Eliza Anntinett, his three children, India, Ann, and Edward, and his eight young slaves. In 1854, he purchased land lots 10 and 29 and soon after built his two-story frame house. Two more children, Arch and Steven, were born before Eliza died in 1855. Cowen married Elizabeth Ann Tanner in 1856 or 1857 and had six children, T.R., Ella, Henry, Girtie, William, and Cora, before Elizabeth Ann died in 1874. Cowen married his third wife, Mary Elizabeth Davenport, in 1876 and had two children, Emory and Clara.
As a yeoman farmer in the Georgia Piedmont, Stephen D. Cowen owned land and cultivated a variety of crops, including wheat, corn, oats, cotton, peas and beans, and potatoes. His livestock included mules, milk cows, cattle, and swine. In 1860, Cowen prospered with land valued at $4,000 and personal wealth, which included eight slaves, valued at $7,500. By 1880, his land holdings had increased to 100 acres of improved land and 475 acres of woodland, orchards, and "old fields." After Stephen's death in 1900 and Mary Elizabeth's death in 1912, the property was divided among his heirs, and in 1918 the house was sold out of the Cowen family.
In 1918, W. H. Kemp purchased the Cowen house and land. The Kemps farmed the property until W. H. Kemp died in 1937. The widow Althea Kemp owned the property from 1937 to 1950. After passing though a series of owners, the Lannings purchased the property in 1959. The Lannings, who kept chickens and a few cows, were the last owners to practice agriculture on the property. The Lannings sold the property in 1995. The Acworth Historical Society eventually acquired the house in the late 1990s and rehabilitated the Cowen house to serve as a welcome center, museum, and historical society offices.
Building Description
The Stephen D. Cowen House is a two-story, plantation plain-type house located on a small lot on Cowan Road in the city of Acworth in northwest Cobb County, Georgia. Built in c.1854, the house survives with a high level of historic integrity. The five-bay house features four principal rooms on the first floor divided by a central hall. The rear ell, built in c.1900, contains the dining room and kitchen. The front parlors and second-floor bedrooms are located in the two-story main block. The two rear bedrooms on the main floor are located in a rear shed-roofed ell that was built as part of the original house. In profile, the two-story main block flanked by the front porch, now missing, and the rear shed-roofed ell gives the Cowen house its distinctive plantation plain form. Classical Revival style elements include the corner boards, wide entablature, and the double-leaf entrance with sidelights and transom. The three-bay hip-roofed porch, which replaced an earlier one-bay entrance porch, is missing.
The house is set on brick and stone piers that have been partially infilled with concrete block. The hewn sills and braced frame are fastened with mortise-and-tenon joints. Smaller, circular-sawn studs are set in place with cut nails. The floor structure consists of 2 by 6-inch joists that measure 16-feet long. These were placed on 24-inch centers and run from the front of the house to the rear. The floor system in the rear ell is not brace framed as in the rest of the house, but instead is constructed with ledger boards and notched joists that have been toenailed into place. The hip roof, which is covered with crimped sheet metal, is supported by wood rafters that meet without a ridgepole.
The house is clad in weatherboard, except around the main entrance where flush sheathing indicates the extent of the original one-bay one-story porch. The sash windows are mostly six-over-six-light double-hung sashes with some larger nine-over-six-light windows on the main facade. The surrounds are plain.
The floor plan features four principal rooms and a central hall that runs the full depth of the main block. Two exterior chimneys heated the front parlors. The two rear bedrooms on the first floor are located in a shed-roofed ell. Although these bedrooms are not heated, they were built as part of the original house. A small cellar for cold storage is located beneath the east parlor. Stairs in the central hall provide access to the two second-floor bedrooms, which were heated by stoves. Electrical wiring and indoor plumbing were added in the first decades of the 20th century.
In c.1900, a one-story, gable-roofed ell was added to the rear of the house. The two-room ell included a kitchen and dining room with a porch that faced northeast. The chimney on the rear ell is missing but its profile is clearly seen in the discolored weatherboard. The corbel-capped portion of the west parlor chimney is also missing.
Most interior finishes are plain and remain intact. Horizontal sheathing was used on most floors, walls, and ceilings. The floors consist of quarter-sawn oak or pine six- to eight-inches wide and joined with tongue-and-groove notches. The walls are covered with notched-wood panels with little decorative trim. The stairway retains its plain balusters and rail, and most interior door surrounds survive. The floorboards in the two second-floor bedrooms have been removed, exposing the floor joists.
Two mature cedar trees that stand in front of the house and remnants of a brick walk are the only surviving elements of the historic setting. As development in Cobb County, a suburb of Atlanta, increased, land in the vicinity of the Cowen house has been subdivided and developed. A street lined with new houses was built to the rear of the Cowen house and commercial development associated with the nearby Interstate 75 interchange has moved closer the Cowen property. As a result, none of the outbuildings or agricultural fields associated with the plantation that once totaled nearly 600 acres survives and much of the historic setting has been lost.
