Who built Jasper?
Book to chronicle area's foundation
By SHARON KERR

Who built Jasper?

You could answer that question in terms of founding families who settled here, in terms of timber empires that laid the economic foundations, or in terms of railroads that fueled growth and prosperity.

But in the most literal sense of board-by-board, W.P. Cook built Jasper.

From the Belle-Jim Hotel to the majority of centuryold homes near downtown, Cook was the contractor and builder for who's who in Jasper.

The casual observer, seeing homes that range in style through Victorian, Craftsman, Federal, Old English, Prairie and Greek Revival, would likely not connect the dots and realize one man was responsible for all that construction.

Cook also worked all over East Texas. He built schools, churches, stores and many of the original railroad depots, including the depot building the Tonahill Theater now calls home.

Kay Breidenthal, one of many great-grandchildren still living in the area, says, "I'm just so proud to know what 'Bamp' did."

She has just finished reading the final version of her cousin "Bitsy" Hanna's book, "W.P. Cook, Contractor and Builder," which will be available in February.

THIS PRAIRIE STYLE HOME on West Houston Street and the Craftsman style birdcage posts on Milam Street are two examples of builder W.P. Cook's eye for proportion and detail.

The book has been a family project four years in the making and requiring the sort of sleuthing where one thing leads to another and some mysteries will never be solved.

Some records were unearthed in the Jasper County Clerk's deed book, while other descriptions came from copies of The Jasper News-Boy (as it was spelled then) in the archives of the Jasper County Historical Society in the Old Jail Museum. Family records and recollections filled in many gaps.

The Cook family first established itself in Texas before the Civil War (the family traces its roots to ancestors who arrived at Plymouth Rock shortly after The Mayflower).

William Parker Cook, born in 1862, likely learned the basics of carpentry from his father. However, when he began his career it was as a first grade teacher. In fact, the book reports that Cook took the first written examination for a teaching certificate in Newton County, where he earned a grand salary of $45.50 per month.

Hanna reports, "Cook never had any formal training in regards to architectural design ... It is likely he relied on architectural magazines, his experience, the desires and needs of his clients as well as his developing sense of design to craft a beautiful variety of buildings."

Cook began constructing houses in 1890. Shortly after his first house, he built the R.C. Lanier store and residence in Kirbyville, just in time for the arrival of the railroad.

Soon he was building railroad depots all over East Texas, often camping out near construction sites.

When his wife fell ill and died, he was left to raise six young children. Cook gave up the lucrative railroad contracts to stay closer to home, and his work in Jasper began in earnest.

A 1904 The News-Boy proclaimed Cook as "one of the most successful contractors in this section of the state." It goes on to say, "He employs none but skilled mechanics ... (he) plans and estimates on buildings of every description."

People would see a house they liked while traveling, take its measurements and bring them back to Cook.

"It was common during this time for contractors to be paid as work on the house progressed. The clients would order materials themselves, which left the carpenters to document their work by signing a rafter or a cabinet," according to Hanna's book.

The book presents more than 60 photos and illustrations of known Cook homes and buildings in chronological order, but it is likely that many more structures in Jasper were built by him.

At the time of his death in 1934, The News-Boy reported in his obituary that Cook had built more than half the houses in Jasper.

Breidenthal says her dad, Charles Kent, still has the carpenter's square that "Bamp" used to build Jasper.

All in the details

Houses built by Cook utilized abundant local materials like heart pine floors and solid wood beams. He was known for attention to details, whether in the gingerbread trim of a Victorian home or the solid oak built-in cabinets found in craftsman designs.

Walls were built of boards rather than lath and plaster (sheetrock didn't exist yet). If economy was uppermost, boards would be sanded and varnished, but in finer homes the wood walls were hung with canvas and then wallpapered.

Joe Chapman, who with wife Gayle Meigs is remodeling the old Mays house at 157 W. Milam, says he removed three layers of wallpaper. He preserved some samples in an album for future owners of the home.

A 1911 edition of The News-Boy called the home being built for A. L. Leake Mays, "One of the handsomest and most convenient homes in Jasper."

Chapman said the house originally had two staircases, one centered on the front door for guests and family, and another stairway parallel but opposite for servants to access the upstairs from the kitchen.

The early houses Cook built did not have electricity. Chapman says when it was added later, this house became one of the first homes in Jasper to be electrified. You can still see the old knob-and-tube wiring, and he has kept the fuse box with an inspection sticker dated 1927.

The original slate roof was intact until Hurricane Rita, but now only the garage has slate. Another example of Cook's slate roofs can be seen at 451 N. Bowie.

When Cook built the Prairie-style home at 452 W. Houston in 1919, it would have been cutting edge modern. Frank Lloyd Wright pioneered the style, which has low horizontal lines, large overhangs and an open floor-plan that is once again stylish.

The house, now empty and for sale, still has the original built-in parlor cabinets and stained-glass windows with a Scottish thistle design.

Most of the windows have the original handpoured glass with wavy imperfections now highly prized by craftsman aficionados.

Under the house are huge solid wood beams doubtless cut from local timber, but of a size that today would only be available laminated from pieces.

Many of the homes and the Belle-Jim Hotel had sleeping porches off upstairs bedrooms. They were long rooms with many windows to take advantage of breezes at a time when no one had air conditioning nor even fans.

In his later years, Cook built the house at 301 N. Main for Homer and Dess Gibbs. In 1927 The News- Boy reported, "Finishing touches and final detail work are being put on the new brick veneer home of H.N. Gibbs, a striking example of the Old English type of residence and one of Jasper's many new homes."

The house reportedly cost $12,000, a fortune at a time when a complete craftsman bungalow could be purchased from the Sears catalogue for about $3,000.

Page after page shows houses still familiar to Jasper residents, albeit sometimes greatly altered. One sketch shows the original version of Cook's own house at 401 N. Main, a one-story frame with a porch. By 1911 it had second wing and second story addition. It was proclaimed in The News-Boy as "one of the most stately and handsome (homes) in town."

The Historical Society and the county are financing the limited edition printing of the hardbound book. Books will be sold at a book signing Feb. 3 and through the Jasper library.

Hanna donated her research and writing on the book, Bill Wise donated use of his watercolors of many historic homes, and Georgia Purdy donated photography to make the book possible.

According to the preface, "Profits from the book will contribute to the preservation and knowledge of the early days of this much beloved stretch of land."