I hinted the other day that I was going out to the Allen House because we heard some interesting news. I did go out there, but not about the summer kitchen! This summer kitchen news came out of nowhere today! What if I told you that it might not have originally been a summer kitchen! What if I told you it is quite possibly the plantation school!!!!!
There were a few things about the “summer kitchen” that always bothered Jeremy Bradham and me. For those that don’t know, Jeremy has his Masters Degree in Historic Preservation that he received from Charleston, SC. It never made sense to us that the summer kitchen was in front of the house. Have never seen that before.
Second, there are lathe marks in the “summer kitchen”, a sign that it had plaster walls when it was built in the early 19th century. We discussed maybe it was used as a residence first while they were building the main house? But we have seen where Vincent had another house that they lived in while building the Allen house, and it wasn’t the summer kitchen. Another strange thing is Mr. Amato told me there used to be a sign on the “summer kitchen”. It was called Katydid. We all thought, why would they name a summer kitchen?
I have been chatting with a lady in South Carolina. I am not going to mention her name in case she doesn’t want to be mentioned. She has her grandmother’s journals. They are related to the Allen’s through Martha Susan Allen Stainback and John Oliver Stainback. (Martha was Vincent Allen’s daughter)Â So today she messaged me, when you are out there look for remnants of an old building. Martha Allen Stainback had a plantation school built on the property. She hired James Durham as the teacher. James Durham ended up marrying Martha’s daughter.
I thought, how fascinating! An old school! Then I got to thinking………the “summer kitchen”. I immediately texted Jeremy this new information and he said, Holy Cow!! Wow. That makes so much sense!!!
This news came today at 3:00 and it has boggled our minds so we are still trying to process it and waiting on more information from a couple of sources. So fascinating though!!!!
