sebastopol house state historic site

We visited Sebastopol House yesterday. We had a wonderful tour guide named Charles. He knows so much history about the local area. Absolutely fascinating! Recommend the tour.

Looks like a McMansion from the outside but actually small living quarters. Knowledgeable local guide gave us a wonderful tour. House is made from lime crete, very thick walls, lovely floors and a mystery room with small barred windows but no entry or exit. Speculation from historians that it was used as a safety room from raiding Native Americans or other threatening folks. We stopped while enjoying the Pecan Festival and would go again if in that area. Guide gave us lots of local history about settlers and a famous pottery works that was nearby.

Guide, who was native to the city and grew up only blocks from Sebastopol House, gave an informed tour with loads of extra historical information.

Harks back to the early days of Texas. Well-kept small grounds and walking path. Didn't have time to go inside although it was open.

I attended Juan Seguin Elementary School in the late 50's. Adjacent from the school is Sebastopol. I recall playing softball in a dilapidated diamond just to the north of this house during our physical education period with our home class. On a couple of occasions, I ventured out towards this place. It was in poor shape. On the west side of the house were windows that had been broken for years. I wanted to get a closer look. A large window in the lower level had a gaping hole. I peeked and noticed big timbers or wooded posts with chains or shackles still fastened to them. It gave me a creepy feeling up my spine. I felt scared and ran fast from the premises. One question I ask myself is, were African Americans subjected to slavery at this home and tortured in this huge dungeon below. My next question is why preserve such a building if despicable practices might have occurred there towards this group of people. In my opinion, this building should have been condemned and erased from memory! Miguel

Starting way back in 1846, when Texas had just become a state, Dr John Parks began experimenting with using concrete. He soon had rivals, including Joshua Young, who built this fine home for his sister. Within 30 years the town had about 100 concrete structures, including the courthouse, a church or two, a school, numerous houses, sheds, fences, cisterns. A reporter exclaimed that Seguin was "The Mother of Concrete Cities" and indeed it had more concrete buildings than any place west of the Mississippi! Today fewer than 20 remain, and Sebastopol is the most imposing. A team of skilled African-American slaves built the Greek Revival style home about seven years before the Civil War. Wooden forms about 15 to 18 inches high held the concrete in place until it hardened. Then the forms were raised and another layer poured. The resulting structure was fireproof, well-insulated, and long-lasting. White-washed, it almost glowed in the light. Sebastopol represents a milestone in the history of construction technology. A tour will interest men, women, and children.Open weekends and by appointment.

Sebastopol House was formerly a property of the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department who, in light of recent severe budget cuts, have had to jettison several of their less profitable properties. So the city of Seguin (or the Texas Historical Commission, not sure which) has taken over Sebastopol, and I hope they have the funds to keep it up. It's a wonderful building with a lot of historical significance. Check in for a guided tour, and keep up with the special events that they occasionally host.

The house lay abandoned while I was growing up. We would go over and play in and under the old structure. We knew it was historically important just by looking but no one seemed to want to take on the restoration. In 1976, long after I left Seguin to join the Navy, the Texas Parks and Wildlife Dept. acquired the park and house opening it to be public in 1989 after a complete restoration. Sebastopol is an 1856 Greek Revival-style house sitting on 2.2 acres of its original 4-acre site and listed now as a Registered Texas Historic Landmark as well as in the National Register of Historic Places. Exhibits inside explain the original construction, the restoration process, and the history of the house and its inhabitants. Selected LeGette and Zorn family furnishings are displayed demonstrating the tastes of middle-class families of the late nineteenth century. For history buffs, especially Texas, it is a gem.