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Show NFS Form 10-900-a Utah UordPerfect 5.1 Format (Revised Feb. 1993) United States Department of the Interior National Park Service National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Section NO. 8 Page 3 Crook, Heber & Matilda, House and Lake Creek Schoolhouse, Heber City, Wasatch County, UT Narrative Statement of Significance The Lake Creek Schoolhouse (c.1895) and the Heber and Matilda Crook House (1901-03) are locally significant for both their history and architecture. The schoolhouse is an excellent local example of log construction, featuring exceptional craftsmanship in its dovetail joints and fitting of logs. Only a few well-preserved log building remain in this area, and log buildings of this quality are especially rare. 5 The schoolhouse is also historically significant as the only known remaining 19th century school in the Heber Valley. The Victorian house, completed in 1903, is also architecturally significant as the only known example of a large stone house built as part of an outlying farmstead in the Heber City area. A number of similar houses remain in Heber City proper, 6 following the original pattern of city development-nucleated city surrounded by farmland. 7 The emergence of substantial houses such as the Crook House in outlying farmsteads indicates both a new level of agricultural prosperity in the area and a willingness to abandon the social and religious (Mormon) prescription of clustered town living. Though a comprehensive study of this shifting pattern of residential development has not yet been completed, an initial survey of the Heber City area indicates the Crook house to be on of the most dramatic and well-preserved examples of this phenomenon. The schoolhouse and the house have been part of the Crook farmstead since the house's completion in 1903; the schoolhouse ceased functioning as a school c.1899. HISTORY: After the Provo Canyon Road was completed, Heber City was the first settlement in the area in 1859. A few people began building homes from local red sandstone in 1864-65. 8 "The settlement of Heber was designed to take advantage of the water supplied by Lake and Center Creeks on the eastern side of the valley." 9 The communities of Center Creek and Lake Creek were developing in the early 1870s. Lake 5 A review of the Utah Historic Preservation Office computer database reveals that although there are nearly 300 log buildings remaining in Utah that are potentially eligible for the National Register of Historic Places, only 49 were constructed of hand-hewn logs and only 3 of those buildings were built as education facilities. Observations of many of these log cabins by Don Hartley, Historic Architect, also reveals that the craftsmanship of this cabin is one of the finest hand-hewn log buildings in Utah. 5 Murdock, Joseph, House, National Register, 1987. Hatch, Abram, House, National Register, 1975. Stone, vernacular residence built in 1865. Stone, Victorian residence built in 1892. 7 Joseph William Parker Farm, National Register Nomination, 1976, on file at Utah State Historic Preservation Office. This farm is another example of a stone Victorian eclectic house and log cabin. 8 How Beautiful Upon the Mountains. 1963, p. 107. 9 Under Wasatch Skies. A History of Wasatch County, 1858-1900. The Deseret News Press, 1954. Daughters of Utah Pioneers, Uasatch County: Deseret News Press, |
