Farmers Branch Historical Park

A look at the community festival.
And a self portrait...see me?

S and I had the occasion to visit the Farmers Branch Historical Park last weekend. This city is northwest of Dallas, on the way to Denton. They were having an outdoor concert we took in. Before the concert, we milled around their little community festival and checked out the historical buildings. I took a few photos of those historical buildings, and, since it was dusk, the light is very nice in the photos. And, they are burning a hole in my hard drive, so I figured I better share them with you here.

The park itself is 22 acres, and houses several historical buildings. We did not see all the buildings on the property - for instance, there is a church, and a school...and another historical house from 1856...we certainly missed those. And maybe others. But, here is what we did see!

In one section they have this 1870's train depot and caboose.

According to their website, they have this to say about the depot building:

In 1874, to ensure the railroad would come to Farmers Branch, Dr. Gilbert and other local settlers sold rights-of-way through their land. Around 1877, the Dallas and Wichita Railroad built this depot. The rail line, which runs from Dallas to Denton, was sold to Jay Gould and the Missouri-Kansas-Texas Railroad in 1881. The Interurban Railway electrified the line in 1924 and until 1931 ran as many as 50 scheduled trains per day. The Depot was relocated to the Historical Park and restored in 1985. The Depot is used to display artifacts that demonstrate the impact different modes of transportation had on early Texas. The 1890s all-wood Caboose includes original bunks, sink, icebox, hardware and potbelly stove.

And a gas station from a few years back.

Check out the price of that gas!

Again, from their website:

This replica structure incorporates many of the architectural features of a Texaco gas station that was located on Denton Drive, just down the street from the Historical Park in the 1930s. Gas Stations were the first businesses in America to begin the age of mass marketing that we are all familiar with today. We can travel across the country and eat identical hamburgers, drink the same soft drink, and put the same gas in our vehicles, and that trend was introduced to America through gas stations such as the one that our building represents.

Then, we walked over to the "log culture" area.

This area had a few buildings that represented a homestead of the 1840's - "second generation" frontier homes. This would have been around the time that Farmer's Branch was being first settled.

You can see the concert area was near the log culture area.

This house, and the barn you'll see later, were originally located in nearby Pilot Point.

Settlers were coming to the area on 640-acre land grants.

And, according to their website, Farmers Branch was once one of the most well known established areas in Texas throughout Europe.

These homes were "second generation" because they had windows and lofts, for example.


The lady of the house happened to be out on the porch at the time of our visit.

I think that is a meat grinder.
Is that a meat grinder?

I'm pretty sure this structure is a replica of an 1840's land grant office.

It's of course similar to city offices today, with the budget shortfalls and all.

This building had the wagon out back.

The homestead had quite a garden growing.

It made me wish I had gotten busy and planted one of my own.

Ellie and Echo would have liked eating it.

Theirs was pretty nice, though, huh?

Last in the log culture area, the barn.

A blacksmith was demonstrating at the side of this building.

He drew a crowd of interested parties...not right when I took this shot.
But, he did.

It's a lovely little park. If you're in the Dallas area, I highly recommend checking it out. S and I will have to go by again to see what we missed. That's it for today. See you tomorrow!