Cavitt House
713 E. 30th St., Bryan, TXThe Cavitt House, located in Bryan, Texas, is the oldest residential structure in Bryan and the only local example of the Italianate style. Built as the home of William R. Cavitt, a local financier, the house is unusually austere for its era and style.
W. R. Cavitt, a prominent Brazos County landowner, purchased the city block on which the house stands for $1,000 in January, 1875. The following October he brought his bride, Mary Mitchell Cavitt, to the newly completed house. The large, white stuccoed home was constructed in the Italianate style with typically large fenestration, assymetrical massing and dominant cubic shapes. However, the house was unusually chaste for its style and date, and lacked the deep bracketed comices, corner tower, and elaborate millwork commonly foiond in contemporary examples of the mode. By the turn of the century the house had extensive gardens, one of Texas' first private tennis courts, and a cedar-lined walk leading to the main entrance. Only the cedar walk has survived to the present.
Cavitt was actively involved in civic affairs and twice served as a county attorney, from 1878 to 1880 and again from 1882 to 1884. In personal business matters, Cavitt was primarily involved in the planting of cotton and the acquisition of rich farmland in the surrounding Brazos valley. At the time of his death, in 1924, Cavitt owned much of the land between Bryan and nearby College Station.
Of Cavitt's six children, two are still living. Edith and Ethel Cavitt, presently confined to a local nursing home, have retained ownership of the Cavitt House and most of its original furnishings.
The Cavitt House is unique in Bryan for its continued ownership by the family which built it and for the near total lack of major modifications and alterations, which have preserved the house in very nearly its original appearance. The age of the Cavitt House is particularly significant since much of Bryan was enlarged and rebuilt in the years following Reconstruction, after the erection of the Cavitt House.The Cavitt House is therefore of particular historical value to the city of Bryan since it represents the earliest group of substantial structures built there.
Bibliography
Dozier, Phyllis, The Cavitt House. A research paper prepared for the Texas Historical Commission by Ms. Dozier, Executive Director of the Arts Council of Brazos Valley.
Listed in National Register of Historic Places in 1976.
The National Register of Historic Places is the official list of the Nation’s historic places worthy of preservation. Authorized by the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966, the National Park Service’s National Register of Historic Places is part of a national program to coordinate and support public and private efforts to identify, evaluate, and protect America’s historic and archeological resources.