Rush-Crabb House

The Rush-Crabb House is a rare local example of a vernacular dwelling that retains much of its original architectural features. The house is in an area of South Dallas whose architectural integrity is largely compromised by insensitive building alterations, vacant lots, abandoned houses, and neglect. Further, it is one of the earliest extant buildings surviving in all of South Dallas, below Martin Luther King, Jr. Boulevard (MLK), whose construction dates to the first years of South Park Additions' development and provides a link to the very beginnings of South Dallas' phenomenal residential growth from 1900 to 1920s. The Rush- Crabb House, which pre-dates the later bungalows that predominate in the addition, is nominated under Criterion C in the area of Architecture as a rare surviving local example of turn-of-the-century vernacular architecture, and is associated with the historic context, The Development of East and South Dallas: 1872-1945.

The Rush-Crabb House represents the earliest suburban development efforts in the huge 39-block South Park Addition (1889; replatted 1902 to exclude land between Grand and Forest avenues) that encompassed all the territory from Grand Avenue on its northern border and Warren Avenue to the south, between Central and Myrtle avenues on the west and east. The subdivision of the land, formerly used for agricultural purposes, was accomplished in conjunction with the construction of the Dallas Rapid Transit streetcar in 1888. When the streetcar line was put into operation, it linked the downtown area with the fairgrounds to the east, thereby opening hundreds of acreage for real estate development and speculation. Most pre-1900 development in South Dallas took place in the upper Colonial Hill area to the west, before the economic depressions of the 1890s curtailed nearly all buildings in the city and its suburbs. Although South Park Addition was platted in 1889, little construction took place in the addition prior to 1903. The Rush-Crabb House, an exception, was among the first houses built in the addition, and it was one of the first of literally hundreds of small, 3- to 5- room, wood-framed houses erected between 1902 and 1907 (city building permits, 1905-15; city directories, var.).

The earliest known resident of the Rush-Crabb House was James P. Rush, who occupied the house by 1901. Since city directories did not account for this area prior to 1901, it is possible that the house is older but not much. James Rush, who listed his occupation as "trackman", may have been an employee of the street railway company. He and his children lived in the house until 1906, after which a series of different occupants were listed at the address until 1916 when Charles C. Crabb purchased it. Crabb, a driver for The Texas Company, lived in the house with his wife Mattie through the historic period ending in 1941. Later city directories indicate that Crabb owned the house. Like most of the residents of South Park Addition, Rush, Crabb, and the others who occupied the house between the two were members of the working class. The occupations of men who lived on Pennsylvania, Peabody, and Birmingham streets in the first half of this century underscore Dallas' growing importance as a manufacturing and trading hub of the region. Many of South Park's residents worked in the mills and other factories that sprang up along the Trinity River, to the west, and along the major railroad lines that crisscrossed the city. Still, others were employed in building and service trades to keep abreast of the construction and population boom that Dallas experienced along with its industrial growth.

The Rush-Crabb House, although unique in its age and unaltered condition, is representative of the type of housing provided for the working-class men and women who formed the backbone of Dallas' industrial society in the first decades of the 20th century. It is nominated to the National Register under Criterion C as a rare, intact example of early housing in suburban Dallas. Further, it is a good and well-preserved illustration of a vernacular residence with a T-shaped plan, and only a small number of this once-common house form survive relatively intact in South Dallas.