The 14th Annual
Heritage Homes Tour
The Heritage Neighborhood
Mother's Day Weekend
Saturday, May 13, 2006
10 a.m. - 6 p.m.

The Heritage Neighborhood

The Heritage Society of Austin invites you to explore the story of the Heritage Neighborhood, with its colorful cast of characters who played out their lives amongst a charming assemblage of homes. The 2006 Heritage Homes Tour will celebrate the past and present of this beloved Austin neighborhood.

The Heritage Neighborhood presents a pleasant mix of early 20th century architectural styles. While at least two stone farmhouses (the Penn and Lesser Houses) long predate the developed area and some later intrusions are found, the neighborhood is characterized by comfortable and handsome homes from the 1910s and 1920s. Most are one or two stories in height with wood or stuccoed exteriors, sometimes with limestone details. The most popular architectural influences are Craftsman and Colonial Revival. While a number of homes were planned by architect, artist and educator Raymond Everett and avocational architect Ada
Read Penn, the design of other homes likely comes from lumberyard designs or popular home plan books of the day. At least one substantial home was said to have been designed by its owner, Texas Secretary of State Jane Yelvington McCallum. Several homes in the neighborhood have City of Austin Landmark status, including the McCaleb House on W. 32nd St. Tall trees and mature vegetation, sidewalks and access to urban amenities further enhance the area.

Map of Featured Homes

Courtesy of Peter Flagg Maxson, Architectural Historian


Neighborhood History

Gypsies and judges. Professors and professional gamblers. Cowboys and Comanches. Students, actors, musicians, architects, lawyers…..and a lot of feisty women! They’ve all left their mark on the Austin Heritage Neighborhood, which extends from 29th Street north to 38th Street, and from Guadalupe west to Lamar Boulevard.

One of those feisty women was actually the developer of much of the neighborhood. In 1902, Judge Robert Penn bought, for back taxes, the 1840s house at 3112 West Avenue, now a historic landmark known as Heritage House, from which the neighborhood takes its name. Penn’s purchase included the dwelling and a large tract of land extending west to Shoal Creek. Seven years after the judge and his family moved into the house, Robert Penn died, leaving his widow, Ada Caroline Read Penn, with nine children, $10,000 and their ten acres. Ada faced the challenge of supporting her family by buying a T-square and enrolling in night school, where she learned to make blueprints and planned the development her property. After persuading Austin City Council to rename Asylum Avenue (leading to the State Lunatic Asylum) as an extension of the fashionable West Avenue, Ada subdivided her ten acres into forty lots, and, acting as architect and contractor, designed and built or remodeled some forty houses in the next thirty years, without cutting any of the neighborhood’s beautiful oaks. It was her intent that university professors and their families would occupy these homes. Mrs. Penn also arranged to have Grandview Street cut and named it for the beautiful view of the western hills, then referred to as Austin’s “Violet Crown.”

By the end of World War I, the Penn Development was still quite rural, with an active farm just north of 34th Street. The main attractions on the northern edge of the city were the State Lunatic Asylum, a soap and candle factory, a horse racetrack (in what became Hyde Park) and a gypsy camp, now referred to as Gypsy Grove. The proximity of the gypsy camp to the racetrack was likely due to the skill of the gypsy men with horses and the women with telling fortunes.

Many University of Texas faculty members purchased homes Ada Penn designed and built for them, including Daniel Pennick, the tennis coach and professor of Greek, as well as the University’s first director of athletics, Theo Bellmont. Among other faculty who resided in the neighborhood was architect Raymond Everett, who also designed some homes in the neighborhood. Another well-known former resident was Johan Udden, a brilliant scientist, whose work using seismology led to the discovery and development of the Permian Basin oil field in West Texas. After his published account of discovering dinosaur bones in Big Bend, Texas Memorial Museum was built to house his finds. Another well-known couple in the neighborhood were “feisty woman” Jane Yelvington McCallum, Texas Secretary of State and suffragist leader, and her husband, Arthur Newall McCallum, long-time superintendent of Austin’s schools.

The neighborhood is still home to many University of Texas professors and students, as well as artists, musicians, architects and writers, who enjoy its central location, its unpretentious homes and its interesting history.

by Marty Moulthrop, with acknowledgement to Anne Boyer from "Writing Austin's Lives: A Community Portrait", UT Humanities Institute and Waterloo Press.

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All images courtesy Shoehorn Design.

613 W. 31st St.


806 W. 31st St


810 W. 31st St


614 W. 31 1/2 St.


616 West 31 1/2 Street


700 W. 32nd St


3208 King St.

3112 West Avenue

All images courtesy of
Shoehorn Design.