Video
Lyndon B. Johnson Boyhood Home - Audio Described Tour
Transcript
Sam and Rebekah Johnson moved their young family to Johnson City in 1913. The Boyhood Home of President Johnson is a white, one-story, wood frame house. It has seven rooms and four porches, one porch for each corner of the house.
The Boyhood Home has been set to its 1920s appearance, the teenage years of Lyndon Johnson. While a few artifacts on display are original to the Johnson family, most are authentic period pieces.
FRONT PORCH A L-shaped porch of gray-painted boards welcomes visitors to the home. White posts hold up the porch roof and match the white-painted house. The ceiling of the covered porch is painted light blue. On the short side of the porch, a wooden bench swing hangs from the ceiling by chains. The windows of the house have open, green shutters, and there are two screened doors here. The front door has half-sidelight windows.
OFFICE The entryway is a small room about 13 feet by 8 feet. Referred to as the “Central Hall,” this space served as the front entry as well as an office for Sam Johnson. The walls are salmon pink, and a border along the top has hand-painted poinsettia flowers. A few black and white photographs of early 1920s Texas legislative representatives adorn the walls. Furniture fills half of the narrow room. This includes a wooden rolltop desk with a matching swivel chair and a revolving bookcase with four shelves filled with thick law books. The rolltop is open, revealing only a few items such as a Record book, an ash tray and aged, yellowed stationary. A kerosene lamp sits on top of the desk. A white door with half-sidelight windows is closed on the far side of the room.
On one wall, there is an open door to the Dining Room. A wooden box telephone with mouth piece, separate ear piece, and two round bells hangs next to this door. On the opposite wall a door opens to the Girls Room. A tall hat stand in the corner next to this door has one Stetson hat.
GIRLS ROOM Lyndon Johnson’s three sisters shared a large bedroom that is 15 feet by 13 feet. Each of the white walls has one or two tall, single-hung windows with long, sheer curtains. There are two beds, across the room from each other. Each bed has a lacy, embroidered white covering. A dark rug covers most of the wooden floor, and there are children’s toys on the rug. A small wooden box has a tea set and jacks at the base. A doll sits in a small high chair and a second doll lies on the one bed. A couple books and a teddy bear sit on the closer bed.
There is a mirrored dressing table with a couple of brushes, a hand mirror, and two kerosene lamps upon it. A wooden commode washstand with an attached, curved towel rack. It has a pink porcelain basin and pitcher upon it. An open armoire displays a few small dresses. We exit to cross the Office and enter the Dining Room.
DINING The Dining Room is the center of the Johnson Home. It is 16 feet by 14 feet with wooden floorboards. There are gray wainscot panels below the off-white wallpaper. One or two open doors on each wall lead to other rooms or porches. Several small, framed black and white photos adorn the walls. All are of family members except a print of a European portrait. In the middle of the room sits a wooden table that has a wooden chair with padded seat on each of its four sides. Covering much of the table is a circular, crocheted centerpiece. At its center, a glass display holds polished apples. Hanging from the ceiling above the table is a kerosene lamp with a simple floral design and several glass baubles. Across the room, there are two open doors, one to the Tub Porch and one to the Parents Room. In between these doors is a small table with a dark, rectangular Atwater Kent radio and a circular horn speaker. A wooden magazine holder hangs on the wall above the radio. Two wooden chairs with deer-hide seats flank either side of the radio table.
The next wall features the fireplace. The mantel and surround are finished wood, and the hearth and lintel are stone. An embroidered mantel scarf is laid across the mantel where two candlesticks flank a black mantel clock. There is also a cigar box and Crown Dominos box on the mantel. A closed closet door is on one side of the fireplace. On the other side, a recessed area leads to the Parlor door. Near this recessed area is the doorway to the Office. In between this door and a door to the Sleeping Porch is an enclosed bookcase with five shelves filled with old books with faded spines. Each shelf is covered by a sliding glass door. The top half of the Sleeping Porch door has is a square window of etched glass. This open door rests against the last wall.
This wall has a door in its center that leads into the kitchen. In the corner, a small stand with flowers in a vase is half hidden by the open door top the Tub Porch. KITCHEN The kitchen is a room, 13 feet by 11 feet, with white board and batten walls, and a blue-green patterned linoleum rug covering much of the wooden floorboards. A wooden table and chairs sit in the center of the room. Items on the table include wooden spoons, a flour sifter, tin pans, a wooden bowl with eggs and cookie cutters. There are two single hung windows, both with sheer, blue curtains tied to each side. A white door with a glass window leads to the Sleeping Porch. There is a kerosene stove below shelves holding glassware, blue cooking pots and white bowls and plates.
A corner cupboard has its curtains open to display four shelves of canned goods of varying size with colorful labels. A modest single basin sink is next to the cupboard by the central window. The attached drainboard has a bowl of tomatoes, onions and potatoes. In the other corner is a large, wood-burning stove that includes a bread box and a stove pipe extending to the ceiling.
Across from the oven is a butcher cabinet. On the wall nearby the cabinet is a framed needle-point of a house and a tree with the words “Be it ever so humble, there’s no place like home.” Crossing back through the Dining Room, we pass the fireplace to enter the Parlor.
PARLOR The parlor is 16 feet by 14 feet, and its wallpaper is a floral diamond pattern that is simple yet dynamic. Furniture in the room presents a formal feeling. These furniture pieces are placed around the room, leaving a large open area in the center. An area rug with a leaf and flower design in muted colors fills this center space and covers much of the floorboards. Three walls have tall, single-hung windows with closed shades behind lace curtains. Three large, framed photographs on the walls showcase different individuals. An open door with half window of etched glass reveals the front porch beyond a closed screen door. Next to the door, there is a large, cabinet Victrola with an open top and a record on its turntable. A round, marble top table holds a candy dish and sits in between the Victrola and a chair with dark upholstery and a bold-flower design.
In the corner, next to the dark chair, there is a small writing desk with attached mirror. Two books rest on the desk. Next to the desk, in the middle of the far wall, is a rectangle, marble-top table. It is centered below a window. Sitting on the table, there is an ornate kerosene lamp flanked by two ceramic baskets. Next to the table, in the far corner, there is a Whatnot stand with ceramic figurines on each of its four shelves and a porcelain doll in a lacy dress at the bottom. A yellow, Eastlake-style chair has its back to the Whatnot. This chair is angled near an end table next to a sofa on the wall. The sofa sits underneath a large, square mirror on the wall. The sofa is upholstered with a dark yellow fabric matching the style and color of the chair. There are a couple round, lacy pillows on the sofa as well as a few periodicals.
Next to the sofa, a tea cart holds an etched wooden box, a kerosene lamp, and a tea set. It is positioned in front of an alcove in the wall next to a fireplace. The alcove has a built-in bench with a red velvet seat, and the alcove wall has three framed European prints. The fireplace is next to the door from the Dining Room. The fireplace matches the one in the Dining Room with a wooden mantel and surround and a stone hearth and lintel. On the mantel, two candlesticks sit on the embroidered mantel scarf. Above the mantel is a framed print of what appears to be a skull. Upon further inspection, it is an optical illusion that also appears to be a woman seated at her vanity looking at herself in the mirror.
Passing the Parlor fireplace to return into the central Dining Room, we pass the Dining Room fireplace to enter the Parents Room.
PARENTS ROOM The Parents Room was the bedroom of Sam and Rebekah. This room is 14 feet by 13 feet, and the wallpaper is light gray with small, colorful floral designs. A few framed, black and white photos of individuals hang on the walls. There are windows with half drawn shades and lacy, white curtains. Two single-hung windows on one wall face the backyard and the screened Tub Porch. The opposite wall has one window and an open porch door facing the front yard. Across the room, there is a doorway with gray molding leading to the Boys Room. Next to this door, a brick enclosure on the upper part of the wall extends to the ceiling. It has a round covering for a stove pipe.
Furniture is placed on either side of the bedroom. On one side of the room, a wooden armoire sits with one door open revealing a few dresses. There are also two wooden chairs with deer-skin seats, a commode washstand, and a Singer sewing machine with a metal foot pedal and a wooden top and drawers. On the other side of the room, there is a dressing table and a bed. The double bed sits on a wooden frame. It has two pillows and a blue cover. There is a porcelain chamber pot with a floral pattern underneath the bed, and next to the bed, there is a marble-top, bedside table with two books. Towards the foot of the bed, the dressing table has a tiltable mirror. Small items such as a brush and round containers sit on a white cloth on this table. In between the bed and the dressing table, there is an open door below a transom window. This doorway leads out to a L-shaped porch similar in appearance to the front entry porch. Crossing the Parents Room, we enter the Boys Room.
BOYS ROOM The Boy Room was the bedroom shared by Lyndon with his younger brother. It is 14 feet by 11 feet with wooden floor boards and a tall ceiling. Its wallpaper has an embossed, beige and cream floral pattern. There are two single-hung windows in the room. Both have linen curtains drawn open and shades half down. Two framed, black and white photographs adorn two walls. One is a school photograph of nearly a hundred students. The second is a young Lyndon Johnson.
In one corner, there is a finished chair and a wooden box on its side displaying several die-cast models. These include wagons, tractors, a train engine and flatcars. Filling the other corner of the room is a long, double bed with a handsome, wooden bed frame . It has two pillows and a checkered quilt with pink squares alternating with different square patterns. A baseball mitt and ball sit on the quilt. A simple blue chamber pot lies underneath the bed. Near the bed is a dresser with a round mirror and three drawers. It has small items such as a comb, slingshot and a box of marbles sitting on a white cloth. A tennis racket and a baseball bat lean against the wall in between the dresser and a pot-belly stove. This black stove has a long, rusty stove pipe that leads into a brick-enclosed chimney near the ceiling.
A very tall, wood armoire stands next to the doorway to the Tub Room.
TUBROOM The Tub Room is a small, board and batten room that is 7 feet by 6 feet. There is one small window with long, sheer curtains. Most of the room is taken by a white, claw-foot tub. It sits next to a commode washstand with an attached, curved towel rack with two towels. A white, porcelain pitcher sits in a matching wash basin on the washstand. There is a framed print on the wall of a child in a wash barrel. A door to the left leads to a long porch.
TUB PORCH This porch from the tub room is 18 feet long and 6 feet wide. Like the other two porches, the wood planks of the floor are painted gray and the ceiling is light blue. Two windows from the Parents Room are on one side. It is a screened porch with white posts and the screen on the opposite side. A green, wood frame screen door leads to the back yard. There is a small stand across the porch next to the door to re-renter the house. Crossing through the Dining Room, the last porch is nearly straight across from the tub porch.
SLEEPING PORCH Known as the Sleeping Porch, this is the largest porch at 23 feet long and 12 feet wide. Like the others, it has a gray, wooden floor and light blue ceiling. The left wall has the closed door to the Office and two windows to the Girls Room. There is furniture along this wall. A wooden chair with deer-hide seat. There is an iron-frame bed with a plain, covered mattress and pillow. A wooden hat rack with a small mirror and metal hangers is mounted on the wall above the bed. Next to the bed is a commode washstand with attached, curved towel rack. There is also a large wooden ice box with two doors. On the wall above the icebox is a metal holder for two ice picks with wooden handles.
Two sides of the porch are screened above a knee wall. Beyond the porch outside, there is a wire perimeter fence with a white gate. The backyard has flowering crepe myrtles and large live oak trees with long branches. There is a red barn in the distance, park benches, a raised water tank and a small wooden structure with a lean-to on its far side.
Description
Guided, audio-described virtual tour through the Boyhood Home, childhood home of President Lyndon Johnson.
Duration
13 minutes, 20 seconds
Date Created
01/12/2022
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