Imagine the hollow clip-clops of horse-drawn carriages traveling the freshly-paved roads of Junius Street and just picture old-world Dallas from this porch. The year is 1908 and the city of Dallas is bustling with new development. Mr. William Frank Knox is a railroad man for Gulf Texas & Western Railroad who is eager to put down roots for his wife and two young kids in Munger Place.
This new East Dallas neighborhood is ahead of its time in the early 1900s as the first deed-restricted neighborhood in Texas. The developers, the Munger brothers, stipulated that homes must cost at least $2,000 to build, are required to stand two stories tall, and are prohibited from facing a side street. Mr. Knox has selected this large 0.28-acre lot to build the Knox family home, address 5107 Junius Street — just the second home built on this block, which boasted paved streets, sidewalks, electric street lights, and two Sycamore trees on every lot.
Owners Jim and Peggy Walker have called 5107 Junius, listed by Mary Poss of Ebby Halliday Realtors for $1.125 million, home for nearly four decades. When they moved in in 1983, they were the only house that still had the two original Sycamore trees, though storms and lightning ended up claiming those timbers years later.
“During the early years of our ownership of the home, one of the Knox sons who moved into the house with his parents would stop by the house and tell us stories about the home,” Jim and Peggy say. “He said his father, the elder Mr. Knox, had his office where we now have our office. And the deep window ledge in the dining room was built that way for his grandfather, who liked to sit in that window and watch the neighborhood.”
But the office required some work. “The mantle in the library had seven coats of paint on it when we bought the house. We had a very fine woodwork stripper work on it, and he suggested using dental picks on part of it to get all the paint out of it,” the Walkers say.
The oversized pocket doors are original and provide an impressive visual separation between the hallway and the library that features extensive built-in shelves and a fireplace. Also original to the home, the deep emerald Rookwood tile fireplace in the living room and the brass edging behind the coal grate.
This home also has some interesting “imports,” replete with tales of debauchery. The tale as told by Jim and Peggy Walker:
“The Czechoslovakian crystal chandelier in the dining room dates back to 1900 when it was originally hung in the Wilson House on lower Swiss Avenue. Old Mr. Wilson got sick, and his housekeeper married him and moved him north, where the local folks couldn’t easily get to him, or so I was told by area historian Virginia McAlister. The housekeeper then sold off everything she could from the house. The [next 5107 Junius homeowners] Criswells purchased the chandelier and had it installed in the dining room. The story goes that the Criswells got drunk and fiddled with the chandelier’s crystals and really damaged the chandelier. When we purchased the house, we had Crow Chandelier come and get the chandelier and re.build it so the crystals hung correctly. They also added back in a couple of missing pieces.”
The thoroughly modern kitchen is a chef’s delight, says the listing agent Poss. The Walkers expanded the kitchen about 15 years ago, converting a small back porch into more kitchen space.
The second floor contains the primary bedroom and bath, two bedrooms, and a bath. The third floor consists of a bedroom, bath, and large storage room which could be a second office or craft room, Poss says.
When the Walkers purchased the home, it still had four bedrooms on the second floor and one bath off the hallway. “We turned Mrs. Knox’s bedroom into a bathroom and a closet, and finished out the other bedroom, which was in its original condition with shiplap walls and old muslin-backed wallpaper falling off in strips,” Jim and Peggy say.
The detached garage, which was once a carriage house, contains 601 square feet. (including a large storage room), and the 2nd-floor income-producing quarters consist of 374 square feet. and deck. Neither space is included in the 3,885 square feet comprising the home.
“It has incredible charm elegance and really spacious rooms that you don’t find at this price point anymore,” Poss says.
The Walkers hope when they pack everything up for their move to Costa Rica, they’ll find the original title papers from the Munger brothers’ Texas Land Grant and an original photo of the home circa 1909 will resurface out of storage. They promise to leave those artifacts for the next owner.
Mary Poss of Ebby Halliday Realtors has listed 5107 Junius St. for $1.125 million.
