Woolsey farmstead nears completion of renovation
FAYETTEVILLE — A 180-year-old house is closer to displaying its welcome mat for the first time in a long time.
Work to renovate the main house at the historic Woolsey farmstead is finished. Next comes some accessory structures and additions, such as driveways and parking, to make the property accessible to the public.
The home sits on Broyles Street, north of 54th Avenue, on the west side of town.
Bringing the property back to its late 19th century self has been on the city’s capital project list since 2014. Aaron Ruby with Revival Architecture has taken the lead on the project since the beginning. Ellingson Contracting in Siloam Springs has been doing the construction work.
“It’s my baby, like I’m part of the Woolsey family or something,” he said.
The city bought the land in 1999 to build the West Side Wastewater Treatment Facility. Most of the land is wetlands, which the city also has worked to restore. Tucked away behind some foliage lies the Woolsey farmstead dating back to the 1840s.
Samuel and Matilda Woolsey and their 13 children were some of the earliest frontier settlers to the region. Samuel Woolsey bought the land, more than 200 acres, from the federal government in the 1830s, according to a page about the project on the city’s website.
Samuel Woolsey died in 1858 at age 67. Matilda Woolsey took over the farm until her death in 1871. The property passed to two of the couple’s daughters. In 1919, Lester and Vella Broyles bought it. Multiple generations of the Broyles family lived there until selling the property to the city in 1999, according to the city webpage.
The Woolseys and some of their children are buried at the cemetery on the site.
BRINGING IT BACK
Restoration work on the 800-square-foot house wrapped last fall. It may not seem like it now, but 180 years ago, the house was quite something, Ruby said.
Most wood structures back then were made of logs. The two-room home with a loft still has its original frame and is more akin to homes built in England at the time, Ruby said.
“It’s a small house by today’s standards, but it was actually a pretty big house by their standards,” he said. “The Woolseys, when they built this place, already had a pretty good sized family.”
Some additions were made to the home over the years, which were removed to bring the house back to its original form, Ruby said.
Part of the reason the house remained standing for 180 years is because of the way it was constructed, Ruby said. The braced-frame construction uses heavy timber beams hewn by hand. The carved end of one beam fits into the hollowed-out slot of another beam, and the beams are locked together with a peg.
A portion of the original frame is exposed inside the house so the public can see it, Ruby said.
The wood used to restore the home is tidewater red cypress, he said. The Woolseys wouldn’t have painted the outside, so the wood needed to be sturdy and attractive, Ruby said.
“It’s pretty expensive stuff, but it will hold up to the weather,” he said.
The family cemetery and rod iron fence on the property also has been restored, Ruby said. Crews cleaned headstones at the cemetery with a gentle solution that kills the bacteria and organic growth but doesn’t damage the stone. The work was paid for through a grant from the Arkansas History Preservation Program.
SEEING WHAT FITS
The city doesn’t have a firm schedule on when the property may open to the public, said Alison Jumper, director of parks, natural resources and cultural affairs. It will take time to look at the property holistically, perhaps bring on a partnering organization to recommend ways to make it accessible and take public input, she said.
There are a few models nationwide the city could follow, Jumper said. There could be guided tours, which would require staff. Some historic properties have self-guided tours with signs or even audio playing to interpret the history, she said.
“We’re working through all of that to see what fits,” Jumper said.
There are still accessory structures to rebuild or recreate, such as a smokehouse, sweet potato curing house, barn, corn crib and chicken coop. The house still lacks an entrance that complies with the Americans with Disabilities Act, and the property needs a driveway, parking and trails, Ruby said.
The project has $200,000 allocated in the city’s capital improvements budget for this year and next, and $250,000 slated for 2026. Each year in 2027 and 2028 has $200,000 attached to it. The capital improvements budget projects five years out, but the City Council can adjust it annually.
Since 2014, the city has put just more than $1 million toward the project.
HISTORICAL CONTEXT
Most white settlement in the Ozarks didn’t happen until the latter half of the 19th century, making the Woolseys some of the earliest known settlers, said Jared Phillips, associate professor with the Department of History at the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville.
Before then, it was predominantly Native Americans who lived in the region. Those populations were forced out with the passage of the Indian Removal Act in 1830. The Trail of Tears ran through Northwest Arkansas. White residents began moving west as the Appalachian and eastern regions grew in population.
The land was fertile, and the Woolseys would have had some other farmsteads nearby, albeit a few hours’ horse ride away, Phillips said. The Woolsey farmstead is emblematic of a particular kind of frontier family who changed settlement patterns, paving the way for Northwest Arkansas to become what it is today, he said.
In addition to white settlement and the Native Americans forced out on the Trail of Tears, enslaved people also lived in Northwest Arkansas at the time, Phillips said. History suggests the Woolseys did not have enslaved people on their land. That could have been because they were abolitionists or because they couldn’t afford it, Phillips said.
“If we only center the story on people like the Woolseys, that story is incomplete,” he said.
Having a restored Woolsey farmstead within the city will help visitors understand that period of history is not far removed from modern-day society, Phillips said. It can be easy to forget with the rapid pace of development replacing much of the region’s landscape, he said.