The Searby Way--Attention to Detail Keeps Historic Home Stunning
</element><element id="paragraph-1" type="body"><![CDATA[The Du Quoin Historic Preservation Commission is proud to present its preservation award this month to Mr. and Mrs. David Searby, proprietors of the Searby Funeral Home, located at 130 South Washington Street.
Mr. and Mrs. Searby have the singular distinction of owning what has to be the most sophisticated and beautiful Victorian Queen Anne home in Du Quoin. This home, which in any one's estimation must rank as one of the most distinctive residences in the county, exemplifies what preservation is all about.
The Du Quoin Call Centennial Edition mentions this residence in its September 20, 1953, edition, the excerpt for which was graciously provided to Du Quoin Historic Preservation by Robert Morefield: "Hatfield's Masterpiece"
At the northeast corner of Franklin and Washington streets stands the large frame Mussleman house. It is only about 70 years old, but historical.
Clarence Hatfield told H. W. Schroeder that he considered this house his masterpiece. He and brother Victor were architects and builders. They designed many of the better homes around Du Quoin. This is now the Schroeder funeral home."
Those who are long time residents of Du Quoin will recall that the Schroeder Funeral Home became the Keeling Funeral Home, and now, the Searby Funeral Home.
The Musselman home has, by virtue of having been a funeral home for so long, benefitted from meticulous care. However, not enough credit can be given to the Searbys for preserving the original details of this remarkable home by resisting the urge so prevalent today to obscure them with vinyl or aluminum siding. In strolling past this beautiful home, one would do well to pause a few minutes to observe the intricate details of contrasting bands of siding, and gable details, all of which combine in intricate cooperation to create a virtual symphony of beauty to be enjoyed and appreciated by even the most casual passerby. All this beauty would have been lost had the Searbys taken the easier, and certainly more economical course in covering the whole building with siding, rather than painstakingly scraping and painting, every few years.
This outstanding structure was constructed circa 1883, rather early on in the ascendancy of the Queen Anne substyle of Victorian architecture. Some of the earliest Queen Anne designs were constructed circa 1875 on the East Coast.
The style spread rather rapidly across the nation. It is the Queen Anne residences that are most often today referred to as "Painted Ladies" for the colorful polychromatic paint schemes that often adorn them. The Queen Anne style was characterized by its light hearted whimsey, and great fondness for the picturesque. This style which was so easily adapted to local conditions, and which was filled with such energy and fanciful playfulness came to prominence at a time when our nation was just emerging from the dark and mournful period of the War Between the States, and was ready for something lighthearted.
The use of the term "Queen Anne" is a laden with contradiction, given that Her Majesty, Queen Anne, (1665-1714) reigned during a period of time when Palladian classicism and formal Roman and Greek symmetry were the order of the day. But, it would seem that the writers of the late 19th Century used the Good Queen's name to equate with anything that was intended to be in a quaint or "antique" style. And, although the Queen Anne style was, as it evolved to be practiced on these shores, a uniquely American look, it at least had its inspiration in some brick and half-timbered Tudor-esqe buildings constructed by the British at the Centennial Exhibition of 1876.
The ebullient Queen Anne style homes evolved to typify the ultimate fulfilment of the Victorian fondness for the ornamental, the picturesque, and the fanciful. Victorian Queen Anne homes are almost always asymmetrical in their massing, typically having a gable on the front, a turret or projecting tower at one side. The porches of these homes are wide and expansive, usually only one story, frequently encircling multiple sides of the residence, and frequently adorned by intricate wooden spindle work.
The rooflines are complex, typically being adorned with multiple gables and projections, which were further adorned by spindled or sawn gable ornaments. Frequently the original roofs would exhibit contrasting bands of shingles, either wooden or slate, in various ornamental patterns and colors, often terminating in ornamental copper or iron cresting along the ridges, with ornamental finials at the tops of turrets, and at the ends of the ridge cresting.
The siding of these buildings often exhibited a variety of differing styles and textures of siding. Frequently, the ground floor would be of stone or Dutch lap siding, with the second story being covered with a variety of fancy cut fish scale shingles, often to be surmounted by yet a third story with exhibiting yet another style of siding and shingles. All the while, the complex pattern of the siding would be punctuated by various little balconies and bay or oriel windows jutting forth from the building in quaint and unanticipated locations, only adding to the visual delight found in such detail.
The fenestration of these buildings was varied in sized and shape, with exceptionally ornamental windows, frequently containing beveled, stained, and leaded glass compositions or great intricacy and beauty. It was during this era that the stained glass maker's art reached an apex, with the insertion of multifaceted glittering glass "jewels" into the exquisite colorful glowing "paintings in glass" that were created to be inserted into the windows of these beautifully intricate and highly ornamental buildings.
It is with deepest regret that the Searby home is among a now dwindling number of Queen Agnes remaining in Du Quoin.
Sadly, the Forrester home, on Vine Street, in recent memory, the residence of Dr. & Mrs. W.E. Leach, was lost to fire a couple years ago. The Leach residence was certainly on a par with the Searby home in quality and size, although it was ornamented in a simpler and more Palladian manner, owing to its later date of construction. Another charming Queen Anne, the former Gussie Hall residence on South Mulberry Street, was also sadly lost to fire.
Still surviving is another notable Queen Anne, the former Grace Lean home at the end of Mulberry Street. Last year, the Historic Preservation Commission honored yet another Queen Anne, constructed in a simpler and less ornate mode, the residence of Mr. & Mrs. John Van Voorhis, at 314 East Park Street.
All in all, the quality of life in the City of Du Quoin is greatly enhanced by the tireless efforts of the Searbys, and so many others, who work to preserve these remarkable structures for another generation to enjoy.