Pleasant Ridge

In 1860 Macklin Cockrell built this house and he sold it to Andrew S. Steele in 1869, according to Mrs. Mary Grantham Marshall, the last owner and occupant. In 1894 the Granthams bought the place.

It is a one and a half story frame building with a gable roofed front porch supported by four square (actually octagonal) columns. The house has a center hall with two rooms on each side on the first floor and only two room upstairs. It has large rooms with high ceilings (about fourteen feet) and massive sliding doors between them. An ell extends from the rear of the house with a porch along it and across the back with its roof supported by square columns that match those on the front porch.

This house is one of the few remaining examples of a style that was popular in Pleasant Ridge. The Archibald house, which was like it, has been demolished. It was the last visible reminder of the family of educators who ran the Union Academy in Pleasant Ridge in 1850. Pleasant Ridge, formerly known as Sipsey Ridge, has an interesting history and once was the location of several antebellum homes.

Unfortunately the Cockrell-Steele house has suffered from a lack of maintenance. It is structurally sound, but it needs restoration. This house also lacks fire protection.

Historical data for this house was researched by the Greene County Historical Society. It is shown as a dot on Snedicor's 1856 Map of Greene County.

This house was also demolished after Mrs. Marshall's death in 1987.

Provided by Scott Owens

Map Horton-Summerville House

Moses Horton's house sold to Henry Summerville.

Picture taken about 1995, and provided by Scott Owens.

The house was then purchased by Henry G. Jones (1800-1870) & wife Sarah Kennedy; speculation allows that Edmund J. Jones (1782-1856) & wife Mildred Murphy, may have been the buyers.

Both Jones families lived in Pleasant Ridge in close proximity to each other. 

It is a one story frame house with  plastered interior walls, a high bricked foundation, and two porches. The front porch had four fluted Doric columns (two are long gone) and the side porch has two matching columns. The cornices and eaves are decorated with wood dentils and the porch ceilings are coffered.

Photo provided by Scott Owens

Beautifully restored, Henry G. Jones' house was moved into Eutaw and is now known as the "Sipsey William B. Willis" house. 

Built about 1900

Pictures were taken by Scott Owens in 2005.

Currently in use by the Full Draw Hunting Club.

Listed on the Alabama Register of Landmarks and Heritage - Owens-Hutton Home HWY 14, 17 miles north of Eutaw.

Hugh Lafayette Owens purchased this home in the early 1900's; later the Elmo Owens family lived there.  The James Wilton Owens family lived there from 1935 until  1964.  The home was built on the site where the organization of the Pleasant Ridge Presbyterian Church took place in 1848; services were held there until the church building was built in 1859.

Pleasant Ridge Presbyterian Church before addition of porch

Historic Marker

Sign at church

Historic Marker Text:

By appointment of Tuscaloosa Presbytery, Nov. 18, 1848 Rev. J. L. Kirkpatrick and Rev. C. A. Stillman organized a Presbyterian Church at Pleasant Ridge, Alabama. There were 13 charter members. Services were held in a home near site of present church.
 

The first pastor, Rev. J. P. McMullen, served from 1855 until he was killed while serving the Confederacy at Resaca, Ga. 1864. The church building erected 1859, has been a blessing to all who have worshipped here through the years.

Sipsey Ridge 1992
photo: Scott Owens

Sipsey Ridge was originally settled by James Hall Archibald.

Submitted by Scott Owens

This is the Antique and General store operated by Mr. Thomas Taylor Summerville during my childhood.  It no longer stands, but was there for a while.  My daddy told me that when a boy he would loop a rope from a sled around the rear bumper of a a Model T stopped out in front of the store and get a ride down the road for a ways.  This ended when one day he looked up onto the porch and there sat his daddy.

From what I understand the store was built by William Horton (son of Jesse) in the 1870's after he purchased the house behind.  It was operated by William's son Amos, and then by his son William Taylor Horton, who was the owner when Daddy was riding sleds behind cars.  Cousin Taylor and Eliza Mary Poyner were childless, and during the Depression I was told that they took in her nephew, Thomas Summerville, to help H.B. and Mattie (her sister) Summerville, who had several children.  After Cousin Taylor's death in 1949, the store came into Mr. Thomas' possession.  He operated it as a general store (it and Crooks Schiver's across the road were the only stores in Pleasant Ridge when I was a child--o.k., there was Mr. Homer Carpenter's store past the lake, operated by Mr. Eugene Jones--it, too, is  gone).  In later years Mr. Thomas took to restoring and selling antique furniture.  It closed after his death.

From Bill Horton regarding the Summerville Store:

Uncle Taylor Horton's store which Scott Owens refers to may or may not have been built by William Horton. Amos Horton and his sons, Charles Richardson and William Taylor operated a business but I can not say for a fact that the business was in this store. The home was built by a Mr. Westmoreland and was destroyed by a tornado in 1898 and it was not Uncle Taylor's home at that time. William Horton had been dead several years by then. It is more likely that Amos Horton built the store if Mr. Westmoreland did not build it.

It is worth mentioning too that Mr. Will Steele had a commissary as did Mr. Everett Owens, Scott's grandfather. Both these stores were there to serve the people who worked for them and it is highly possible this old store was Mr. Westmoreland's commissary.

Uncle Taylor and Mr. Will Steele were partners in the store and were life long friends. I remember the two of them visiting for hours on the front porch of the store, discussing the crops, mules, hired hands, the weather and of course politics.

They decided to dissolve the partnership and divided the assets in an little different way. They rolled the dice for every item - horse collars, bolts of cloth, cotton sacks, candy bars, cans of tobacco, bottles of snuff, well buckets, single trees, pony plows, Sloan's Liniment, sacks of flour, cans of molasses etc. etc. They had their farm hands there and as each item was rolled for it was promptly loaded on the winners wagon. Uncle Taylor said the division took two days with everybody on the Ridge looking on and rooting for one or the other rollers.

CA 1845

Former home of the Thomas Taylor Summerville family.