Or, Our Life as a House:

An Unlikely Dream Called “the Mission” Takes Root.

Paul Hampton Crockett From: http://welcometothemission.net/?p=12

With grateful acknowledgment to the University of Miami Digital Initiative, an amazing historic
and visual resource. http://merrick.library.miami.edu/

MIAMI is my hometown, as it was my father's before me, and I am

interested in its history. Yet history is an extremely fleeting thing in this
city, incorporated only in 1896. The dreamers, schemers, and builders
relentlessly driving the city forward have been primarily obsessed with
visions of "progress" and the shimmering horizon of the always-great
future, and rarely paused to look back even for a moment. Consequently,
much of its rich, various, and abundant architectural heritage has been
carelessly discarded and often ground to dust.

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The demolition of this particular building proved a “flash point,” as the cutting-edge
historic preservation effort was then well underway, and the owner apparently nervous.
The movement suddenly burst into flame, and the die was cast. History seems to be
judging the results kindly: as it turns out, honoring and protecting those old buildings was
visionary wisdom, and an absolute triumph.

THE house we have come to call "the Mission" is old by Miami standards,
built in 1927. The city was then only thirty years old. That time and place is
now long gone and nearly forgotten, even hard to imagine.

Mouth of Miami River, ca. 1906. Below, today.

(Courtesy of Google maps.)

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It was a time when people had time to visit, as those from the South say,
and kept always on hand some iced tea, soda pop, or what have you, for
neighbors “just passing by.”

“Royal Oak Arch Tree, Miami”

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"Ocean Drive, South of Lincoln Road." 1912

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With thanks to the UM Digital Initiative, cited above. Photograph by Kirk Munroe, Cocoanut
Grove pioneer, turn of the century.

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Even well into the late '20's, the Eastern edge of the "Great River of Grass" known as the
Everglades lay just along where 27th Avenue now runs North and South. Ten blocks
away.

SO I love to listen for clues. The Mission is just a house, a simple one, really,
and offers no pretension of being anything else. But it has been well-loved, and
much lived in. The fact that it still remains, even retaining its stubborn dignity,
in a place where history is so very disposable, means something.

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And old houses talk. Always, to those who take the time to listen and are
willing to pay attention. They tell stories, louder than words and often
more honestly. Like people, they are conceived with great hope, and
embody a portion of some greater dream. They too have their seasons,
endure the wear and tear of experience, and witness their days of glory and
decline. The idea of “home” could not be more integral to the great
“American dream,” nor any of our notions of society or community. And
the ends of their stories, as ours, are as of yet still unwritten.

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There is something about vintage homes, to me, that is special. The world
is ever changing, and I suppose always has been. Yet I cannot imagine that
the felt velocity of those changes has ever seemed greater, and nowhere
might their impact be felt more intensely or keenly than in this sprawling,
multicultural, chaotic, "happening" of a place that is Metropolitan Miami.
So I find myself grounded in the architecture of the past.

The American homestead of great-grandparents Johann & Mathilde Petersen & their two
daughters, Kathe and Annelise, ca. 1920, following the family's immigration from their
ancestral home of Flensburg, Germany. Within fairly short order my Great-Grandfather
had applied the fullness of his Teutonic intention to carving out of the true wilderness of
the Redlands, some 30 miles south of Miami, a producing citrus grove/ working
horticultural science laboratory / expansive garden of exotic tropical fruit /tourist
attraction called “Bonita Groves.” Being at his heart a huge “ham,” Johann couldn’t resist
including “before” pictures to mark his progress (below).

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Mathilde & Johann. Annelise, my paternal grandmother taught fifth grade at Coral Way
Elementary for decades. Older sister Kathe was also a lifetime schoolteacher and much-
beloved, teaching German to generations at Coral Gables High School.

A wonderful riff on the Great Florida Dream, helping "sell" the Dream of Bonita Groves.
Witness my great-grandfather sipping a pina colada while his wife toils away the creation
of one of the many citrus-based products churned out by the Grove.

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Annelise now lays at rest with her "one and only," my grandfather, Howard Bruce
Crockett, under the oak-shaded lawn of the historic Miami City Cemetery. They are both
loved, and well earned their rest. May they share an unending dream of joy, together.

Newlyweds, 1925

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WE cannot do other than move forward, but as the days seem to fly by ever
more quickly I find in older homes an excellent “starting point” for living
my life, one that helps soothe me and enriches my experience. Something
about them quietly whispers “Breathe, Paul.” “There is always time. Just
breathe.” And they would know. So something within me responds, simply
and gratefully, “Yes!”

The Mission is two bedrooms, one bath, and one huge vision. Its thorough
renovation, from top to bottom, side to side, can be understood only as a
labor of love, if indeed it is to be understood at all. That’s really the only
way to describe it: the time, energy, and resources that have been invested
in its renovation (or really, rebirth!) over the last couple of years defy logic
or reason.

Master Bedroom

Its name seemed to come to us naturally, inspired by its Old Spanish/

“mission” style of architecture, simple and classic, and the long and
winding journey on which it has led us. Its original features have been
maintained whenever possible; its lighting fixtures, hardwood floors,
working casement windows hand-built of Florida cypress wood, numerous
inset panel and French doors throughout, all gleam as if installed maybe
last Tuesday.

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Original cypress wooden windows freed at last from decades-long slumber under layers
of paint. Open (ahhh!), to garden View

And the home is enhanced by the best and brand new: central air/heat,
under-the-counter washer/ dryer, stainless steel kitchen appliances, and
much much more. It is furnished in a very comfortable yet truly eclectic
style, and ready for immediate enjoyment. Here is truly a “home away from
home,” and you are the one for whom its many features and comforts have
been prepared.

It’s simple, really: Miami is my hometown, and I am at home here. And

though the city may not turn out to be at all your “cup of tea," which would
most certainly be understandable, I am nevertheless willing to go “the extra

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mile,” or maybe even further, so that once you’d returned home you’d be
able to say, at least, that you’d had a really great place to stay while you
were here, and were perhaps surprised at just how comfortable it had been!

A sitting area in your private garden, awaiting your pleasure.

In a city where real estate has been “hyped” to the extent of collective
numbness, here is an experience of rare quality: a window into a simpler,
more peaceful, and less pressured time, yet situated close to center of the
inspired insanity and excitement that is today’s metropolis.

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 From Miami: an Introduction, a tourist booklet, 1919

The home sits in the heart of the city's historic Shenandoah neighborhood,
a once prominent area that was well-established years before the first
cornerstone was laid in that brash "planned development" so audaciously
envisioned by a young George Merrick on land that had been his father's
citrus plantation, now known as Coral Gables. Yet that was long, long ago.

For some years the neighborhood slipped gently into a state of general
decline as the fascination and restless fancy of the growing public attached
to the newer and more "uniform" communities being built ever further to
the West, where for millenia untold there had before been only the savage
majesty of the wild Everglades, and to the South, down into the great pine
forests of Cutler Ridge and Kendall, and always to the North.

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Only the closely bounded shoreline and the salted blue waters of Biscayne
Bay and boundless Ocean to the East, it may be safe to say, had prevented
further development in that direction as well.

"Drive to Cocoanut Grove, Miami, Fla."

WITH the arrival of the first wave of Cuban exiles in the early 1960's, and
the multitudes that thereafter followed from that and a number of other
Spanish-speaking countries, the area became known generally as part of

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"Little Habana." That the neighborhood had once readily and proudly identified
itself as "Shenandoah" seemed destined to become quaint fact, a cultural oddity
now only hinted at only by names inscribed upon its branch Post Office, its
middle and elementary schools, and so forth. The word had lost all context, and
thus any meaning. Nobody cared.

The above corner store of the 1930's is still open for business, but now serving an
excellent café con leche.

Yet the only constant is change. As the pendulum currently swings, in the
Shenandoah neighborhood of Miami as in other historic neighborhoods in
urban areas across the Nation, there has been a resurging groundswell of
interest in the idea of “neighborhood.” The collective experience of
neighborhood has taken on new life, and the idea become relevant,
immediately so, in new and vital ways. Amidst the cacophonous chaos of
modern life a deep hunger has taken hold for a sense of “rootedness,” or a
personal "history of place." People seek first to understand what their
neighborhood is, I suppose, in part so they might better understand where
they now find themselves, and what that might mean. Quite often the path
of that inquiry involves an exploration of what once was.

The unique dreams of a place often speak most directly of its heart.

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Personally, I find my rear-view mirror to be of great and practical value as I
navigate forward.

In my passion for history, particularly as it relates to my home and my

hometown, I am not alone.

The Shenandoah neighborhood has not only reclaimed its identity, but
steadily improved its standing as a desirable and safe place to live. Demand

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for the homes has remained steady even in the economic free fall in which
this city, along with the rest of the country, now finds itself. The area is
increasingly prized for its historic architecture and central location, as traffic
congestion continues (impossibly) to worsen on Miami’s roadways. Odds are,
from where the Mission sits you are only minutes away from many of the
places you want to be, or to see while you are here.

All of which leads us right back to the present, and to the future potential of
your visit. Your comfort, enjoyment, and well being are our driving goals. We
have been waiting for you!

Welcome.

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