Duckworth Grimshaw House
The Duckworth Grimshaw House is one of the black stone houses for which Beaver is famous. The house was started in March of 1877 and finished in December of 1877 so that the family could move in on Christmas Day. Thomas Frazer, the Scots stonemason/contractor, built the house; and Duckworth Grimshaw paid $2,000 for the completed home. The house represents the first extant house that was built in Frazer’s mature style. It has two cut rock facades with white mortar joints, a center gable upstairs on the front façade and two dormer windows, all of which are well known characteristics of Frazer’s building style.
Mr. Grimshaw was born in England and obtained his first name from his grandmother’s family, a name he recorded he was not greatly pleased with. He converted to the Mormon faith and moved to Beaver, Utah, where he was a farmer for most of his long life. He was a polygamist who was eventually convicted and sent to the state prison for “unlawful cohabitation.” However, he was released early due to good behavior.
Harley Potheringham, Duckworth’s grandson, now lives in the house, and the house has always been in the same family. Harley says that Duckworth, one wife and her five children lived in the house. He also says the first lights in the house were candles which were later replaced by coal oil lamps and eventually electric light bulbs.
The home is listed on the century register (1972).
The home’s significance stems from three sources: first, it is a historic house whose character has not been weakened over the years. Second, it is a stone house which traditionally was not a common building material in America. Third, the home has an excellent design; a design that was evolved over the years by the vernacular architect Thomas Frazer. This house is the first house done in Frazer’s mature style, and the design was so successful that it was repeated many times in other houses around town.
Located at 95 North 400 West in Beaver, Utah and added to the National Historic Register (#80003886) on February 1, 1980. The text on this page is from the national register’s nomination form.
The Duckworth Grimshaw House is a one-and-a-half story “I” house. It is built of black rock (basalt) which was hauled by ox team and wagon from the hills about four miles east of Beaver. The mortar is made of lime that was burned west of town in the Mineral Mountains. The lumber used was red and yellow pine from the Tushar Mountains. In fact, the house today still contains one section of log walls that used to be the family’s log cabin, a temporary dwelling used until the rock house was completed.
The walls are 18 inches thick and the house is 36 feet long by 20 feet wide. The two facades that face the street are of squared black rock. The front façade has four windows and a door, all symmetrically placed. Upstairs there is a center gable with a door in it that leads out to the front porch. The center gable is flanked by dormer windows on either side and each gable end has chimneys. There are offset windows on each side of the gable ends and over all the proportions of the windows, dormers, center gable, roof slope, height of the building, etc. are very well balanced with each other. The house has a very formal character, due to many factors including the contrast of the black and white colors, the symmetry and the angular lines of the house,