Florida 'Cracker' Becomes Hot at Upscale Developments

The Wall Street Journal ^ | 1-10-2003 | QUEENA SOOK KIM

[Cagey]

SEAGROVE BEACH, Fla. -- Architect Jim Strickland bought a 40-by-80-foot lot in a posh Gulf Coast resort community. On it, he's building a poor man's home.

With a corrugated-metal roof, a screened-in porch and clapboard siding, Mr. Strickland's new house has many of the same features as the shacks built by some of Florida's early settlers. The style reminds the 60-year-old Atlanta native of a "less formal, and less affected" time.

[Cagey]

Well, it is different.

[Mo1]

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[volchef]

Well, in downtown Orlando there are REALLY cute old homes that were built in the early 1900s.....these are the original "cracker" homes and have porches, hardwood floors, crown molding...they're just great....however, these newby communities are just as crappy as the tract homes......a 40x80 foot lot????? gag me....you might as well live in a condo.

[Servant of the Nine]

Well, in downtown Orlando there are REALLY cute old homes that were built in the early 1900s.....these are the original "cracker" homes and have porches, hardwood floors, crown molding...they're just great...

Crown Molding? Those are not cracker houses. Cracker houses, the unfinished wood walls just run up to the unfinished wood ceiling.

By the way "cracker" houses have always been the standard country house, all over the South. They are hardly a Floriduh specialty.

You don't know what restful is till you have lain in a feather bed under a tin roof listening to the rain and the ceiling fan going "whock ...... whock ...... whock"

So9

[volchef]

I think it's the tin roof that makes em "cracker". They are pretty cool....but they need that "old" character. I personally love that tin roof sound and living in Florida I perpetually listen to our ceiling fans whack :) However, about the crown molding....I think alot of these old homes have been redone by the yuppies and gays that are moving to downtown and they want the crown molding thing. You're right though....they wouldn't have those in the original.

[catpuppy]

... these newby communities are just as crappy as the tract homes....

I don't know which communities you refer to but the Seaside/Watercolor communities mentioned in the article are anything but "crappy." As for a "40x80 foot lot," you might find that small but it will accomodate a nice beach house if one can afford the million or so it takes to buy the lot.

[volchef]

just my opinion....didn't mean to offend. I just look at all these homes going up around here that you can stand in one yard touching the home and reach out your arms both ways and touch the home next to you. That just doesn't seem like quality of life to me. Personally I prefer a lot where I don't have to look at my naked neighbors in the window every morning :)

I'm just kind of eclectic I guess. I like to have a big yard and a house that doesn't look like everyone else's. But to each his own. Sorry again if I offended.

[chimera]

Is "cracker" a racist term? I'm offended. I think this guy should be sued or fired (from his own company). After all, we've got people out there being trashed when they used a perfectly valid english word (niggardly) because it sounds like a racist slur and there offends people. Surely "cracker", which is most certainly used as a racist/regional slur, should be so viewed, and the people who use it punished accordingly.

(/PC sarcasm mode)

[catpuppy]

No offense taken (and sorry if I implied that). I like my space too and actually live in the mountains on enough acres situated so that everything I see belongs to me. But currently taking a break in the communities I mentioned, I have admired the way they have been beautifully planned and the quality materials and care with which they have been built.

As for lot costs, they become steeper by the day. I just looked at the local paper. In one ad are listed 4 beachfront lots ranging from $2.1 down to 1.25 million. It appears that about 70' of beachfront costs about 1.4 million.

[lodwick]

You just won the Classic Post of the Day Award.

Thanks much for this one!

Go Crackers Go!

[getmeouttaPalmBeachCounty_FL]

[Alice in Wonderland]

The dog trot is a "Cracker" style typical of early settlers in Florida that splits the kitchen off from the main living quarters but is connected by one roof structure. It incorporates many energy conserving features that are tailored to the hot, humid climate found in the southeastern. These include cupolas, large roof overhangs, porches on the east and west sides, ventilation under the house, a kitchen and bathroom isolated from the living room and bedroom in an attempt to reduce heat in the summer and provide protection from fire.

I’d love to build one on my newly acquired 7.5 lakefront acres here in rural north central Florida.

Here’s a floorplan of a simple dog trot:

[AnAmericanMother]

The WSJ is a day late and a dollar short - [i]Fine Homebuilding[/i] magazine featured a cracker-style house at least 3 years ago.

Probably the hallmarks of the "cracker style" - aside from the rough finish - are the wraparound porch, the elevated floor (with blue tick hound sleeping accommodations underneath) and the central cupola or lookout in the middle of the roof. The true genius of the cupola is that the entire house ventilates through the "chimney effect" it creates, keeping everybody nice and cool in the days before air conditioning.

The house in the photo is not a "real" cracker house because it lacks the cupola, and the floor is not elevated nearly enough, the dogs would have to crawl under to lie next to the chimney base. The porch also goes only half way around.

And no self-respecting cracker would have painted his house in those awful colors.

[Mamzelle]

Neat plan. I love to look at floor plans, and had a smashing and stressful good time building my present home (the only one I got to build). Curious how much a custom house costs compared to an existing one of similar quality. In another life, I might want to go into home construction.

It's interesting how you've incorporated the traditions that supported a life before air conditioning, but you're still probably going to want and use air conditioning... (?) I love your centered kitchen, but you'll have to wander quite a distance from your bed at night and bump into a few doorways and walls to get to the bathroom toilet, and you'll have to make your bed to have guests in the living room. If this were a mountain cottage, I'd recommend a slepping loft, but you'd smother sleeping that way in Florida.

Vacation cottages offer creative opportunities that regular houses can't enjoy (because of resale essentials).

[Mamzelle]

Is that a "cracker" house? I would have called it "tidewater" for the lowcountry style, elevated yet one-story with tin hipped roof/cupola.

I like the farmhouse styles, log/mortar Appalachian, and tidewater for my rural southern area.

I just detest the French Normandy fakes-on-the-lake, though, in their bright white stucco that distracts from the landscape. So many Biltmore mini-wannabes in Mansionland.

[ReaganCowboy]

A good study of cracker style architecture is the Marjorie Kenning Rawlins house at Cross Creek, Florida. Essentially that's four hallways connected as a square, with rooms off the outward side, and an open space in the middle -- sort of a country dirt floor courtyard. The kitchen is built off one corner, to keep heat away from the rest of the house. Yes, tin roofs are the norm.

No, 'cracker' isn't racist. The term derivates from the crack of the whips the natives used to drive cattle through the palmetto brush on the way to market. Jacksonville, Florida, used to be known as Cowford (you can actually ford cattle on the St. Johns River there); Gainesville was known as Hogtown.

Always thought the Jacksonville Jaguars football team should have been named the Florida Crackers. Used to be a Negro League baseball team called the Atlanta Black Crackers, BTW.

As for race in Florida, the 'natives' in the 1800's were a mix of poor Scots, leftover Spaniards from the 1500's - 1700's, Creeks and Seminoles, free blacks that escaped from former British states of Georgia and Carolinas prior to Spain losing la presido Florida, and some black slaves from the post Spanish era. Florida was a melting-pot for poor people -- prior to air conditioning and mosquito control. Now it's just a suburb of the Northern tier states.

I'm a fifth generation Floridian, and still consider my 'po white trash' and Creek background to be an asset to handling life's little problems.

Class dismissed for today.

[Vigilantcitizen]

I have a very good friend that lives between Destin amd Panama City. He's making a killing doing finish woodwork in these communities.

I visited him in October while going on a fishing trip, and he took me on a tour of the community he was currently working in. The houses were constructed of very high quality materials and very well built, but were very close together. And they averaged 1.5 million each.

Something else, each adjacent house shared one minor architectural detail with it's neighbor, yet overall had a different look. A nice detail in these days of cookie cutter subdivisions, but something I would expect in that price range.

[gitmo]

I remember meeting a guy from Philadelphia, once. He was bragging about how successful he was. He commented that he actually had grass in his yard! I told him I've got about 28 acres of grass in my yard.

[miss marmelstein]

When I saw this thread, I immediately thought of Marjorie Rawlings. Do you know the movie "Cross Creek"? It shows Miz Rawlings buying a shack and turning it into a real home. I've always wanted to visit the real Cross Creek. Wonderful book, too.

[Shanda]

As soon as I saw the guy's name was "Strickland" I knew he was probably from Georgia or North Florida.