Whew.....it appears the Margaret Pope house, Searcy Arkansas, lives on.

They did a nice job on this house.  The front entrance looks so warm and inviting.  It makes you think of welcome wagon or holiday dinners.

I drove by it Monday and was THRILLED to see how it's shaped up.  Sort of disappointed they didn't keep the screened in porch on it, but hey, this IS Arkansas and it seems to get hotter each year.  Doubt if they would have done much sitting out there and reading, as Margaret Pope did!

To whomever bought and restored it, I applaud them and wish they might hold an open house!  I'd love to go thru it. Think you might get us Searcy Sleuths an invitation for a tour?  Use your influence, Barbara....(as a member emeritus of the Jr. Auxillary, if none else)....

It does look lovely, but it doesn't look like an old house anymore (from the front anyway).  I wish they'd replaced the stucco rather than going up with siding. 

As I live just a few blocks from this house, I've loved watching it become reborn from the ashes of neglect. I understand parts of this house may be antebellum. I talked to some of the construction workers and they told me all of the nails in the framework had square heads (very old!). Seeing the stucco come off to reveal lovely wooden siding was especially satisfying. I kept waiting for the rest of the stucco to come off - maybe sometime.

Oh, and one particular thing that always fascinated me about this house: functional shutters. Look around town and you'll see that about 95 percent of modern shutters are for visual flair only, and in fact are quite ridiculous if taken literally (far too small for giant windows, etc.). The Pope House appears to have always had these real shutters, and I note that the current owners removed them for renovation, then replaced them when finished. Applause.