Four historic homes in Junius Heights will open their doors to the public on Saturday as part of a neighborhood celebration marking 120 years since the East Dallas community’s founding land rush. The Saturday Stroll and Historic Home Tour runs from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. and also debuts a brand-new garden at Lipscomb Elementary, live music, local vendors and family activities spread across what organizers call Dallas’s largest historic district.
The anniversary being marked is no small thing: Junius Heights traces its origin to a chaotic sale of building lots that unfolded shortly after midnight on Sept. 3, 1906, according to The Dallas Morning News. Accounts of exactly how fast those lots moved differ. The City of Dallas’s landmark nomination report states that half of the 200 available lots sold within the first hour, while CandysDirt.com describes more than 200 lots selling within 45 minutes after a pistol was fired at midnight to kick off the sale. Either way, the frenzy launched a neighborhood that developer C.H. Munger would shape over the following decades, per CandysDirt.com.
Junius Heights was officially plotted on July 19, 1906, and its first streetcar service began that September, connecting the new neighborhood to the rest of the city, according to the City of Dallas’s landmark nomination report. That streetcar line later disappeared when Dallas began converting its streetcars to buses in the late 1930s, the same report notes.
Saturday’s Lineup: Four Homes, a New Garden, and Porch Bands
This year’s walking tour begins at Munger Park and includes stops at homes ranging in age from 1910 to 1981, Dallas News reports. Junius Heights Historic District president-elect Sean McCort said the tour celebrates the land rush anniversary while spotlighting the neighborhood’s mix of architectural styles, including Craftsman, Prairie and Tudor designs…