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Spectators watch as the house gets loaded onto a barge in Palmetto on Monday. JIM REED/Tribune photo
Video: House Being Moved | Photo Gallery | Eagle 8 Video: House On Barge
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By SUSAN M. GREEN
The Tampa Tribune
PALMETTO - It took about half a day Monday to load a 1910 Queen Anne house onto a barge and wait for suitable tides to send it across Tampa Bay to Ruskin.
By the end of the day, after neighbors and fans wished the stately old house bon voyage, it was launched into the Bay, headed for its new home on the Little Manatee River 25 miles to the north.
City leaders said the house had to go to make room for a complex of condominiums, offices and shops, part of a waterfront revitalization plan. Its home for the last century was by the Manatee River, built there for Asa Lamb, son of Palmetto founder Samuel Lamb. Its new owner plans to restore the house and make it part of a ministry he runs with his wife.
Overnight, the house sat on the barge at the mouth of the Little Manatee River. This morning, it set out for the bay’s open waters.
On the Sunshine Skyway fishing pier, about 150 people braved sun and then driving rain late this morning to watch the house go under the bridge, many with binoculars and cameras. Some said they had been tracking the house’s move for days, exchanging information about the changing schedule with people they met as they watched it prepared for the trip.
Janice Hutchings of Palmetto and Norma Dallas of Sun City Center met Monday as they watched the house moved onto the barge. They got up early this morning to watch it leave Emerson Point in Manatee County, then drove over to watch it go under the Skyway.
“I’ve been driving by this house for so long, I’m very happy it’s being preserved,” Hutchings said.
Terry Stewart, the home’s previous owner, and a handful of employees of the former group home he operated at the house, were among those on the Sunshine Skyway to bid it farewell.
Veteran mover Kim Brownie rolled the 220-ton house on hydraulically steered wheels from the sandy lot it occupied for almost a century onto the barge in less than an hour. For the crowds who watched from atop a nearby condominium building or brought folding chairs, the boarding looked easy.
George Corbett, who with his wife Nancy will restore the house once it lands on his Ruskin lot, noted that it has been almost a year since he proposed the move to state and local officials in Hillsborough and Manatee counties.
He negotiated with two owners to get the house. The Corbetts said they plan to seek historic landmark protection from Hillsborough officials after the house settles.
The couple own a campground retreat for missionaries, Canaan Land, in North Carolina. The Corbetts restored a number of buildings at that site, which is on the National Register of Historic Places.
Many who turned out Monday said they were sad to see the house leave but happy it would not meet the wrecking ball.
Reporter Susan M. Green can be reached at (813) 657-4529 or
I am one among may who had been in the house when it was a group home. I have driven by the home wondering it’s fate. I want to thank Terry for not giving in to the pressure of having the home destroyed. Now, the home will give others the pleasure that Manatee Ciounty and Palmetto have had for many years.
Yes, it’s very sad that they had to move the home for yet MORE condos,offices and shops. Yea.
I don’t care how nice and expensive the condos, offices etc. will be. They won’t be near as charming and wonderful as the old house was on that land. Not to mention the fact that Palmetto just traded a piece of their history in exchange for “PROGRESS”.
Let me guess, the shops will be a nail salon, dry cleaners, oriental food and a dollar store.
At least the home was saved.
I was so delighted to see such a beautiful “Grand Dame” being saved from our state’s developers plague. I want to really give a big “Hooray” to the buyers who are committed to keeping such a gorgeous piece of art and history alive!! I just wish there were more like them!!
It’s extremely sad that it had to be moved in the first place to make room for more of our “Concrete Jungle” but I am glad, as others are, that it remains a house, a historic house at that, and not a pile of rubble.
All of our old homes, particularly along our beautiful beaches and rivers, should be so lucky. *BIG SIGH*.
Amazing site! Nice to see that the house will be restored and wasn’t razed for yet another condo project.
Beautiful house. Glad it’s being preserved and hopefully will continue to be in the future.
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Posted by John Williams, Tampa on 09/26 at 10:18 PM
What a great story. Yes, the downside is that it was moved for new condos, but let’s face it. We live in Florida and growth and development is what is tearing this state’s heart out. If you want preserved history, move to Nebraska or North Dakota. Not any development there.
I am glad the owners saved it, and I hate the see that it had to be moved, but that’s just the small price we pay to live in this beautiful state.