The oldest extant building in Beaumont was built as a trading post several miles northwest of the original townsite near the Opelousas Trail, an eastward continuation of the Atascocito Trail between Texas and southern Louisiana. The two-story clapboard house is a central-hall, side-gabled I-house with one story, shed-roofed attachments to the front and rear. The front attachment is a veranda; the rear attachment contains a second layer of rooms. San Augustine architect Stripling restored the house, which was opened as a historic house museum by the Beaumont Heritage Society in 1970.