What attracts a person to a specific type of architecture? If not ornament, then how does the shape and scale of a building speak to a viewer? There’s an A-frame house I’ve passed by hundreds of times – as a child, I found it odd, yet appealing. As an adult, I wonder how on earth I would hang any artwork on the walls, but I know there’s legions of A-frame devotees.
The 19th century octagon house craze surely had as many detractors as it did ardent fans. One admirer of the octagon plan was Dr. William Smith Kouns, a physician in a riverfront town in northeast Kentucky.
The Kouns House can only be glimpsed through the trees.
The octagon house form was popularized in mid-19th century by an interesting fellow named Orson Squire Fowler. Fowler’s main concern was to enclose the most interior space for the least amount of money, and the octagon house was the “perfect solution…a house, beautiful by the form itself, that focuses on economy and function.”
You can read more about the fad of octagon houses in an earlier post I wrote, but suffice to say, Fowler promoted the idea of a house with an octagonal footprint as not only economical, but good for one’s health!
Two contact prints (one mostly sadly marred by a staple) of the Kouns House in the late 1980s.
Dr. William Smith Kouns, born in 1817 in Greenup, graduated from the Louisville Medical Institute in 1841 (his thesis topic was syphilis). He returned to his hometown and sometime in the 1850s, he had this two-story, frame, octagonal house built. Local sources point to the date of construction as 1856, and census records show an increase in the value of his real estate between 1850 and 1860.
In the 20th century, the house was home to William Cole, and later owned by Sam Leslie.
A circa 1987 view of the house. Photograph by Helen Powell, NRHP files.
A long sidewalk leads to the Kouns House.
I’m not sure what drew Dr. Kouns to the octagonal form, but I know I was delighted to see such a rare house form on an unplanned detour in Greenup.
I am so glad this house was discovered by your magazine. Equally excited that you have also discovered the city of Greenup, which is one of the oldest settlements in Kentucky. The history of this place is rich and deep, and presently undergoing something of a renaissance. It’s citizens are discovering its past, and are re-awakening to the magic of its culture.