Stonehaven House
Stonehaven House
On Dec 9, 2025 the City of Wylie held a Work Session to discuss the Relocation and Sale of Stonehaven. A few days later Mayor Porter posted his Council update on the City’s Facebook page where he mentioned the work session and encouraged the community to view the video of the work session and email feedback to the city council.
If you choose to provide feedback to the city, we encourage you to please be respectful in your communications. This email address will copy to the entire city counil: council@WylieTexas.gov
Also, the city's website has each council member's public email available.
If you would like to copy WHS on your email to council or would like to receive updates on Stonehaven Use this Email address and be sure to include "Stonehaven" in the subject line.
***We will be updating this page with more information soon!***
To view the Work Session here is a link to the city's video Work Session Stonehaven or watch the video below
The History of Stonehaven and the Stone Family in Wylie.
Stonehaven House, since its construction in 1912, has been owned continuously and in use by family members of the William and Charlotte Stone family, except for a few years in the 1970’s when it was rented to a local high school teacher. The original land patent was issued in 1850 by the Commissioner of Mercer’s Colony and transferred in 1851 to Daniel Herring, a relative (by marriage), of the Stone family. This 40 acre plot came to Josiah Stone in 1890 when one of his sons married a daughter of Daniel Herring. Josiah also had extensive land holdings in Collin, Rockwall, and Dallas Counties.
The Stone family was one of prominence in the community of Wylie. Josiah Stone (1835-1910) was one of the first trustees of the land given for the building of the first Methodist Church there. Stone Street, honoring the family, is one of the longest in the town, and Stoneybrook Street on the north border of the forty acres (house site) evidences the position of the family in the community. In 1986, a new residential development was named Stone Grove.
James Caleb Stone (1856-1909), son of Josiah, was also active in the community of Wylie.
William Emmett Stone (1884-1931), son of J.C. Stone, was a versatile individual of wide interests. He had a degree in accounting (1903) and took a series of classes in electrical and mechanical engineering. He owned and ran a gravel deposit on his property. He had income from oil holdings in several Texas counties. He was a motorcycle and car buff and owned one of the first cars in the community [a 1912 Stoddard Dayton]. He was an active member of the First Methodist Church of Wylie and a member of the founders Club of Southern Methodist University.
William married Charlotte L. Howard (1891-1965) in 1912, moving into the original bungalow on the site of the present Stonehaven house. The smaller house was moved to the back of the 40 acre tract, where they lived while the building of prairie style home was in progress.
The new house was not a copy of other common styles, with merely altered or added elements. It had no local contemporaries, comparable in innovating style, artistry of detail, or quality of construction. It clearly demonstrates excellence through a well conceived plan having functional reasons for its inventive features and attributes, common to many examples of homes by Frank Lloyd Wright of the Prairie Style and others. Mr. Wright coined the term “organic architecture” incorporating simplicity in space, the capture of light, and allowance for air flow. The exercise of restraint and the canons of taste did not preclude beauty and decoration, and expense was not spared in providing them.
The four square design with a gently hipped roof stretches 60 feet across the front by 60 feet deep allowing for sizable rooms. Every room in the house is cross-ventilated in two directions, a significant feature for that pre-air-conditioned time. The front veranda (porch) is four inch concrete with concrete square pillars, wide steps and low wide copings on the parapet (wall) for sitting or placement of planter boxes for fern and flowers. The veranda ceiling is pressed patterned tin. A porch swing hangs at the north end. Beveled and stained glass graces the veranda windows. The exterior sheathing of the house is double-drop siding of the familiar milling pattern in extensive use at that time. The house is painted in the original cream color, accented by a muted gray trim.
The front door leads into a 32 foot long living room, flanked with beveled glass French doors on the north to the dining room (with bay window) and matching French doors to the sun parlor on the south. The sun parlor has double French doors exiting to the front veranda and a door leading out on the south side. Antique brass hardware, electric switches with double button/mother of pearl inlay and brass cover plates were state of the art. Hardwood floors and stained woodwork enhance the simple design.
A double sided fireplace, between the living room and wide central hall, burns three foot wide logs and is decorated with Italian blue/green/gold tiles on both sides. Two floral and vine designed stained glass windows hang on either side of the fireplace. The two large fireplaces were ordered from a company in Michigan. They were accompanied by individual blueprints for their construction, each brick or tile numbered to insure the perfection of the completed designs.
The master bedroom has a door exiting to the screened porch across the west side. The porch ceiling is tongue in groove beaded board. A bath with claw foot tub, pedestal sink, and toilet sits between the master bedroom and guest bedroom. A third room off the kitchen can be used for an office. A makeshift second bathroom with portable shower stall was added in later years but has been removed.
One of the most unusual features of this home is the basement that was constructed at the north end of the house to hold the large generator and sixteen glass batteries for the self-contained direct current Delco Light System, itself unique in the community. The system was in use until rural electrification became available in the 1940’s. The basement also provided extensive space for dry storage of root vegetables and home-preserved foods, and for accessibility to the ash vault, plumbing and other servicing needs. The ash vault was large enough that it only had to be emptied seasonally rather than daily or weekly disposal. When the home was presented for a Historical Marker in 1992, this basement feature was thought to be the only known basement in a private home in the area.
Furnishings: Mission style (Stickley in master bedroom) and Victorian throughout. Over the years, some vandalism has caused damage to the exterior stained glass windows and the original hanging light fixtures are missing. Years of un-use, several attempts at modernization, and frequent habitation by vermin, squirrels, and possums required over 150 volunteer hours to shovel out debris, remove 4 inch orange shag carpet, and linoleum to reveal the original beauty of the hardwood floors, and to dismantle a makeshift second bathroom with portable shower.
The land was originally used for farming ---cotton, corn, wheat and other grains. In the 1990’s it was in use for cattle, grain, and hay production. A two acre orchard produced pears, peaches, apricots, apples, and plums. Only the pear trees were still in existence in the mid 1990’s. The original pecan grove was wiped out by pecan blight. A smoke house (including slaughter hoists and curing bins), a cistern for laundry uses, and a silo were built on concrete foundations. William was a progressive farmer and a conservationist. He developed his own water conservation techniques to create self-supporting reservoirs on each pasture. When the City of Wylie drilled a water well (1921), William secured permission to lay an extension, at his own expense, from the city limits to his home property (about one mile). He permitted any neighbor wishing to, to tie on to the line, which 10 or more did. In 1989 (after 68 years) the city replaced his installation with a 10-inch supply line.
William died in 1931 and Charlotte died in 1965. Both are buried in Wylie Cemetery. William and Charlotte had two daughters, both well educated - graduating from SMU - as teachers who eventually moved to Washington DC and worked for the government.
