Ballentine-McCain House (National Register of Historic Places)

(Description from the original National Register submission by Ana Gordon, Historian for Mississippi Department of Archives and History, Oct 1982)

ARCHITECTURAL DESCRIPTION: The Ballentine-McCain House is a rambling one-and-a-half story irregularly massed and fenestrated, frame residence with both Queen Anne and Colonial Revival influences located on a large residential lot facing west. The roofline is multi-gable-on-hip with a prominent second story multi-fenestrated turret capped by a conical roof on the northwest corner. Four prominent, but plain, chimneys pierce the roofline. The entrance is double-leaf with rectangular glass panels surmounted by a leaded-glass transom and flanked by leaded-glass sidelights with paneled aprons. Remaining fenestration is highly irregular, including shed and gable dormers on secondary elevations, paired window and lunettes with leaded glass, and bay windows. The irregularly shaped flat-roofed encircling verandah is supported by clusters of two and three Tuscan columns which rest on quarry, faced stone pedestals and terminates in a porte-cochere on the south end. The entry bay is defined by a pedimented gable with a carved, foliated wooden ornament and is reached by a broad flight of stone steps flanked by stone pedestals.

ALTERATIONS: Slate roof still intact under present roof surface, removed balustrade

OUTBUILDINGS: Smoke house, dilapidated sheds of no importance, small nineteenth-century tenant's cottage.

LANDSCAPE FEATURES: Walk on axis with entrance lined with magnificent oaks, remnants of early twentieth-century cast-iron fence, said to have been imported from England.

STATEMENT OF SIGNIFICANCE: Within the extant collection of Andrew Johnson's architecture, the Ballentine-Bryant House is a significant deviation from his other turn-of-the-century houses. This one-and-a-half story residence is significant for its unusual squat round tower and Johnson's only recorded porte-cochere. While most of Johnson's other residences of this period are solid and square, the Ballentine-Bryant House is a rambling, and at points, awkwardly massed, residence. The design details are varied, contrasting Queen Anne and Colonial Revival and shows perhaps less of the master's craft and more of the owner's eclecticism.

Ballentine-McCain House was designed sometime between 1870 and 1871 by Andrew Johnson (1844-1921), one of the few formally educated, resident architects in northern Mississippi during the second half of the nineteenth century. Along with approximately ten other extant buildings in the immediate area, the house is a unique example in predominantly Anglo-Saxon Mississippi of the contributions of a Scandinavian immigrant to the architectural history of the state. Although the house, like Johnson's other buildings, does not show any specific Scandinavian influences, the sophistication of the house is exceptional in the surrounding area.

Andrew Johnson was born in Sweden in 1844, the son of Anna Persdotter and Johns Persson. While studying architecture at Uppsala University, he won an important design competition and was awarded a trip to America. After his arrival in New York City in 1865 and his marriage the following year, Johnson decided to make the United States his home. He soon travelled to Chicago where he was granted a contract by the Illinois Central Railroad to construct several depots along the company's rapidly expanding rail network in the South. By the 1870s the Illinois Central Railroad was becoming a major factor in the economy of Mississippi, and Johnson soon settled in Sardis near the center of the state's rejuvenating cotton production, an important source of business for the railroad. Research has not yet uncovered information on the railroad depots Andrew Johnson constructed, but among the significant buildings he designed in Sardis are the Ballentine-Seay House (1870), the Johnson-Tate Cottage (1873), and St. John's Catholic Church (1872) in Como. Possibly his finest public building was the Second Empire First Sardis courthouse (ca. 1878), which unfortunately has burned.

About the architect:
Architect Andrew Johnson (1844-1921): Born and educated as Anders Johnsson in Sweden and honored by the King of Sweden, Johnson was sent to Mississippi by the Illinois Central Railroad to design and build depots. He chose to move permanently to Sardis (seven miles south of Como) where we built one of the area's first Methodist churches. The prolific "Big Swede" and his son, John Wright Johnson, went on to design some of the most famous homes, academies, churches, and private clubs in the Mid-South, including more than 60 here in Panola County. Their architectural style, which combined elements of Greek Revival, Gothic Revival, Queen Anne, Italianate, and French Second Empire, became well known throughout the United States. Roughly 20 Johnson "works of art" still survive in Como. (www.comocourtyard.net/historic.htm)