History of the Shotgun House: An American Vernacular Classic

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  • Опубліковано 10 лют 2025

КОМЕНТАРІ • 37

  • @FrockYeah
    @FrockYeah 4 роки тому +28

    What a great idea for videos! Using the Sims to illustrate the house and different versions is so cool! I just really love the combination of a speed build and a history/architecture lesson. I can't wait to try my hand at making a shotgun house for one of my Sims. 😁

    • @simminghistory5504
      @simminghistory5504  4 роки тому +2

      Thanks! I'm so glad you enjoyed it! Good luck on your build!

  • @DelusionalMinds808
    @DelusionalMinds808 3 роки тому +5

    I always loved housing from older era's, they give that feeling and tell many stories. Plus not to mention they're kinda homey if you think about it more than the newer housing.

  • @dkennell998
    @dkennell998 6 місяців тому

    Lovely vid. I like the distinction between vernacular and style, that's new to me. Hadn't thought about the fact that shotguns could be built in several different styles!

  • @nashiapietersen855
    @nashiapietersen855 3 роки тому +3

    In my current build I am redoing Willow Creek and this video was so interesting and helpful. thank you! immediately subscribed.

  • @emmaheikkinen2773
    @emmaheikkinen2773 3 роки тому +1

    Great video! I am renovating the whole Willow creek neighborhood and will def use this info building the Foundry cove houses. Would love to see a similar video on other traditional house styles in different price classes fit for Willow creek.

  • @edgarsiahaan6571
    @edgarsiahaan6571 3 роки тому +2

    Please make a video about the architecture style of Pepper's Pub from Britechester!

    • @simminghistory5504
      @simminghistory5504  3 роки тому +1

      I'll add that to the list! I'm assuming you mean the first floor - its a substyle of Victorian called Second Empire. (The overall building isn't really anything.)

  • @bean4423
    @bean4423 3 роки тому +4

    Shotgun houses come from Africa they were first built by slaves. If u look at the old shotgun homes the building techniques are the same architecture techniques that u would find all over West & Central Africa. Also the idea of being able to walk straight thru ya house in a straight line comes from Africa too.

  • @-iIIiiiiiIiiiiIIIiiIi-
    @-iIIiiiiiIiiiiIIIiiIi- 4 роки тому +6

    What would be the key differences between a shotgun house and a railcar house?

    • @simminghistory5504
      @simminghistory5504  4 роки тому +9

      Shotgun does not have a hallway while the railcar house does. Railcar houses have a narrow hall running down one side of the house, connecting all the rooms while shotgun rooms just open into each other.

  • @adrianjohnson7920
    @adrianjohnson7920 2 роки тому

    Since the traditional shotgun house has very tall ceilings, using a walk - under staircase loft bed in the bedroom, with storage in the stairs. would maximise the floor space for an L-shaped wooden dining nook with trestle table which could make the room both a dining room (and with strategically placed electrical outlets) a laptop work-space.
    A small swag lamp could be hung from the underside of the bed to make a chandelier over the table, which would be stylish as well as dual-use. A wall-mounted drop-leaf (IKEA style) table on the kitchen wall could make a kitchen table which can seat 1 or 2, if you planned your kitchen for it. Two good wooden Windsor chairs from the front room could be carried back for kitchen dining, thus making furniture do double duty too. Do not have a dish-washer; instead have an under counter washing machine, and clotheslines on the front and back porches to dry clothes. (screen one porch to keep away mosquitoes and clothesline thieves 😁
    A Tall loft bed under a high ceiling makest the bed is invisible to foot traffic. For a micro-small bathroom, use a combination toilet with the basin above the tank; and a corner shower unit.. Get an over-the toilet storage unit for towels.

  • @billburgess4720
    @billburgess4720 3 роки тому

    Another question. Would you lower the barge rafter on a Mansard roof line to increase the appearance proportion so a 10' ceiling height could be maintained? I observed one in or near the French Quarter in 2011 that looked like it was done that way....

  • @IslenoGutierrez
    @IslenoGutierrez 3 роки тому +1

    I'm from New Orleans and the shotgun house in the southern US originated from New Orleans as Bew Orleans has the greatest concentration of them in North America.
    The origin of the shotgun house in New Orleans is one of a house type that New Orleanians elaborated and added distinct local design to that arrived as the shotgun house style from St Domingue (the multicultural French colony of what is now the all black republic of Haiti).
    The French owned St. Domingue as well as Louisiana and there was lots of two way cross-cultural pollination during the French colonial period, just as with other French territories such as Martinique and Quebec. People and customs would come and go.
    When the slave revolt happen in French colonial St. Domingue, many of the St.Domingue French creoles (native-born SD whites of French descent) fled St. Domingue (SD) for Louisiana (also for Louisiana via Cuba) along with St. Domingue creoles of color (native born mixed race mulatto type people) and St. Domingue creole blacks (native born blacks). Creole was a term meaning native born to the land as this was used across the French, Spanish and Portuguese colonies. This multicultural group of St. Domingue refugees arrived starting in colonial New Orleans. They brought the SD shotgun house type. The New Orleans shotgun is a local adaptation and local recreation and evolution of this type of house. But that just covers how New Orleans got it. Now let's cover its origins and how it came to be in St. Domingue.
    The origin of the shotgun house in St.Domingue and the Dominican Republic comes from several sources and adaptations. The first phase of development came from the rectangular Spanish houses built by Christopher Columbus and his group in the Dominican Republic northern part of Hispaniola (the island that DR and Haiti occupy together) in their town named La Isabela.
    The second influence came from the Taino Indians of the island that adopted the rectangular type house of the Spaniards and recreated it in their style to be the chiefs house. Before Spanish influence, all Taino homes were round, even the chief's house.
    The third influence comes from the French who adopted the Taino chiefs house and recreated it in their style using French architecture and design.
    Then, the native born whites, mulattoes and blacks built these evolved houses in St. Domingue and added local influences of that population. Then, the St. Domingue refugees fleeing the slave revolt (made up of whites, mulattoes and blacks) brought this house type to New Orleans where it was adopted and recreated using local architecture and styles in the New Orleans creole style (the local architectural influences of New Orleans). And from New Orleans, the house type spread across the southern US where it evolved into different looking types.
    So the history of the shotgun house has its origins in this order:
    Spanish->Taino->French->St.Domingue creoles (whites, mulattoes and blacks of St. Domingue)->New Orleans creoles (whites, mulattoes and blacks of New Orleans)->the southern US (whites, mulattoes and blacks of the south).
    Here are pictures for verification:
    Christopher Columbus's house in a rectangular shotgun style along with rectangular houses and buildings of the Spanish settlement of La Isabella (Dominican Republic, Hispaniola) (pictures of the Spanish town as well as a picture of a recreation of Columbus's house is attached):
    ibb.co/TKhz4fq
    ibb.co/0qjf7Lr
    ibb.co/QDC8587
    Taino Chiefs house based on rectangular Spanish houses: ibb.co/0c3nBCS
    Early French settler houses with front facing porches in the shotgun style: ibb.co/sJf7SZd
    Also, examples of French Canadian architectural influence in some New Orleans shotguns as in the roof of this house (French Canada also had bidirectional influence with Louisiana): ibb.co/1XbsqMR
    Comparison of a remake of Christopher Columbus's house and a New Orleans shotgun to show similarities:
    ibb.co/QDC8587
    ibb.co/pKYsFW7
    The End.

    • @simminghistory5504
      @simminghistory5504  3 роки тому

      Thank you for your comment and interest. I did touch on the origins of the Shotgun, noting it believed to have been brought to New Orleans by Haitians (modern term for the residents of Saint Domingue). Unfortunately, I cannot go into extreme detail on what needs to be rather short videos. But thank you for sharing those useful links. I also found this one very helpful in my research: prcno.org/the-geography-of-the-shotgun-house/

    • @IslenoGutierrez
      @IslenoGutierrez 3 роки тому

      @@simminghistory5504 I read the material you posted which quotes Vlach. However, most scholars disagree with him over the origins of the shotgun house. He attributed the origins of the shotgun house to Africans, however the evidence does not support that as several other scholars have attributed the shotgun house to a mixture of Spanish-Taino-French design as I've posted links to the evidence. Columbus's house in La Isabella D.R. in 1493 is literally a shotgun house and I posted the Taino chiefs house along with evidence of French buccaneers in early St. Domingue constructing front facing homes that copy the Taino chiefs house, which was a copy of the Spanish rectangular house of Columbus and his men.

  • @JacobMinger
    @JacobMinger 2 роки тому

    I’m assuming it would be possible to have a 2 bedroom shotgun as long as you put both bedrooms next to each other correct?

  • @mares3841
    @mares3841 4 роки тому +3

    Can I hire you for new shotgun plans? I have a 50' x 180' lot💛

    • @simminghistory5504
      @simminghistory5504  4 роки тому +1

      Assuming this is a serious question.. I'm gonna have to pass BUT you can find shotgun plans for sale online. I've looked ;). Happy building!

  • @DeborahADahl-bl8mu
    @DeborahADahl-bl8mu 2 роки тому

    Folklorist and professor John Michael Vlach has suggested that the origin of the building style and the name itself may trace back to Haiti and Africa during the 18th century and earlier. Vlach claimed the name may have originated from a Dahomey Fon area term 'to-gun', which means "place of assembly". The description, probably used in New Orleans by Afro-Haitian slaves, may have been misunderstood and reinterpreted as "shotgun".[8] Citing Vlach, James Deetz claimed archaeological support for an African origin in his dig at Parting Ways, a 1790s community of freed black slaves in Plymouth, Massachusetts; his shotgun interpretation of the extremely limited evidence - two rooms that "may or may not have been unified" - has been challenged as "premature".[9][10] Vlach's theory behind the earlier African origin is tied to the history of New Orleans. In 1803 there were 1,355 free blacks in the city. By 1810 blacks outnumbered whites 10,500 to 4,500. This caused a housing boom. As many of both the builders and inhabitants were Africans by way of Haiti, Vlach maintained it was only natural they modeled the new homes after ones they left behind in their homeland. Many surviving Haitian dwellings of the period, including about 15 percent of the housing stock of Port-au-Prince, resemble the single shotgun houses of New Orleans.[8]

  • @Me.602
    @Me.602 3 роки тому

    Hi…I’m wondering since most original shotgun houses were approximately 12 ft wide, how long would each room be?

    • @simminghistory5504
      @simminghistory5504  3 роки тому +1

      Anywhere from 8 to 15 feet, but usually not much longer than it is wide. They were not roomy!

    • @Me.602
      @Me.602 3 роки тому +1

      @@simminghistory5504 thank you

    • @simminghistory5504
      @simminghistory5504  3 роки тому +1

      @@Me.602 If you check out the HABS video - there are a lot of shotguns on the HABS website so you can check them out yourself!

    • @Me.602
      @Me.602 3 роки тому

      @@simminghistory5504 oh thank you!

  • @joebudi5136
    @joebudi5136 4 роки тому +1

    Says their is a comment but there is no comment present but this one i am currently typing.

  • @chdreturns
    @chdreturns 5 місяців тому

    How does this channel have less than 1k subs?

  • @fartsmccracken1445
    @fartsmccracken1445 3 роки тому

    Which Sims version are you using here?

  • @DeathSocrates
    @DeathSocrates 4 роки тому +1

    Would a shotgun shack have that large of a yard? If a yard at all?

    • @simminghistory5504
      @simminghistory5504  4 роки тому +3

      It varies but usually, no. These were crammed in as much as possible. Unfortunately, Sims doesn't really have the right lot size for this.

    • @edi9892
      @edi9892 3 роки тому

      @@simminghistory5504 but there must be some minimum distance between windows and the next building?
      Else it not just messes with the view, but also light and ventilation...

    • @simminghistory5504
      @simminghistory5504  3 роки тому +1

      @@edi9892 In general... not really. If you go and look at some picture of historic short gun neighborhoods - the houses are only about 3 feet apart (or even less!). If there is any distance, they will add a window. These were not homes built with the view in mind - the priority of the builder was to cram as many in as possible. Any window adds some light and some ventilation and there are shotguns that have no side windows.

  • @jmalljmall
    @jmalljmall 2 роки тому

    The liquor house…