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Hewn and sculpted from the Ozarks landscapeDouglas home outside St. James is result of years of hard work By R.D. Hohenfeldt Perched atop a rocky ledge just east of St. James, the home of Bob and Janet Douglas symbolizes the persistence, frugality and hard work of Ozarkers. Literally hewn from the pine, oak and hickory forest surrounding it and sculpted from the Ozarks geology beneath it, the home today features a 34-foot tall fireplace, an indoor swimming pool, a three-car garage with workshop and a roomy, enclosed porch where the Douglases can relax and listen to the water fall they built next to the porch. Twenty-two years ago when the Douglases bought the property, the home was a rotting, trash-filled log cabin abutting a tiny house, really little more than a shack, that served as a room addition. About 50 yards away was a barn, also filled with trash. To
get from the highway to the cabin, the Douglases had to drive a Jeep to
the edge of a ravine, then walk and climb down one side of the ravine
and clamor and crawl back up the other side like goats. “I bought a dump truck and hauled 200 loads of trash out of here,” says Bob Douglas. “I hauled about 200 loads of clay to build the road.” Although the property feels remote, it’s really just 1.3 miles down Highway DD from Highway 68, which runs through St. James, and is only half a mile from the city limits. It’s less than a 10-minute drive to Ferndale Residential Care Facility, the family-owned boarding home where Janet grew up and still works, or the Douglas Company building, former site of the well-known restaurant and gift shop Bob built and operated for many years after selling his Barn Bar-B-Q in downtown St. James. “I’ve never lived farther than seven miles from here,” says Janet, a native of the St. James area. “And I don’t want to live anywhere else.” Bob adds, “I’m from up around St. Louis. My dad was a minister and my parents operated the Whispering Winds Bible Camp. We moved here when I was 14 years old so I’m pretty close to being a native.” The Douglases bought the 45-acre parcel in 1984 while they were still living at the Ferndale home. “We lived above Ferndale for about 20 years,” Janet says. “This was known as Hippie Joe’s place because a Chicago jeweler named Joe one day just up and left the city and started driving south. He was driving down I-44 when he saw a local Realtor’s sign. He pulled off the interstate and ended up buying this place.” Hippie
Joe didn’t live in the cabin/shack combination across the ravine.
Instead, he parked a mobile home closer to the highway and lived there
until the urge to move hit him again. “His teen-age son also left Chicago, and he lived in this little house. He apparently never took out the trash; he just opened the door and threw it into the cabin, because when we came here, it was filled with trash.” Despite the condition of the buildings, the Douglases saw the beauty of the landscape and the potential for the property. They bought it, and after five years of brush-clearing, road-building and remodeling, the Douglases moved into the home. What they moved into was far different from what they bought. They moved the barn next to the cabin and the little house, tying all three structures together. “The
barn had never been used for livestock; it was just filled with
trash,” says Bob. “We had a couple of guys from Salem move it for
us. They cross-braced it one day and then the next day lifted it and
backed it like a trailer on the foundation we had poured.” The barn loft, now a guest bedroom, served as their bedroom while they renovated the log cabin into their master bedroom. Meanwhile, the main floor of the barn became the front room or living room. The little house or room addition eventually became their kitchen and dining room. It was while they were working on the initial remodeling that the property attained a new name. “We were calling this place home, but we also called Ferndale home because we had lived there so long,” Janet says. “One day I told somebody we would meet them at home and they asked us which place we meant. We told them this place, and they said, ‘Oh, you mean The Goat Ranch.’” The name stuck, and now there’s a sign outside the front door, as well as a larger sign made by the couple’s son-in-law at the opening of the circle drive, proclaiming the place as The Goat Ranch. “There’s never been a goat on the place as far as I know,” Janet says. “It’s just a reflection on how difficult it was to get to the place at first; you had to be like a billy goat.” Bob says he originally envisioned demolishing all the buildings and constructing a new home among pine trees up the ridge from the ravine edge. “I
asked her what she wanted to do with the cabin and the house—bulldoze
it or burn it,” Bob says. “She wanted to save it.” Having grown up in the history-rich Ferndale facility, Janet couldn’t bear to raze the cabin, which may have been built in 1852 or 1853, or the little house addition, likely built in 1922 along with the barn. “It was pretty primitive,” Bob says of the construction of the cabin. “You can see the axe marks. The only saw work is what I did. I trimmed off the ends when I was redoing the building. The initial remodeling took about six years of intensive work. They did the work themselves, along with carpenters. “We never had a general contractor,” Bob says. “We’d just get a carpenter out to work on different things that we wanted done.” Adds Janet, “We went through five carpenters over the years,” and Bob quickly notes, “We’re still friends with all of them.” Bob’s brother-in-law built the fireplace in the old barn section of the house; the back of the fireplace juts out into the enclosed front porch. “All the rock is from the place except for one big hearth stone that he found somewhere else,” Bob says. Remodeling of the home has never ended. “He’s the original Bob the Builder,” Janet says of her husband. There have been a couple of major changes just in the past four years. The Douglases hosted a stop on the Phelps County Master Gardeners Garden Tour in 2002. Visitors then would have seen a carport on the side and an open front porch. Guests now see the front porch screened and glassed, while the carport has been enclosed to become a living room and a sun room with a swimming pool. “My heart doctor told me I needed to swim, but I don’t show my body in public,” Bob says. “I’ve seen these Endless Current pools advertised in Southern Living magazine for years, so I had one installed. I swim 45 minutes a night.” The pool is 6 feet deep, and the Douglases say they have no problems with humidity. “I keep it covered when I’m not swimming and the ceiling fan dries the cover off quickly,” Bob says. Putting in the pool required a jackhammer. “Everything here is complicated to build, because it’s a rock ledge,” says Bob. “We jackhammered out a place for the pool and for a little basement underneath it for equipment.” That rock ledge falls off into the ravine, giving the Douglases and their guests a beautiful view from the sturdy deck built behind the pool room and living room. It’s a good place to sit and watch birds and other wildlife. In fact, the Douglases have seen wildlife on the deck itself. “I’ve seen a bobcat, and I’ve seen foxes, baby foxes, on our deck,” Bob says. “I’ve seen a cougar out here on the property, too. Now they deny that we have cougars in Missouri, but I saw it and I know what it was. The neighbors have seen it, too.” He has also seen deer and turkey in abundance on the property. “So far, I haven’t seen a bear,” he says. Back inside, furnishings throughout the home are family heirlooms or from collections that were used in the restaurants or the residential center. Janet says her mother kept Ferndale updated frequently, but she was frugal and would find used furniture that had fallen out of fashion but was still beautiful and in good shape. “My mother always found good, solid old furniture she could use at Ferndale,” Janet says. Some of that furniture has found its way to the Douglas home as updates have continued under her administration. The Douglases also have some furnishings and interior design items, such as old clocks and other antiques, from the restaurants. “That book case was my dad’s,” Bob says in one room. “That held his theological library.” Other pieces have been bought in antique shops and in auctions. Bob points to a couple of chairs that he bought for a low price from someone who was replacing them with newer models. “We had them reupholstered and found they were built in 1917 in St. Louis,” he says. The house is a treasure of memories, stories and local history. Bob says, “Dr. Stricker told me he delivered babies up here a couple of times. He drove here in a Jeep after World War II.” Bob also tells how he found an old well at the bottom of the ravine. “It was cased, but it had a hand-crank on it, not a pump, so they must have carried water from down there.” He pauses briefly and adds, “There are so many stories attached to this house.” |
