Plank Kitchen

Plank Kitchen. . Built around 1825, this is the oldest building on the property. It most likely served as a home for the Williams family before they finished construction on the main house in 1855, and was once the meeting place for the Samaria Baptist Church. It's named the Plank Kitchen for its longest known use from 1855-1940, a kitchen. At times it even served as a dining room for the farm manager and his family. When the Pooles bought the farm in 1940, they renovated the main house, adding an indoor kitchen, electricity, and indoor plumbing. , Throughout the 19th century, southern kitchens were usually a separate building and not located in the main house. Cooking on an open fire was extremely hot work, and during hot, humid summers, the family wanted to keep their home cool and smoke free. With the invention of cast iron stoves, people began putting kitchens inside the main house. Cast iron stoves contained the heat of cooking, making cooking in the hot summers more bearable. , In general, the kitchen was the domain of women. When Mrs. Burchett Williams worked in the kitchen in the early 1800s, she would have had the help of her 2 daughters, as well as a woman named Eliza. Eliza was a slave, gifted to them by family. By the time of the Civil War, the Williams family had 12 slaves, many of them children. , [Captions] , . Top: Above is the Plank Kitchen before any restoration work was done by Wake County. An often-overlooked key to a historic site, restoration work allows visitors to travel back in time and truly visualize what life might have looked like. , . Bottom: Pictured above is a scene from Wyatt family picnic dating back to 1915. The Wyatt family owned the property from 1889 to 1940, but their main residence was in Raleigh. The family relied on a superintendent, or farm manager, and tenant farmers to deal with the daily operations of the property. The Wyatts visited the property on weekends and for special occasions.