Reid Dickie
Robert Fern Lyons was one of the early settlers in the Carberry area after emigrating west from Ontario in 1879. He purchased one of the first lots when the community of Carberry was established, on which he built a department store which he operated until 1888. Lyons owned 2700 acres of land around Carberry and raised crops and livestock. A Conservative, Lyons was elected to the Manitoba Legislature five times between 1892 and 1914.
What interests me most about Lyons is the house he built near Carberry. Though long abandoned and disintegrating quickly, the crumbling mansion retains enough of the detail to suggest its original magnificence. Located east of Carberry and Hwy #5, the house is visible among the overgrown trees from the highway, its brick construction standing out against the prairie fields.
Built around 1895, the red and buff brick two-storey house combines elements of Italianate and Queen Anne architectural styles into a striking and luxurious pile. The first floor features buff brick, the second floor red brick, both laid in standard running bond. The commingling of both coloured bricks on the second floor is fluid and dynamic. The asymmetrical massing of the house, round segmental arches over the windows and the accent
quoins are all Italianate elements that give the house a villa feel. Queen Anne style is represented in the two-storey rounded rooms, the bargeboard and fish scale shingles on the gable ends, the ornate three arched windows, which I believe went up the stairway of the house, and picturesque roofline. The former Lyons farm yard still has the wooden barn collapsing into itself and a rusting car parked at the rear of the house. The interior picture shows how far the place has fallen from grace. It’s a shambles.
good grief..isnt this being preserved or restored ???
Hi Jim, Apparently there isn’t a lot of interest in preserving this old place. Structurally it’s too far gone for viable restoration. I suspect it will end up being bulldozed and the yard turned into farm land. The town of Carberry has an excellent and effective heritage committee (Lyons house is in RM, not town) that has saved and preserved many of the town’s heritage buildings of which there are dozens. The main street of Carberry is a heritage buff’s dream!
Who own’s the property today?
Hi Lee,
Thanks for reading my blog. I believe the house and acreage is owned by the farmer whose land surrounds the place. There is no plan to do anything but let the old pile deteriorate and fall into the ground. Sad since the place does hold a lot of local history.
always loved that house and now I know a little more about it…thanks
Why did no family members continue to live in this house?
I photographed this house in July of last year. I wouldn’t be surprised to learn we photographed it around the same time because the condition of the house is almost exactly the same as your photos. I also posted my photos on FaceBook fpr public viewing.
Thanks for your comment William, and for checking out my blog. Regarding the Carberry ruins, Jonathan Hale says: “A ruin is an expression of real death, and we find that moving. Some of the most passionate architecture in the world is ruins, where real death has come.”
“Though nothing can bring back the hour
Of splendour in the grass, of glory in the flower;
We will grieve not, rather find
Strength in what remains behind…” William Wordsworth (Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of Early Childhood)
By which I relate Wordsworth to houses such as Lyon’s House. As I age I have seen houses similar to Lyon’s before, so I can never claim to again see “…the hour of the splendour in the grass…”, but I can feel a thrill at the memory I have of seeing it the first time.