This 19th-century cottage was previously located at 809 Robin Street in Houston’s Fourth Ward. It was home to a German immigrant family in the middle of the 19th century before serving as a rental house for more than a century (1883 to 2001). By the turn of the 20th century it was part of the thriving African American neighborhood known as “Freedmen’s Town” which served as a major hub for black education, business, and culture after Emancipation.
The cottage is the result of two separate buildings joined together: a one room Acadian cottage (front portion) and a two-room cottage (back portion), which resulted in a “shotgun” layout, mimicking the adjacent houses on Robin Street. The building was modified over time to meet residents' needs, and evidence of these changes can now be seen in the exposed layers of materials inside the building. The cottage was relocated to Sam Houston Park in 2002.