Goose House

by Sue Matthews

Everyone in the Hazard area is familiar with the Mother Goose building in Wabaco. It's a landmark, one of the first things a stranger would notice in the town. But back in 1935 no one dreamed that such a building would exist.

No one, that is, but George Stacy, who hatched the plan for the goose. According to Stacy's wife, Ollie, he simply came home one day with the idea in his mind.

"I don't know what gave it to him or anything of the kind," said Ollie. "I was surprised and didn't think he would go through with it." "As we all know, he did."

Putting his plan into action, Stacy went out to Big Creek and shot a goose. Ollie cooked it carefully, leaving the skeleton intact but removing all the meat. He used that skeleton to scale the building by, as a sort of natural blueprint.

According to Ollie it was a sacrifice to construct the goose building. They started with nothing and lived in an old shack above the site. They would build awhile, stop and work awhile, and then build again. They didn't have the money she said, but were determined to do it anyway. It took six years for them to complete the project.

The roof of the building is ribbed just like a goose. Eli Brashear of Home Lumber milled the lumber which was numbered and fixed to make the skeleton. Charlie Presnell and Ivis Jones did the stone work, Lee Spalding poured the concrete and Corvitt Brown supervised the woodwork.

"Most people think there's a rock in the building from every state, There's not," said Ollie. "there are rocks from quite a few states and Canada but not from every single one," she added.

The Mother Goose building was planned as a home, and the Stacy's lived there from the time it was completed until a few years back. Inside are three bedrooms, a bath, kitchen, dining room, living room, and a large family room. They and their four children shared the house. The grocery store was added later.

Myra and Logan Sizemore live in the Mother Goose now. They say that people are still fascinsted by it, especially out-of-towners. It's a cozy little apartment, built in an oval to symbolize a nest, with egg shaped windows going around it. Inside the ribs bow out to form the attic.

Most of their early neighbors have passed away now and the area has changed. Back then there were only two ot three structures near the Mother Goose building and most everyone was "Kind of astonished that it was around there," said Ollie. Today people have an affectionate feeling for the goose.

It's a symbol of civilization to one neighbor who moved there from the midwest where such structures used to be prevalent. And it's the dream of another Hazard man to live in the house someday.

The Mother Goose building is the creation of a man who was bron and grew up in Hazard, a man who worked for the Land N railroad. It seems amazing that one day he just came home with the idea to do such a thing. "He was like that, says his wife, who now lives in Dayton, Ohio.

The people of Hazard are lucky that he was, for though he has died he left a little bit of fantasy in an otherwise down-to-earth town. The building is a concrete hint to the magic of imagination that lies within us all, just waiting for a chance to hatch out and become real just like the Mother Goose.

The Goose House was built by George Stacy and his wife Ollie Hoskins, daughter of John Hoskins and Nancy Ann Hensley.

I want to thank Deane Hoskins, Clay County, Kentucky, for sending this story