Clark Family Farmhouse Dining Table
Elijah Godfrey
I grew up with the Clark family in Dumas, Texas. My dad went to work with Clark Farms when we moved to Dumas when I was only a few months old. The Clarks had a really cool half section of land just outside of town, where they had their homestead set up on the one of the corners of this 320 acre half circle of farm land. This farm, this house, this piece of land was really a major memorial for me as a child. The Clark family was extremely involved in many areas of my upbringing and my feet ran on this soil quite a bit in all the years I lived in Dumas. From the snowy winters of getting the snow mobile out and riding it around, to the church wide functions like the Annual Corn Boil or the Sunday afternoon football games on the "football field", this was a place that many knew very well. The house that sat on this piece of land was built in 1965 and lived in by Wayne Clark and his family. Several years later, his son, Brent moved into this house with his wife and two daughters. One of those daughters, years later, grew up, got married and had a kid, and eventually took over the family home and made it hers, a 3rd generation home.
Last year, the family unfortunately discovered black mold in the home and had to make the decision to tear the home down. It was a sad time for entire family as they watched their home of 50 years being leveled to the ground.
My client's grandfather, Wayne, lived in this house for the longest, also grew up in a small town near Lubbock. On that farm, a couple old barns stood for many years and protected farm equipment, hay for the cows and other things used on the farm. As the Clark family discovered they were going to have to tear down the family farmhouse in Dumas, they also learned that these barns, near Lubbock, were going to be taken down as well. It was then, that Emmy decided she wanted to preserve these 2 iconic structures somehow, so I got a phone call.
We discussed building a very large farmhouse dining table that would sit in her her home, in the same place that the old family home was being taken down. She wanted this table to feature both the old house and the old barns from the farm her papa grew up on. And that's exactly what we did. She and her husband drove down in September with a trailer load of rescued wood, both from the house and the barns.
The table top is made entirely of the rescued barn and house wood from the Clark family. The steel base are made from mild steel. It measures 12' long and 4' wide. It was designed to seat 14 people comfortably. Features 2 - 6' Benches to that line one side of the table.
