| A two-story vernacular Greek Revival house, with a brick lower story and a wood-frame upper story, that has three tetrastyle porticoes. Listed on the National Register on 10 October 1985, from a nomination prepared by Michael Fazio. The Cedars is significant as the home of the Montgomery family and as one of the few remaining antebellum structures in Oktibbeha County. Starkville had only a few wealthy planters and therefore equally few large planter homes. The Cedars is decidedly the grandest of these few and is particularly notable for having its second floor as the main floor. This so-called raised cottage type eveolved in the Gulf Coast from French and Spanish 18th-century prototypes as a means to have living spaces elevated for ventilation and to avoid flooding. It was enlarged and given Neo-Classical dress in order to make it an appropriate 19th-century dwelling for Southern planters. The Cedars is the only remaining raised cottage type plantation house in Oktibbeha County. This house is included in "A Guide to Early American Homes – South" (1956) (p.133), "Old Homes of Mississippi, Volume II: Columbus and the North" (1977) (p. 44), and "The Majesty of Eastern Mississippi and the Coast" (2004) (p.19). |