Givens Mansion c.1893 (SGNA)

GIVENS TOWNHOUSE 324 North Sterling Street Local Historic Property #85 Givens Townhouse was built by “Sallie”, Sarah Lyle Torian Givens. Sallie grew up on the Pinckney sugar plantation near Patterson, Louisiana during the 1800’s. She was married shortly after the Civil War and moved to Corpus Christi, Texas at a time when all of Texas was considered wilderness where the “wild savages” lived. Sallie’s husband, John S. Givens, practiced law and served as a Judge for the Corpus Christi area. When John Givens died in 1887, Sallie and her three children moved back to Lafayette to be close to her two brothers. Sallie built this house to look like an Eastlake house she had seen in Lake Charles. Eastlake is a type of Queen Anne Victorian architecture that achieves its picturesque look using multiple gables, bays, and balconies with an abundance of turned balusters, spindles and pierced wood.