Conch Shell House...a home with a history
About the article
This is a digitised version of an article from The Cayman Compass's print archive. Occasionally, the digitisation process introduces transcription errors, or other problems.
See the article in its original context from September 1986.
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Presently occupied by Mike Henderson and family, the unique structure has been in his family since it was completed by his father, Carol Henderson in 1937. They are the first family members to occupy the house and only the second occupants, over the years, to call the house a home.
Building the house was no easy task for Carol Henderson, especially back then. A small homemade sailing boat, known locally as a "cat boat", was used to transport the shells to the shoreline in North Sound, near the present site. Even back then the structure was considered off-beat, especially so because, until then, no house on the island had been constructed of anything but wood or the more common style known as wattle and daub, using limestone, heated and melted to a liquid state when applied to a wall of woven wood sticks.
The cement that Henderson used had arrived in barrels and was slated to be used to construct the telegraph office in town. He purchased some of their excess and hand mixed all the cement that was used to construct his one bedroom, one bath home with walls that are one foot thick. It is interesting that he built a bathroom since there was no electricity to operate a pump to supply the house with water. Son Mike says he even constructed a septic tank, which until recently was still in use.
Carol Henderson was farsighted. This was possibly the first house on the island to have such a convenience. The conch shells were added to the walls as a veneer, evenly spaced apart in lines. Once finished the house sat vacant for over 20 years.
Mike was living and working in the States. On his first return visit home in 1966, since leaving in 1939, he was convinced he should restore the homestead by cousins David and Dick Arch. They were instrumental in seeing the rebuilding through to the finish for Mike after he returned to the States.
The first occupants of the house, a local bank manager and family, lived in it for a year. In 1975 Mike and his family returned to his homeland and into the Conch Shell House. Since then they have added a family room, a service porch and a carport to the original structure.
The Conch Shell House, the Henderson Homestead, 38 years after completion, was finally occupied by members of that family. They are especially proud of what is now one of the biggest tourist attractions on Grand Cayman. (CINB)
