The Lunn-Allen House

W.N. Lunn (1883-1959) bought this lot in 1916 for $1,000—and there was likely a house on the lot because $1,000 was a lot of money to pay in that day for an empty lot on Main Street in Olney. At that time, this home/lot was the furthest house west on Main Street.

Mr. Lunn was born in Montague County. His father, Ed Lunn, delivered some gin parts to J.K. Thomas in Olney in1899. Mr. Thomas convinced Ed that he could buy land very cheap around Olney, and it was much superior to the sandy land in Montague.

This set the Lunn Family move to Olney into motion in late 1899-1900, which took seven days by wagon.

Also, Ed Lunn purchased some farmland around where the airport is now located. However, Will did not take to farming, so when Olney developed enough for Morrisons to establish a store here, he came looking for a job and landed at Morrisons.

In the 1910-11 period W.D. Bolding started a mercantile store across the street from the Morrisons, and when the Morrisons asked Lunn to go to Newcastle to run their store, he quit and went across the street and became a longtime associate of Mr. Bolding. Most mercantile stores sold caskets, and Mr. Lunn saw an opportunity to better himself if he went to an embalming school, which he did in 1913 in Ft. Worth. After school, he came back to Olney, and he would go to the homes of the deceased to do the embalming there as they had already secured a casket. Then, the funeral would be at the deceased’s house. You will see this 1913 date for the beginning of Lunn’s Funeral Home in Olney and Wichita Falls.

In their late teens, Lunn and Bolding engaged in the funeral business in Wichita Falls as partners. In 1929, Jack Marcell had a vacant building on Grand Avenue north of city hall, and he wanted to rent it to Mr. Lunn for a funeral home. In the 1930s, the J.P. Alexander building became open, and Mr. Lunn took the opportunity to open a furniture and appliance store there, which is currently a floral shop.

Mr. Lunn’s first wife was Nora Robinson (1887-1911), who he married in 1905, and their children were Raymond (1906-1989) and Bernard (1909-1982). His second wife was Emma. Simmons (1888-1975) whom he married in 1914, and their children were Ruthelle (1916-1998), Wayne (1921-1965), and Richard (Dick) (1930-1991).

In 1928, Mr. Lunn and his wife Emma executed a mechanic’s lien for $3000 for repairs to the house.

In 1960, after Mr. Lunn’s death, Emma sold the house to William Russell Parks (1914-1989) and his wife Cora, and they sold the house to C. Russell Parks (1935-1995), their son. The dates of these conveyances are not clear. The Parks ran an auto parts business in Olney for several years, starting in 1954.

In 2006, Rosala (Brock) Parks, C. Russell’s widow, sold the house to Dennis Frazier.

In 2007, Dennis Frazier sold the house to David Brandon Cook, who flipped the house to the Peter Allen Family in 2008.