Lorenzo Hill Hatch & John Doney Houses
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These two buildings are examples of the types of houses that were built in Franklin and other Mormon communities from the 1860s to the 1880s. Typically, early Franklin dwellings were simple cabins with a central hall, as the residents prospered they built more elaborate homes.
The Hatch House
In 1872, Lorenzo Hill Hatch built this elegant stone house on Main Street across from the city square. It is a rare Idaho example of the Greek Revival style of architecture popular in Utah in the 1870s. Its rectangular proportions, symmetrical doors and windows, and heavy cornice lines with return eaves, are characteristic of Greek revival architecture brought to Utah by Mormons from upstate New York. When it was built, the Hatch house was the largest house in town. Travelers from Utah, including Brigham Young, often stayed here. The brick room on the rear was added around 1905 when the house was remodeled and plumbing installed. The house was occupied by Bishop Hatch's descendants until the 1940s. In 1979, it was acquired by the Idaho State Historical Society.
Lorenzo Hill Hatch was Franklin's temporal and spiritual leader from 1863 to 1875, serving as the town's second Mormon Bishop and first mayor. He was also the first Mormon legislator in Idaho. Born in Vermont in 1826, Hatch later moved to Nauvoo, Illinois, before settling in Lehi, Utah, in 1851. Like many early prominent men in the church, he married plural wives and fathered twelve sons and twelve daughters. In 1863, at the request of Church president Brigham Young, Hatch settled with his large family in Franklin to serve as Bishop.
The Doney House
The small stone house was built by John and Ann Doney to house their family of ten children. The Doney, originally from England, journeyed west as part of a handcart train to Utah. Arriving in 1860, they were among the settlers who established Franklin. The Doneys built this modest home, typical of early Franklin and Cache County dwellings, using locally quarried stone. Many of Franklin's early buildings were constructed using the same local stone, laid by skilled stone masons, many whom had emigrated from England. Originally located one half mile to the south, the Doney house was moved to this site, which was owned by the Idaho State Historical Society, in 2002.
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The Doney family journeyed west as part of a handcart train. Thousands of new Mormon converts from England and Wales took a new form of transportation to Utah. They could not afford wagons after leaving their homeland, so they pulled handcarts. Between 1856 and 1860, ten companies of handcart pioneers walked 1,300 miles from the end of the rail line at Iowa City, Iowa, to Salt Lake City, Utah.
[sketch of handcart train in Iowa]