{"nrhp_refnum":"94000449","name":"Johnson Farm","other_names":["41dn248"],"category":"site","location":{"address":"Johnson Branch Park","address_restricted":false,"city":"Lake Ray Roberts","county":"Denton County","state":"TX","lat":33.41776566100003,"lon":-97.04830486999998,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"1994-11-17","is_nhl":false,"nhl_designated_date":null,"areas_of_significance":["Historic - Non-Aboriginal","Agriculture"],"significance_levels":["local"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"An archeological site (41DN248) at Johnson Branch Park, Lake Ray Roberts, Denton County, Texas, marking the remains of a mid-19th-century farmstead settled by John Johnson and his family in the 1850s. No structures remain standing.","why_significant":"The site is significant under Criterion D for its archeological information on rural farm life in northcentral Texas. It is one of the better-preserved examples of a rare settlement type, a single-component farmstead from the mid-19th to early 20th century with no deposits after 1920. Together with the nearby Jones farm, archival records and excavated features let researchers study early Peters Colony settlement and agricultural lifeways.","narrative":"Johnson Farm is an archeological site in Johnson Branch Park at Lake Ray Roberts in Denton County, Texas, where John Johnson and his family farmed from the mid-1850s until about 1915. Nothing stands above ground today. The dwelling, a small one-story log house on sandstone piers with a later two-room frame addition, reportedly burned about 1920. Excavations in 1987 and 1990 examined fourteen features, including the chimney fall, a detached kitchen, two possible smokehouse or drying sheds, a dugout cellar, fence postmolds and a large trash deposit. Tax rolls, census records, deeds and oral history add detail about the family's crops, livestock and community ties. The site was listed for what it can reveal about frontier settlement in the Peters Colony and about farm life in northcentral Texas from the 1850s into the early twentieth century. It is also valued as a rare, well-preserved farmstead from a single period.","period_of_significance":"1857-1915","architect_builder":null,"architectural_style":null,"criteria":["D"],"status_note":"No structures remain standing; the site has been tested and excavated, and the dwelling reportedly burned about 1920. The current use is listed as excavation/archeological site.","vacant_flag":null,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-sonnet-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.0-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 02:54:23.842132-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/opastorage/live/95/9717/40971795/content/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_TX/94000449.pdf"},"photo":null,"district":null,"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/40971795","wikipedia":null,"wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q110000914"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/texas/denton-county/johnson-farm-94000449/"}