Description of Historic Place

The 1 1/2-storey Hooper House, a wood-frame dwelling built in 1900 and enlarged in 1910, stands within a spacious tree-sheltered farmyard off a gravel road near Sperling. The municipal designation applies to the dwelling, a seed granary, a workshop and the large site they occupy.

Heritage Value

The Hooper House and its setting are important links to the pioneer experience in the Sperling area and one of its longstanding farm families. For more than a century the site was home to John Henry Hooper, who came to Manitoba from Ontario in the 1890s, and his descendants. Hooper's high-gabled house, an informal, picturesque Anglo-Ontario-style structure, one of the few of its type in the Sperling area, recalls the Gothic cottages that were popular in southern Ontario in the nineteenth century. The dwelling's two-stage development also illustrates how modest early farmhouses could be transformed as needed into larger, more elaborate versions of their original designs. In addition to the well-maintained home, this site is valued for its large expanse of groomed grounds and outbuildings, notably a granary and workshop.

Source: Rural Municipality of Morris By-law No. 1616/07, September 12, 2007

Character-Defining Elements

Key elements that define the heritage character of the expansive Hooper House site include:
- the rural agricultural setting at the intersection of gravelled municipal roads in the Sperling area
- the large, well-maintained farmyard, sheltered by mature trees, and with a long narrow driveway
- the dwelling's placement deep within the farmyard and its physical and visual relationships with the workshop and the granary to the northeast and north, respectively

Key exterior elements that define the dwelling's picturesque Anglo-Ontario style include:
- the L-shaped form, 1 1/2 storeys high, under a moderately pitched, side-gable roof crossed on the south face by a large gabled pavilion and a narrower, steeply pitched, Gothic-style wall dormer
- the one-storey screened verandah in the southeast corner
- the number and variety of openings, including the single-door west and south entrances, the dormer doorway, the fenestration on all sides, etc.

Key interior elements that define the dwelling's heritage character include:
- the informal plan, including the narrow central staircase that divides the 1900 volume into equal main-floor areas, the 1910 east-side addition (the kitchen) and the upper-storey bedrooms and bathroom, etc.
- the details and finishes, such as the side-entrance door with panes of bevelled clear glass, the kitchen's plain, painted wood trim, the finely crafted wood staircase with turned balusters, etc.

Key elements that define the character of the site's designated ancillary buildings include:
- their straightforward vernacular design, wood-frame construction and utilitarian exterior features, including minimal fenestration, tall, wide entrances with side-siding doors, etc.
- the workshop's boxy form and high, moderately steep and truncated hip roof
- the granary's rectangular form and forward-facing gable roof