Cass Brewer, showing off the level framing of his first backyard clubhouse. Image: Diane Brewer
Forts and clubhouses, timeless portals to the secret world of kids, stand apart from adult society and its grim concerns of property and propriety — and this usually works out just about fine, at least until those kids get old enough to hide beer inside them.
But no age, innocent or otherwise, can save you from suburban residential zoning. Enforced by adults hidden inside their own clubhouses — clubhouses with taxable values, you understand — a network of vigilant eyeballs watches for toes over lines. We have the audacity to call this a neighborhood, but for nine-year-old Cub Scout Cass Brewer, who built his backyard clubhouse against an invisible border of the grown-up world, Barton Hills was a battlefield, invaded by an army flying a red flag.
Cass and his friends doing their best Goonies impressions in the Austin American-Statesman’s January 1980 coverage of the clubhouse saga, with the ominous red tag affixed to the structure at the center of the action. Image: Austin History Center
The war began in January 1980, as a building inspector for the City of Austin discovered Brewer’s fort stood within five feet of his parents’ property line, encroaching upon the “setback” area where residential zoning forbids construction. The inspector placed a red tag on the clubhouse indicating a code violation, meaning its young architect would either have to move the structure away from the setback zone, seek a variance from the city, or simply tear the whole thing down.
To be fair, the scale of Brewer’s project went far beyond the ambitions of most kid builders, owing at least in part to the example set by his father, Charles Brewer, who worked in Austin’s forever-booming residential construction industry:
Nine-year-old Cass Brewer says proudly that the wooden clubhouse he built in the back yard of his parents’ home in Southwest Austin is sturdy enough to weather a hurricane.
“It’s even waterproof and has some insulation in it,” said Case, who’s been “fooling around” with building things since he was 2 years old.
Cass erected the clubhouse, with the help of some neighborhood friends, against a chain-link fence on the property line of his parents’ large, wooded back yard at 2404 Kathy Cove in the Horseshoe Bend subdivision.The approximate 5×6-foot square clubhouse was built with scrap material that Cass got from his father, a builder for [Austin residential developer] Bill Milburn.
It sits on a foundation of rectangular pieces of timber anchored into the ground with cement. Like a real house, its walls were framed with 2x4s, over which sheets of plywood were nailed. The southeast corner of the clubhouse is shaded by a 30-foot cedar tree.
— Austin American-Statesman, January 24, 1980
Brewer’s parents, perhaps seeing an opportunity for a lesson in civics, elected to help their son fight for his clubhouse by requesting a variance from Austin’s Board of Adjustment. They also knew an amusing human interest story when they saw one, and contacted the media — resulting in the Statesman coverage seen here, a few local TV news items, and a couple of Associated Press wire stories syndicated to papers nationwide. “For those days, it went as viral as it could,” Brewer, now 48, says.
Mike Kelley, a humor columnist for the Austin American-Statesman, satirized what some perceived as a bureaucratic overreaction against young Brewer and his clubhouse in January 1980 soon after the story broke — and you’ll notice he mentions two “feloniously ugly” bank buildings, which at the time could only be a reference to the “Golden Mirror” of Bank One Tower and the black monolith of the Austin National Bank Tower. Image: Austin History Center
The first hearing arrived in March, and the Statesman celebrated the occasion with some amusingly tongue-in-cheek photos of young Cass standing before the zoning board. Approving the clubhouse variance required four votes, but only received three, with one commissioner dissenting — which automatically postponed the item to the board’s next meeting. “I remember being up on the dais, fighting for it,” Brewer says.
Cass Brewer stands before the city’s Board of Adjustment in this March 1980 Austin American-Statesman coverage, complete with some hilarious photos straight out of “Parks and Recreation.” Images: Austin History Center
But despite the board coming within one vote of saving Brewer’s clubhouse, the next meeting in April didn’t go well. It’s not clear exactly what changed the commissioners’ minds, though Cass’ mom Diane Brewer says a surprise testimony against the clubhouse by their neighbor, former Statesman editor Maggie Hillery, dealt the final blow — and so, with neighbors pitted against neighbors, the variance died by unanimous vote. Brewer, with the help of his friends, had to tear the structure down.
“It would be tough to say the board made the wrong decision,” says Rahm McDaniel, who currently serves as a member of the city’s Board of Adjustment. “It sounds like it was a real neat clubhouse, but being adorable isn’t a hardship — then again, it’s no more trivial than a lot of the Lake Austin cases we see”
The photo in this Statesman coverage of the clubhouse’s demolition shows the level of detail Brewer put into its construction. Seriously, how many nine-year-olds do you know who can properly frame a wall? Image: Austin History Center
True to his word, Brewer rebuilt his clubhouse in what he wryly calls the “proper area” — and knowing he wouldn’t have to unceremoniously tear it down this time, the new version ended up even more ambitious than before.
“The structure he built back, entirely on his own with some help from the neighbor kids and his brothers, was bigger, stronger, more solid and two stories tall whereas the other had just been a lean-to,” his mother Diane Brewer says, with unmistakable pride. “This little guy put in an upper floor, windows, and a framed opening for a doorway.”
Despite the early defeat he suffered at the hands of the grown-up world and its many land-use regulations, Cass definitely got the last laugh. As president of Austin residential development company Legacy DCS, which he founded with his wife, Carrie, Brewer’s worked in the building industry for most of his adult life.
Cass and his father Charles celebrating a groundbreaking. Image: Legacy DCS
Cass now oversees the construction of custom homes, multifamily buildings, and other master-planned communities in and around Texas, with his father Charles — who supplied the raw materials and encouraged his son to fight for his clubhouse in the first place — working alongside him as the firm’s vice president. “I guess you could say I’m just building bigger clubhouses these days,” he laughs.
Homes for sale in 78704
-
$1,189,000
807 Christopher Street
Austin, TX -
$449,000
2906 S 1st Street #303
Austin, TX -
$1,998,000
1704 Kinney Avenue #A
Austin, TX -
$340,000
2020 S Congress Avenue #2219
Austin, TX -
$305,000
2020 S Congress Avenue #1314
Austin, TX -
$925,000
4005 Clawson Road #B
Austin, TX -
$740,000
3504 Georgia Lee Drive
Austin, TX -
$2,000,000
1005 Jewell Street
Austin, TX -
$1,795,000
1908 Goodrich Avenue #B
Austin, TX -
$650,000
210 Lee Barton Drive #305
Austin, TX -
$400,000
3806 Southridge Drive #2
Austin, TX -
$449,000
2906 S 1st Street #103
Austin, TX -
$449,000
2906 S 1st Street #104
Austin, TX -
$775,000
1303 S 5th Street
Austin, TX -
$975,000
2804 5th Street #A
Austin, TX -
$1,900,000
704 W Mary Street
Austin, TX -
$449,900
1201 Hollow Creek Drive #202
Austin, TX -
$699,000
1600 Barton Springs Road #6105
Austin, TX -
$1,100,000
2004 Wilson Street
Austin, TX -
$1,200,000
1000 Daniel Drive
Austin, TX -
$775,000
3606 Marcae Court #B
Austin, TX -
$800,000
900 S 1st Street #201
Austin, TX -
$500,000
500 E Riverside Drive #157
Austin, TX -
$1,650,000
2405 Ridgeview Street
Austin, TX -
$1,175,000
2302 Spring Creek Drive
Austin, TX
-
$1,189,000Lot Size5,838 sqft
Home Size1,056 sqft
Beds3 Beds
Baths2 Baths
-
$449,000Lot SizeN/A
Home Size1,040 sqft
BedsN/A
Baths1 Bath
-
$1,998,000Lot Size10,281 sqft
Home Size2,068 sqft
Beds4 Beds
Baths3 Baths
-
$340,000Lot Size959 sqft
Home Size650 sqft
Beds1 Bed
Baths1 Bath
-
$305,000Lot Size610 sqft
Home Size425 sqft
Beds1 Bed
Baths1 Bath
-
$925,000Lot Size5,010 sqft
Home Size1,637 sqft
Beds3 Beds
Baths3 Baths
-
$740,000Lot Size2,875 sqft
Home Size1,490 sqft
Beds2 Beds
Baths3 Baths
-
$2,000,000Lot Size6,042 sqft
Home Size2,608 sqft
Beds3 Beds
Baths3 Baths
-
$1,795,000Lot Size4,448 sqft
Home Size2,044 sqft
Beds3 Beds
Baths4 Baths
-
$650,000Lot Size349 sqft
Home Size897 sqft
Beds1 Bed
Baths1 Bath
-
$400,000Lot Size17,424 sqft
Home Size828 sqft
Beds2 Beds
Baths1 Bath
-
$449,000Lot SizeN/A
Home Size1,040 sqft
Beds1 Bed
Baths1 Bath
-
$449,000Lot SizeN/A
Home Size1,040 sqft
Beds1 Bed
Baths1 Bath
-
$775,000Lot Size2,806 sqft
Home Size666 sqft
Beds2 Beds
Baths1 Bath
-
$975,000Lot Size3,137 sqft
Home Size1,931 sqft
Beds3 Beds
Baths3 Baths
-
$1,900,000Lot Size7,362 sqft
Home Size2,052 sqft
Beds3 Beds
Baths3 Baths
-
$449,900Lot Size7,275 sqft
Home Size664 sqft
Beds1 Bed
Baths1 Bath
-
$699,000Lot Size719 sqft
Home Size1,117 sqft
Beds2 Beds
Baths2 Baths
-
$1,100,000Lot Size10,446 sqft
Home Size1,552 sqft
Beds3 Beds
Baths3 Baths
-
$1,200,000Lot Size7,584 sqft
Home Size1,464 sqft
Beds3 Beds
Baths2 Baths
-
$775,000Lot Size3,385 sqft
Home Size1,022 sqft
Beds2 Beds
Baths2 Baths
-
$800,000Lot Size806 sqft
Home Size1,253 sqft
Beds2 Beds
Baths2 Baths
-
$500,000Lot Size1,630 sqft
Home Size789 sqft
Beds2 Beds
Baths1 Bath
-
$1,650,000Lot Size11,248 sqft
Home Size1,601 sqft
Beds2 Beds
Baths2 Baths
-
$1,175,000Lot Size9,462 sqft
Home Size1,816 sqft
Beds3 Beds
Baths2 Baths
Leave a Reply