“There’s a lot of history in this house,” said Janet Dougherty, who continues to live in the farmhouse where her late husband, Jim, grew up.

The farmhouse, which was built around 1885, came into the family when Jim Dougherty’s paternal grandparents, Charles and Myrtle Dougherty, moved there with their children, Glenn and Gladys. The Doughertys bought the 160-acre farm on Feb. 15, 1909, for $93.75 per acre from the Sheehy family, who had lived there for a number of years.

The house has witnessed the full spectrum of life. In 1925, Myrtle’s father, a Civil War veteran named Henry C. Nicholson, died of natural causes in the east bedroom upstairs. On Nov. 26, 1938, Myrtle’s grandson Jack was born in a first-floor bedroom north of the living room.

“My mother-in-law, Katherine, had gone to a doctor’s appointment that day, but the doctor thought it would be a few days before the baby was born,” said Dougherty, who moved into the farmhouse in 1973 following her 1971 marriage to Katherine’s oldest son, Jim.

Jack was born later that day at home.

“Katherine and her husband, Glenn, dressed Jack and put him in the oven at a low temperature with the door open to help warm him up,” said Dougherty, who noted that Katherine was a registered nurse.

The Dougherty family’s traditional, Midwestern farmhouse reflects a distinctive style of Victorian architecture. The so-called L-house evolved out of an innate understanding of Mother Nature, economic circumstances and the industrial revolution.

While Iowa’s settlers lived in log cabins or sod houses when they first came to the prairie, they often built wood-frame homes after their farms started generating a profit. Many Iowa farmhouses like the Dougherty home didn’t start out as large as they are today. They were often built with just a few rooms. As the farm prospered, the farm family expanded their home by adding on a new room at right angles to the original house, leading to the classic L-shape that was common in late 19th-century, Midwestern farm houses.

The westward growth of the railroads made it easier to ship building materials such as lumber and shingles from mills and factories in eastern Iowa and the eastern United States. When the Chicago and North Western Railroad expanded to Lake City in 1881, this created jobs and led to a house building boom in the area.

L-shaped homes like the Dougherty house rarely featured amenities like built-in cabinets or elaborate staircases. Sometimes, though, the farm family would splurge on accents like ornate door hinges and door knobs, a stained-glass window, gingerbread trim on the porch, or a bay window, like the one in the Dougherty’s living room.

Most L-shaped farmhouses contained four distinct spaces, including a kitchen, a living area, bedrooms and porches for cross ventilation through the house ­– a summer necessity during the days before air conditioning. The Dougherty home includes porches on the south and east sides of the home. Both were open-air porches before the family enclosed the east one decades ago and expanded the south, screened-in porch about 40 years ago.

Through the years, many other modifications have modernized the Dougherty home, which was built before electricity, indoor plumbing and running water were common in Iowa farmhouses. The northwest, upstairs bedroom, for example, was converted to a bathroom after the home was retrofitted for indoor plumbing years ago.

The house has served the Dougherty family well for four generations.

“I appreciate this home,” said Dougherty, who raised her children, Darcy and Jason, there. “It’s comfortable.”