Shotgun Houses in the U.S.

A shotgun house is a narrow rectangular residence, usually no more than about 12 feet (3.5 m) wide, with rooms arranged one behind the other and doors at each end of the house. It was the most popular style of house in the Southern United States from the end of the American Civil War (1861–65) through the 1920s, and may have originated in Haiti.

A grey shingled shotgun house with a front garden and red door in Capitol Hill, Arkansas.

A shotgun house in Capitol Hill, Arkansas.

There are many large neighborhoods in older American cities of the south which still contain a high concentration of shotgun houses today, including the Third Ward in Houston, Texas; Bywater in New Orleans, Louisiana; The Hill in St. Louis, Missouri; Portland, Butchertown, and Germantown in Louisville, Kentucky; and Cabbagetown in Atlanta, Georgia.

Click the states below to explore shotgun houses across the United States:

Alabama  Arkansas  California  Colorado  Florida  Georgia  Illinois

Indiana  Kansas  Kentucky  Louisiana  Mississippi  Missouri  Montana

New Mexico  New York  Nevada  North Carolina  Ohio  Oklahoma

Oregon  Pennsylvania  North Carolina  South Carolina  Tennessee

Texas  Utah  Virginia  Washington  Washington DC  West Virginia  Wyoming

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