This two-story wood frame vernacular house, built about 1913 with a wide screened verandah overlooking Spring Bayou, was bought by Major Jay and Helen Hennig in 1920 when they moved to Tarpon Springs. The following year they bought the weekly newspaper, The Leader. Jay, a newspaper man from New York, had served in the Spanish-American War as a sergeant in the New York Infantry in Cuba and in France during World War I as captain of the 320th Machine Gun Battalion; after the war he was promoted to major and organized the first machine gun company for the Florida National Guard. When Jay died in 1940, Helen became editor and publisher of The Leader and remained in that position for more than 20 years. The Leader was Tarpon's source of information about the ongoing war and the community, and Helen gave free subscriptions to all Tarpon servicemen overseas. She also wrote children's books. In the 1930s, author Charles Rawlings, former husband of Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings, visited often at the Hennig home and wrote short stories about Tarpon Springs sponging. The Hennigs' daughter, Alison Moore, and her family maintain the home in its original vernacular style.