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| This is 801 W. Charles St., a side view, taken while looking West at the intersection of Charles and Mound streets. It took me another few days after this blog to discover my across-the-street neighbor won the Mary Frances Abel award for Best Restoration work in Christmas 1993. I didn't know that, when I picked it to be first, to showcase on my blog. I liked it best! |
Copyright Oct. 31, 2015
See this beauty? I live almost right across from it. I look out at this gigantic home nearly every day, wondering how I got so blessed. This scenic wonder, beautifully painted in gold and contrasting colors, didn't just happen. It has a history -- of folk who (over the centuries) bought and decorated it, made choices, and called it their home. Decisions had to have included everything from functionality to outdoor landscaping.
In 2012, a Ball State University project, titled "Historic Muncie: Preserving Middletown's Neighborhoods," dated this house across the street from my residence to 1900. So many questions remain.
Who are the Bauers? How many generations of Bauers lived in the house? What are their stories, and how did these affect Muncie? The Ball State project focused on architectural styles. I am interested in people. Of course, that assignment is just a bit more complex. I lack the grants that funded Ball State's project at present, and its wonderful treasure-trove of architecture students and professors, and cinematographers. While I have no wish (or ability) to be as comprehensive, I believe the narrative piece, begun with such excellence, might be able to go a bit deeper.
Surely there are historic stories still waiting to be unearthed. And it's fun to speculate. Researching the name, Bauer, for example, I came across the Star Press obituary of "Patricia A. Bauer," a 1947 Muncie Central High School graduate who passed away this February (2015) at age 85. Was she perchance related to our heroes in my neighboring gold house?
Born in 1929, Patricia was preceded in death not only by two infant siblings, William and Edna Heldenbrand (whose name matches, I think, my previous Muncie landlord), but by a granddaughter, Natalie Rose Ferrebee.
Without yet joining Ancestry.com, a quick look turned up a Natalie Ferrebee from Grant (probably County), Indiana, who evidently died at birth in June 1987. If she had lived, she would be 28 years old today. That's probably about the right age for a granddaughter. Grant County is of course home to Marion and Gas City, and tinier towns like Fairmount, a scant 30 miles and 40 minutes away, if that. Miss Ferrebee could certainly have been genealogically connected.
Still, there's another Natalie Ferrebee that popped up as well, located in Dunkirk, Ind., or Jay County. That's super close -- just 17.3 miles north of Muncie, between Royerton and Albany. This Natalie lived until December 1969 but was born on Dec. 18, 1898.
Here's why I find that early date exceedingly interesting. The older Natalie lived to 71 years old, but if she were living today, would be 117 years old. Her age would mean she was alive during the heyday of Muncie's "boom" (population explosion) soon after natural gas was first discovered as a resource.
Now, our city was platted (mapped out?) as a trading post between the Delaware Nation and white settlers in 1827. It incorporated in 1865. Indiana's Gas Boom didn't arrive until the 1880s, jumping the town's population from 5,000 to 20,000, and turning Muncie into a burgeoning center for industrial manufacture.
Whoever wrote the narratives of "Historic Muncie," I pay the history piece this compliment, of sounding at times almost poetic. Here is her (somehow I feel it had to have been a woman) matter-of-fact conclusion about my own street:
"Charles Street is one of the more elegant streets containing outstanding examples of the architecture of prosperous turn-of-the-century residents."
The narrative explains that Old West End District, where I lived, became a predominantly middle-class neighborhood, a favorite of newly wealthy industrialists, business leaders, and even office workers and laborers. "Historic Muncie" writes:
"The rapid growth of the city during the period 1886-1910 following the
discovery of natural gas saw the construction of homes in the district
(Old West End) for members of the city's oldest families, the expanding middle class,
and the gas boom "nouveau riche."
Many of these built their own beautiful houses. The
report attributes the popularity of the Old West End for these upscale
groups as due to its proximity to the White River, but also, its
closeness to the downtown business district. A last comment:
"A large number of homes were constructed along the West End's tree-lined
street reflecting the taste of these residents for various forms of
Victorian architecture."
Old
West End represents Victorian sensibilities in our district's Gothic Revival church (Friends Memorial at 418 W. Adams), Classical Byzantine
Revival-style Jewish synagogue (Temple Beth El at 525 W. Jackson), and houses ranging from Dutch
Colonial to Italianate to American Foursquare and Bungalow styles.
Prominent residents included:
R.M. Ball, entrepreneur, who built his Queen Anne home at 822 West Charles Street. Now, none of the famous Ball Brothers nor their sisters nor their parents had the initials of R.M., so to me, this connection is still unclear. But "Historic Muncie" credits R.M.'s family with manufacture of wire fence. His brothers (they were four) moved in 1901 and in time became officers in several businesses. These included Indiana Steel and Wire, Muncie Gas and Engine and Supply Company, and Kitselman Brothers, a name also associated with several historic homes, including its immediate neighbor, 805 W. Charles Street, the stunning tan structure right across from our apartment house.
My neighbor's home down the street (822 W. Charles) became the property of Joseph G. Leffler at some point; thus its name of "Leffler House." A descendant of one of Muncie's pioneer families, Leffler had lived at first on the City's east side. Moving to Muncie was Judge Leffler's chance to start a new law practice, become an activist for Republican politics and eventually win a seat as a circuit court judge.
Of the Ball / Leffler house, "Historic Muncie" wrote:
"That two and one-half
story Queen Anne structure is remarkably intact, even to the decorative
balustrade surrounding the widow's walk."
It is intact, and here is the evidence. While retaining its historic character, Muncie has continued to revise and update itself, proving its story is still being told. Take a look what 822 W. Charles, just three houses down on the same side as my home, looked like until just recently:
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| 822 West Charles Street, until its most recent renovation, below. |
R.M. Ball's and Joseph Leffler's house was so colorfully, inventively redone, I could not help making it the lead picture on my blog -- even before I knew its history! I love that this Old West End house dates back so far; evidently Leffler renovated Ball's house in 1891.
As for the Ball Brothers -- the ones who owned much of Muncie, whose legacy began the university, the hospital, industry, and the philanthropic tradition to whom I owe so much debt -- they arrived about the same time. Wiki has these famous brothers arriving from New York in 1885, having begun their canning jar company just five years before.
The well-known philanthropist / industrial tycoon siblings were (here we go): Lucina Amelia, Lucius Lorenzo, William Charles, Edmund Burke, Frank Clayton, Mary Frances, George Alexander, and Clinton Harvey (who died in childbirth). The family came to Muncie after discovering Indiana had an abundance of natural gas; their first factory opened in 1888.
I will be, as time passes, mentioning other famous Old West Enders and hopefully finding some of their stories. But, a few names who lived on Charles Street, based on "Historic Munce":
* C. Maitlan Kitselman, treasurer of Indiana Steel and Wire. He built 805 W. Charles St., an "elegant two and one-half story brick home" in 1908. That is the house directly across the street from mine.
* George R. Andrews, a physician and manager of L. P. Lake Company. He resided in 422 W. Charles St. in 1889, a carpenter-built house. Dr. Andrews was the grandson of Goldsmith Gilbert, one of the county's first settlers, and also, donor of the northern portion of the district (the original platted land) to the incorporated City. His wife, Erica J. Daughtery, was descended a prominent founding family in Muncie.
* The First Church of Christ Scientist, 326 W. Charles St., was designed by Cuno Kibele Kibele, an architect responsible for several other distinguished buildings in Muncie. He and a man named Garrard designed Masonic Temple at, 520 E. Main St. and the P. K. Morrison residence, 714 E. Washington St., in a Craftsman-influenced style.
Muncie's depth of history, reflected in its historic architecture, is truly staggering. People living in each of these homes, whether well-known or not, influenced Indiana's present.
Who knows? Maybe the past is somehow connected to our own futures as well.
While I hope to grasp a far more narrative style, I did rewrite this first blog to reflect some of the depth already being grasped in venues such as the Star Press "Hidden Gems" series (which features one famous structure in each article), in the Historic Preservation and Rehabilitation Commission maps, and in the City of Muncie's Redevelopment Commission, which has begun to fight back to preserve what is uniquely special about Muncie.
I liked the Redevelopment Commission's graphic, which shows at a glance some of the styles that can be found on the Old West End. With this link, and my apologies, I include their brochure of detailing my neighborhood's magnificent styles.
http://www.cityofmuncie.com/boards-historic-preservation-rehabilitation-commission-muncie.htm
People living in these homes had lives that influenced Indiana's present. Who knows? Maybe the past is somehow linked to our own futures as well.
