Palo Alto Stanford Heritage 1999 Holiday House Tour: Downtown North
Homes on tour:
The tour program included a list of other homes in the Downtown North area that are worth walking or drivng by.
Starting in 1988, the current owners began an extensive process of refurbishing the house. Used for many years as a duplex (side–to–side), they have restored it to a single family home and added habitable space on the second floor.
The earliest known occupants, for whom this colonial revival house probably was built, was Rufus Keeler, an electrician who worked for many years for the City of Palo Alto, and his wife Miriam. Many of the small homes in downtown north were originally built to accommodate the early working class of nascent community.
Suggestive of the Craftsman bungalow style, due to the comfortable porch and hipped roof with a wide overhang and exposed rafters, this substantial house was recently restored to a single family home. The exterior shell of the dwelling is almost exactly as it was when originally built, but the interior has been substantially redesigned, and a basement was added.
The house was originally constructed for Amos and Lydia Winsor. They retired to Palo Alto from New York state where he had been a farmer. He served as a driver for a livery stable in the earliest days of his residency in Palo Alto. Mrs. Winsor and her sister had a number of other houses built in the city, some as investments.
This vernacular cottage has Stick, Eastlake, and Colonial Revival style influences. It was built by Ellen and Charles Poole and originally occupied by two generations of the Slade family. The younger Mr. Slade owned a smoke shop and billiard parlor. When occupied by these four adults, the house fit the current footprint, but was only one story tall.
The second floor was added in 1991, carefully preserving not only materials but the qualities that make the entire house seem like it fits its environment.
This symmetrical Mission Revival design has miniature corner pavilions in the form of square corner bays and three quatre-foil windows. The recessed entrance porch has been filled in to create a foyer. This design was repeated in Palo Alto, indicating that it is a plan book design or that one builder constructed all of them.
The current owner [1999] refurbished the kitchen and rearranged closet orientation to make them more usable. A previous owner created the tiny rental unit. The great room is original. The original owner was H.P. Harrison, a salesman.
This typical Queen Anne style Victorian was built for Hannah Clapp, a remarkable educational leader in the West. Miss Clapp had purchased the entire block from Timothy Hopkins for this, her retirement home.
The interior was completely rearranged in 1985 when the house was converted to a bed–and–breakfast inn. Each guest room is named for a member of Queen Victoria's family and now has a private bath.
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