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Palo Alto Historic Buildings Inventory

1808 Waverley Street


Inventory photo	Photo taken October 14, 2013

The following is from the Historic Buildings Inventory as revised in 1985:

Physical appearance: Spanish Colonial Revival and Monterey Revival styles are combined in this two-story stucco house. Walled and landscaped gardens surround the house and enhance it.

Significance: This is a fine example of the freedom with which Spanish Colonial revival designs mix the separate phases of the style. the first owner was Professor Gilbert M. and Mrs. Helen Smith (1929 - 1959). Smith was a botanist on the Stanford faculty from 1911 to retirement in 1950; president of various scientific societies.

Byron A. Whittaker and his wife Geraldine owned the house 1961 - 1967. Whittaker was a salesman in several Palo Alto and Santa Clara County stores, one of the original stockholders of the Stanford bank, a photographer, and an active participant in local theatre groups.

Succeeding the Whittakers for a decade were Jonathan and Helen Gifford; Gifford is an architect. The owner at the time of the Inventory was Mary K. Fry.

This house was built in 1927 and is a Category 4 on the Historic Buildings Inventory. The builder was S. A. Born building Co. The property measures 96 by 100 feet.

Sources: Palo Alto City Directories; Palo Alto Times 10/14/27, 3/24/39, 1/1/77; Who's Who, Smith, G.M,; interview 1985, Jonathan Gifford

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