1926 Bowersox House

The photograph above, showing the Hinges-Kimble house as it looked originally on Summer Street in the 1930s, is our only clue to the original appearance of the Bowersox house, just beyond it on Chemeketa Street. In this photograph, the profile of the front of the Bowersox house is at the right margin of the picture.
In 1926, Mr. Frank G. Bowersox and his wife Lillian lived here at 876 Chemeketa Street. He was a grocer with the Carl and Bowersox business establishment at 383 Court Street.
Mr. Dick Buren, whose family lived on Summer Street when he was a child, recently recalled seeing the house pictured below being moved north past his house in about 1937-9. Since this was the period of time when the State Library was being constructed, it must have come from the same block as the Huntington and Baumgartner homes. It has now been identified.
It is hard to reconcile this 776 Shipping Street house with the original since the typical front porch was removed for transporting the house over 70 years ago. The present owner appreciates this fine old house, built for another family and another neighborhood.

1926 Baumgartner House

This dignified house at 1160 Summer Street has has been moved progressively north three times over the last 70+ years. "Maybe it's trying to get out of town!" its owner says.
Joel Baumgartner was a young teller at the Ladd and Bush Bank in 1900 and there are many photographs of him, his wife Ada and daughters Lenta and Josephine, in the Bush family photograph collection. He was listed as a Hop Dealer living at this house, 208 Winter Street, in 1926. The date of construction is not known.
In 1937, the North Capitol Mall's first state building, the Oregon State Library, was planned for this location. It stood as the third house north of the Thomas Kay residence (on the northeast corner of Court and State) and that of his daughter and son-in-law, Hollis Huntington. The Kay residence was demolished, perhaps because Mrs. Kay was a widow and was willing to sell it to the state for that purpose. (She moved to 260 Washington Street, the former home of Mr. Ulysses Shipley.)
The Huntington house was purchased from the state in 1937 and moved north to 790 Winter Street. The Baumgartner house was also purchased from the state and was moved to 785 Summer street. As the North Capitol Mall continued to expand, this house stood where the North Capitol Mall Office Building was to be constructed. In the 1980s, it was moved again, this time to its present address.