Early on, we were joined by Sarah Mullane, who lives in North Tonawanda, New York. Many of the famous designs were commandeered from other sources and/or purchased from architects but given just enough change to be advertised as their own. took off, many builders started offering everything from ready-made prehab homes to foundations and blueprints. Cities with large numbers of documented Sears Modern Homes include: The Carlinville, Illinois, concentration consists of houses bought in bulk by the Standard Oil Company in 1918 to house its mineworkers at a total cost of about US $1 million. 171 examples in La Porte. 2) Look for shipping labels. national database of sears homes - dowdcreative.com Measuring in at a roomy 3,500 square feet, the . Identifying Sears Homes has become a pastime among history enthusiasts because of their sturdy structure, the do-it-yourself nature of construction, and the popular architectural design concepts. [37] Similiar references are made to boyhood homes of Richard Nixon and Warren Buffett. Thanks! The company was forced to liquidate $11 million in defaulted debt. We certainly imagine that the houses have been retro-fitted with one, at this point. If any of you have ever been interested in coming to see me do a kit home So, they are likely from Sears. Once again true to the companys roots, youre more apt to find Sears catalog homes still standing in former factory towns of the Midwest. 159 examples that have a closed pediment in the gable (and a porch style difference). The house forms part of the farmstead at the museum.[40]. Determining which company manufactured a particular catalog and kit home may require additional research to determine the origin of that home. Stevenson, Katherine Cole, and Jandl, H. Ward, (1995), Davis, Michael W.R. and Schweitzer, Robert (1990), This page was last edited on 4 March 2023, at 21:18. PDF See the video of my interview on the St. Louis Business Journal's website. Thank you for visiting! Rockstar, Consistent Trees, and Baryon Mass data from the Generation 3 and Generation 6 VELA Simulations. She said she didnt know the house was built from a kit ordered from a catalog until after she bought it. 920 North Madison Avenue, Anderson, Indiana Asking: $379,900 Sears Roebuck Model: Elmhurst Year Built: 1932 Listing Agent: Julie Armington Listing Brokerage: F.C. But Matthew has a way of pulling everything together and spitting out a coherent comparative analysis with visuals that helps us see what we hadn't noticed previously. As sales grew, Sears expanded its production, shipping, and sales offices to locations across the U.S. To provide the materials needed for the Modern Homes division, Sears operated a lumber mill in Cairo, Illinois. Michigan, Indiana, and New Jersey have large overall numbers, as well. No built examples have been found of some of the least popular models. Some models were offered in both wood siding and brick veneer versions with different names attributed to the same or almost identical home plan. Interested in hearing about Rose's near-death experience? I'm currently working my way through the Burlington County records, but they are limited, and set up in a way that makes the process very time consuming. More than 100 years of stories, product and brand histories, photographs, catalog images and more are now available online. Im looking at this cute little. Simply put, life was rougher. Theres a whole checklist of signs to look for, such as stamped lumber in the basement or attic, shipping labels on the baseboards and other millwork, or even looking up your deed and records pertaining to the actual home purchase. Images of Sears Homes Years later, the sales records related to home sales were destroyed during a corporate house cleaning. national database of sears homes42 ft gibson houseboat. The two-story schoolhouse was priced at $11,500 and its design included six classrooms, a library, an auditorium, and a superintendent's office. Many of these post 1940 homes were based on models from the 1940 and earlier Sears catalogs but not all were, leading to debate over whether these homes qualify as "Sears Modern Homes". that ranged from simple and rustic to utterly decadent. Another old model found predominantly in that Lakeview area, was the. Whitehouse. Complete List of Sears Homes | Aurora, IL We could make the assumption that the model we have located the most was, in fact, the top seller. Their blueprints were based on what was popular at the time and while they werent the first or only company to do mail-order houses, theyre among the most memorable because you could buy damn near anything in their 500+ page catalogs. We maintain the National Database of Sears Houses in the U.S., where we add new finds, almost daily. CNDDB Maps and Data. How do we know another house didn't outsell the Argyle after 1931? According to the US Census, there were about 88.7 million people living in the United States. Sears Homes 1908-1914 Thousands of developments in cities, suburbs, and exurbs have sprung up since with a seemingly endless amount of homes that were built between World War II and today. At one point, I realized that I needed to organize a list of online catalog resources, so I put together this blog post, which has links to catalogs not only from Daily Bungalow and AntiqueHome, but to the many catalogs uploaded on another key resource, Archive.org (have you donated lately?). Philadelphia Inquirer: Sears Homes In the Philly Suburbs and Sears Ruth's Beauty Parlor: A Sears No. Because these homes were constructed using pre-cut lumber and plans provided by Sears, these homes can be considered to be "Sears Modern Homes". Argyles also have a tendency to hide. Sears Houses In the U.S. national database of sears homescalgary police organizational chart. Sears mail-order house kits can often be identified by the shipping labels that were placed on the backside of trim. Here is one of the eleven examples in La Porte: This early version of the No. Photo from Realtor site. by . We have three on our list in Glenside -- one on Cedar, one on Tyson, and one on Edge Hill Rd. Thats cheaper than many tiny houses and with space to actually breathe and have more than one person live with you without wanting to kill each other. By the time of the 1914 catalog, the model had been tweaked, to add the peak gable, closed pediment pop-up dormer over the upper bay windows. 2023 Trib Total Media | All Rights Reserved. I just loved the look of it, she said. Given the more disposable nature of shipping container homes and the portability granted by some tiny houses, its kind of sad in a way that this current crop of Internet-order homes is not only not as simple or affordable as it was yesteryear, but also carries less permanence compared to these mail-order houses. How did Sears Modern Homes come to be? In late 1930, sales of Searshomes were starting to tank. Sears is estimated to have sold about 70,000 of their home building kits from 1908-1940 and it's currently estimated that about 70% of the original Sears homes built from kits are still standing today. Additionally, at this point in the Sears Modern Homes program, the homes were sold/packaged only with standard-length wood, so none of the framing lumber would have been pre-cut (and, therefore, there would be no alpha-numeric stamps on the wood pieces in the house). 4120 Adams St., Gary, IN. If your house was built between 1908-1940, theres a chance it might be an original Sears house. Sears Lewiston: A Sears Model Home in New Jersey - Sears House Seeker Original paperwork for the house including blueprints and letters of correspondence from Sears. 168 (Matoka): Here is the catalog image of the No. However, the streets that are lined with these farmhouse models (and many other houses), are actually in the Lakeview neighborhood so, we imagine that was a mistake in the article. This label was discovered in a Sears Silverdale model home built in 1911 in Northhampton, Mass., by Judith Chabots grandparents. Here are a few: Andrew just today noticed this brick house with the Sears curlicue decorative iron strapping (only offered by Sears, and the only style of iron strapping ever offered by Sears). BMO Celebrates Kickoff of the 2023 Soccer Season at 'BMO Stadium' in Los Angeles Modern Stilt Home Featured in Heat (Listed for $1.599 Million), International House Flipper Alex Camacho Makes $80k Profit on One House Flip, Bugsy Siegel Murder Mansion in Beverly Hills Flats (Listed for $17 Million), Zsa Zsa Gabors Pink Palm Springs Palace (Listed for $3.8 Million), 35 Kitchen Breakfast Bars The Latest In Casual Kitchen Dining. According to the catalog image, both models have only a partial porch at the front of the house. within a fe A very special, authenticated Aladdin home just hit the market in Takoma "The Sears Homes of Illinois" has more than 200 color photos of the most popular designs that Sears offered and can be very helpful in identifying Sears Homes. 181 (264P181) in the 1914 Sears Modern Homes catalog, This image is from the 1913 Sears Modern Homes catalog re-print, available, 374 Hawthorne Street, La Porte, Indiana Sears Modern Home No. Spatial information is available through GIS downloads or can be viewed in the BIOS Viewer. This site is a tribute to the original Sears Houses in Cincinnati Here is the Uriel or Conway at 408 Bond Street. Not all Sears houses became private residences. I've always seen this one in the catalogs, and thought it was kind of ungainly in proportions, but we hadn't found one before this one this is a pretty good match, though not perfect, but, in the days before pre-cut, we are more likely to see some modifications to the models. Andrew Mutch ran across that same article in the American Lumberman, and posted in our group, asking if anyone was interested in looking for some of the old models that might be around. You can contact Tony by email at tlarussa@triblive.com or via Twitter . In this case, the problem was that we couldn't see the left side of these models, just by looking at the catalog and the floor plans. The Greenview/No. Powered by, This September 2017 article in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, this short video story by the Washington Post. Shipping label image from my mother's family's 1911 Sears No. I think the reason the Sears house is so interesting is that most people associate them with the Wish Book catalog that came in the mail at Christmas. Square . Dover, Chateau, and Lexington models are particularly plentiful there! Many of the smaller models are regularly torn down. 168 / Matoka: I am really (really!) | Sears Modern Homes", "Sears Houses in Arlington Virginia: A Comprehensive List", "How Sears built an entire local neighborhood", "Historic Structures Crystal Lake Historical Society", "Sears Houses in Elgin Illinois arranged according to model name", "Philadelphia Inquirer: Sears Homes in the Philly Suburbs and Sears House Hunters", "Where are the rest of the Sears houses in the U.S.? When the tiny house movement took off, many builders started offering everything from ready-made prehab homes to foundations and blueprints. Molly Harbst of Munhall sent along photos of her beautifully preserved Sears homes a 1920 model called The Crescent after reading the article. Their blueprints were based on what was popular at the time and while they werent the first or only company to do mail-order houses, theyre among the most memorable because you could buy damn near anything in their 500+ page catalogs. Many of the homes original features remain intact. 171's porch roof (when it is a partial porch) connects to the house far to the right side of that upper window and then has a wedge-shape side part to that roof, so that both models end the porch just to the edge of the front door, but with a very different treatment to the shape of the porch roof there. We have just over 200 Sears houses on our list, that came from Rebecca's research project in Elgin (it also included kit houses from other companies, that she was able to identify -- we've added those to our lists for those companies, as well). Catarina is quite well informed about Sears houses in the D.C. area, but also has researched the origins of many of the Lewis Homes kit homes in the area. The group has identified 2,700 Sears homes in Ohio and 2,300 in Illinois. 4120 Adams St., Gary, IN. The houses made it as far as Alaska and Canada, as the parts were delivered by railroad. See that curled element at the hinge edge? 324 W Johnson Road Sears Jewel, Jewell, or Wilmore (depends on the year). One of the things that Marie has done for us, is to perfectly describe our search for Sears houses, as a "badass hobby" that is akin to a "huge historical treasure hunt". Because lets get real: affordable ranchers were only for CERTAIN veterans, Government spending was dedicated to housing in an unprecedented manner as the mantra was driven home that the ideal was a nuclear family in a 3-bedroom. However, many houses described as Sears Homes are not true Sears Homes, being either the product of another kit home manufacturer or not a kit home at all. So, I'll just post a nice selection here. Sears Lewiston: A Sears Model Home in New Jersey Authenticated Sears Lewiston 261 N. Jackson St., North Plainfield, NJ 1929 This great-looking Sears Lewiston was built in 1929, and used as a model home for Sears after it was built by Anthony P. Raffaniello, and his wife, Helena. 118 In Columbia, Where are the Sears Houses - February 2023 Edition, The Strange Case of the Wandering Bungalow, DC House Cat Chiming In - Historic Mail-Order Homes, Same Name, Different House Part 2 - From Aurora to the Elmwood, 1926 Sears Special Supplement from AntiqueHome.org. sub 2:15 half marathon training plan; national database of sears homes. that was $886 in 1940 dollars, about $16,000 today. Homes built after 1916 can be identified as Sears kit homes by numbers stamped on the timbers. Sears Modern Homes While researching the property, Harbst learned it was among the first homes built in the boroughs Homestead Park neighborhood. [34], Like the Standard Addition in Carlinville, neighborhoods of Sears houses still hold a sense of identity and community. Kmart History | Search Archives | Sears Holdings Alumni | sears.com | kmart.com : Thursday, Mar. Click to visit. Author, researcher and lecturer Rebecca Hunter became fascinated with the phenomenon of mail order homes in 1996, and is currently engaged in the study of kit homes and agricultural buildings marketed from 1906-1982 by nine different companies. national database of sears homes - thenscaa.com But before all this, having to get your own home built was more common instead of getting on a waitlist for a HUD-subsidized tract home or buying one secondhand from the current occupant. The houses, comprising eight models, were all built in a 12-block area known as the Standard Addition. There were about 132 million people by the time Sears stopped selling Sears Modern Homes kits in 1940. . Originally marketed as the. Thousands of developments in cities, suburbs, and exurbs have sprung up since with a seemingly endless amount of homes that were built between World War II and today. You can find catalog images for these models, in the links on the table at the end of this blog post: Also on W Johnson Road, we have new information from Nancy, who contacted me to let me know that she grew up in the Sears house shown below, a Sears. Sears licensed the plans for the Argyle from a. real estate builder/developer named Jud Yoho. contacting them by clicking on their name. Cities that have records of building permits may list Sears, Roebuck as the original architect. You usually just left with the clothes on your back and a few trunks, and that was it. Either way, these houses offered variety and quality even if they werent necessarily innovative. The Sears Argyle was a small house, about 1,000 square feet, and many of them have been demolished. But it was a different story when Sears began selling house building kits in 1908. The larger Victorian-style houses that were already there and scant in number were out of reach for working class first-time home buyers. Documented Sears houses have been found across the United States and in a few locations in Canada. The next housing boom came after World War II so that veterans could have affordable housing for their families and suburbs could accommodate the massive amount of white flight taking place. In the early years, the models were identified with numbers. some ch Don't miss this never before seen catalog from Sears. There havent been any major structural changes, she said. Finally, if you really want to understand the basics of what a Sears Modern Homes kit house is, and what it is not, you might find this blog post of mine to be helpful and informative. Although it is sometimes claimed that no Sears kit homes were built after 1940, Sears continued to offer pre-cut kit homes through 1941 and into early 1942. Im looking at this cute little Cape Cod that was $886 in 1940 dollars, about $16,000 today. Sears's use of "balloon style" framing systems did not require a team of skilled carpenters, as did previous methods. Before 1916, the home builder had to cut their Sears-supplied lumber to appropriate lengths. website, which was published from Oct 2013 to Nov 2014. Later, Sears constructed a second mill in Port Newark, New Jersey and purchased the Norwood Sash and Door Company in Norwood, Ohio. small-town America even into the 1940 census). Sears Homes Enthusiasts Weve got so much fucking housing just sitting there that NO ONE should be condemned to homelessness. Stamped lumber: Most easily found in unfinished spaces like a basement or attic, framing members were stamped with a letter and a number. Tasty Soft Garlic and Herb Bread Sticks Recipe How to Make it in 23 Simple Steps, Villa Faberge! She said she also didnt know it was a mail-order house when she bought it 14 years ago. Beginning in 1916, the catalogs showed an additional floor plan that did have a bathroom: The rest of the examples of Sears houses in La Porte, that we have found to date, are one-off examples, so were probably individual purchases by the original homeowner, or a few spec houses by the realty company mentioned in the American Lumberman article. Park, MD. Some of the models are easier to identify visually and their counts may be disproportionately high. Whatever Happened to Those Mail-Order Houses From the Sears Catalog? national database of sears homes. Thanks to Ancestry.com, we are often able to get a street name from a census record, but we run into problems there, when we find a town that has no street names (yes! Sears Modern Homes are something we totally need to bring back from the past for this. Sears offered 370 models over the 32 years it sold houses by catalog. Designs may have been modified but generally should match in layout and dimensions. CNDDB Maps and Data - California Department of Fish and Wildlife Ohio, Michigan, and Illinois in particular are your best bet for finding Sears homes although Newark, New Jersey apparently still has a couple. While seeing a bunch of Sears homes jammed together in a cookie cutter suburb wasnt a very common sight in the 1930s and 40s, they still got knocked together like IKEA furniture compared to building a home from scratch.