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In the opinion of the survey, this property appears to meet the criteria of the Seattle Landmarks Preservation Ordinance. |
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The North House was constructed in 1901. Edward E. North (b. 1870), the first house owner, had lived in Seattle for ten years, originally employed as a barber. In 1898, the Union Electric Company, one of the city’s numerous street car and electric companies, hired North as a lineman. In June 1901 North, listed as the builder, obtained a building permit for a 1 ½ story 36 x 20 foot house. The property was about five blocks away from the Green Lake street car line that ran down Woodland Park Ave N. By the end of 1901, North, his wife Mabel (b. 1873), and their children; a son, age 5, and a daughter, age 2, moved from Green Lake to their new house in Edgewater. By that time the Seattle Electric Company had hired North as Superintendent of Construction. Seattle Electric was in the process of buying out all 13 Seattle streetcar and electric companies.
After just a year North left Seattle Electric to work as Assistant Superintendent for the Independent Telephone Company. Telephones were slowly becoming widely used in the city, increasing from just 1,500 telephones at the beginning of 1898 to just over 6,000 phones distributed amongst the city’s businesses and 100,000 residents by early 1902. In the next two years, the number of telephones in Seattle tripled. North continued to live in the house and work for the telephone company until 1908 when he left town seeking employment elsewhere.
Later occupants. Arthur B. and wife Carolyn A. Hornbeck purchased the house in 1919, converted it into a duplex, and for about 20 years lived in one unit and rented the other. Arthur Hornbeck worked at Hamilton Junior High School as a janitor. During World War II Leon F. and Carolyn I. Miller and Lewis C. and Minnie Ackles occupied the house. By the late 1940s, there were four apartments in the building occupied by Boeing employee Robert G. and Betty J. Paulos, painter Frank and Mary Lista, American Mail Line employee Mrs Hazel R. Durant, and machine operator Edward A. and Edith A. Warwick who lived there to at least 1954. Also in 1954 serviceman Lewis A. and Lois J. Boyd and David W. and Zina Ristig rented apartments. David Ristig was a cutter at Northwest Envelope Manufacturing Company. During the 1962 Worlds Fair, two of the apartments were occupied by Safeway grocery store butcher Henry and Mary M. Dunn and Mrs. Alice M. Sloniker.
In 1975 Historic Seattle conducted a survey of the Wallingford neighborhood and listed the residence as Significant to the Community. A field survey of the residence was conducted by the 1979 Seattle Survey.
The residence appears to meet City of Seattle Landmark criteria due to the age of the structure (over 100 years old) and minimal alterations.
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