PLEASE HELP KEEP CHS PAYWALL-FREE!
Subscribe to CHS to help us pay writers and photographers to cover the neighborhood. CHS is a pay what you can community news site with no required sign-in or paywall. Become a subscriber to help us cover the neighborhood for as little as $5 a month.

 

The grand American Foursquare on 14th Ave E near E Roy, thanks to the clearcutting of Capitol Hill, once had an even grander view. It has waited 116 years to be considered for Seattle landmark protections. Now remembered as the Caroline E. Horton House, one of the remaining unprotected chunks of Capitol Hill’s Millionaire’s Row will finally come before the Seattle Landmarks Preservation Board later this month. (UPDATE: Corrected the location mistake. Sorry for the error — that’s what I get from reporting from memory and not looking at a map!)

The old home’s nomination from its most recent owners comes as the Millionaire’s Row neighborhood stretching along 14th Ave E from Volunteer Park won federal recognition — and the protections and tax implications it entails — on the National Register of Historic Places last year.

While many of the now multimillion dollar homes along the street have won landmark status for their immaculate condition as examples of classic Seattle turn of the century architecture, 627 14th Ave E’s story is about the woman who had it built.

From the nomination report — the full packet is embedded below at the end of this article:

The Caroline E. Horton House, located at 627 Fourteenth Avenue East, was built in 1906 by Caroline Horton, the daughter of Dexter Horton, one of Seattle’s most prominent white pioneers. Her father established the first banking establishment in the Puget Sound region, some claim the entire Washington territories,1 and is credited for helping Seattle grow from a settlement into a city. Around the time of the Great Seattle Fire, Dexter Horton sold his bank, and focused on rebuilding parts of the commercial core of the city with the proceeds. After Caroline Horton completed her undergraduate and graduate degrees as an early student at the University of Washington, she became her father’s trusted bookkeeper, working closely with him, as well as learning and assisting in the business. After Dexter Horton’s death in 1904, Caroline Horton became an heiress and ran her father’s large real estate concerns. She built the Caroline Horton House, and moved there with Arabella Horton, Dexter Horton’s third wife, and Eliza Hammond, the niece of Dexter Horton’s first wife. Since Caroline was the daughter of Dexter Horton’s second wife, all three of his marriages were represented in her house. The Caroline Horton House is associated with the Dexter Horton family more than any other house still standing.

Just how difficult was it to be a woman in the financial world of early 20th century Seattle? When her father Dexter Horton died, Caroline had to take on the title of secretary for her father’s company despite her education and know how while she watched her brother Charles Horton, “a man who had been recently working for Dexter Horton as a janitor in the New York Building,” be named president. Still, the nomination credits Caroline with leading the project to create the Dexter Horton Building, “one of Seattle’s most celebrated commercial structures.”

The story of the 14th Ave E home’s place in Caroline Horton’s life and the story of a prominent Seattle business woman might have to do the heavy lifting if the house is to move forward in the landmarks process. While its exterior is considered “amazingly intact” according to a Seattle survey of historical properties conducted in the 1970s, its present condition includes its transformation decades ago into apartments. The old house — also known in the neighborhood as the Mary and Martha Hall for its time serving as “a boarding house for young girls, run by St. Marks Church.” — is now considered a sixplex.

If it does join Seattle’s landmarks program and win protections of its 116-year-old architecture, the old home will have plenty of company. There are a dozen more designated City of Seattle landmarks located within a quarter-mile radius.

The Caroline E. Horton House nomination will be held April 20th. If it is approved, a second designation meeting will take place 30 to 60 days later. The Seattle City Council will then have to approve the designation.

Seattle’s Landmarks Preservation Board will consider the nomination of Caroline Horton House at 627 14th Avenue E on Wednesday, April 20, 2022 at 3:30 p.m. The meeting will be held virtually. Meeting participation is limited to access by the WebEx meeting link or the telephone call-in line that will be provided in the agenda posted to our website one week prior to the meeting.

The public is invited to participate in the virtual meeting and make comments regarding the nomination. You may sign up to address the Landmarks Preservation Board for up to 2 minutes on matters on this agenda. Speakers must be registered to be recognized by the Chair/Board staff. Online registration will begin two hours before the 3:30 p.m. meeting start time, and registration will end at the start of the Board meeting. Members of the public who wish to speak can either use the call-in number or use the WebEx link in the meeting agenda. The agenda for this meeting will be sent one week prior to the meeting, and will be posted on the Seattle Department of Neighborhoods website.

Written comments are also accepted and should be received by the Landmarks Preservation Board by 3:30 p.m. on April 19, 2022. Written comments can be submitted:

Via email: [email protected]

Via US Mail: Seattle Landmarks Preservation Board, Seattle Department of Neighborhoods, PO Box 94649, Seattle WA 98124-4649

A copy of the Landmark Nomination is posted on the Seattle Department of Neighborhoods website under the heading of “Current Nominations.”

A landmark nomination provides a physical description of the building, object, or site, and information on its history, current and historic photos, site plans, maps, drawings, and more. To learn about the nomination and designation process, visit our webpage.

UPDATE: The nomination report includes a discussion of racist redlining on Capitol Hill.

I am NOT the "well, actually" guy in this! The nomination packet actually well, actually-ed the racist covenant topic for this proposed Hill landmark https://t.co/CPBHdY4ciy pic.twitter.com/NSIdesy7ce

— jseattle (@jseattle) April 4, 2022

PLEASE HELP KEEP CHS PAYWALL-FREE!
Subscribe to CHS to help us pay writers and photographers to cover the neighborhood. CHS is a pay what you can community news site with no required sign-in or paywall. Become a subscriber to help us cover the neighborhood for as little as $5 a month.