Ridgewood Historic District
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Ridgewood Historic District | |
 French Norman Revival Home in Ridgewood, Canton, Ohio | |
  Location in Ohio  Location in United States | |
| Location | Canton, Stark County, Ohio |
|---|---|
| Coordinates | 40°49′18″N 81°22′14″W / 40.82167°N 81.37056°W |
| Area | 2.5 sq mi (6.5 km2) |
| Built | 1918 |
| Architectural style | Colonial, Tudor Revival |
| NRHP reference No. | 82001489 |
| Added to NRHP | December 19, 1982 |
The Ridgewood Historic District is a residential neighborhood in Canton, Ohio.[1][2] The neighborhood consists of preserved, architect-designed Revival style buildings built in the early 20th century with amenities such as original brick streets and locally produced street lighting standards.[3] The District features homes designed by several distinguished architects, including Charles Firestone,[4] Herman Albrecht,[5] and Louis Hoicowitz.[6] Due to its historic architectural significance, the District was added to the U.S. National Register of Historic Places on December 19, 1982.[7][8]
The Ridgewood Historic District is an area of residential buildings extending east and west of Market Avenue North, a major north-south artery, in the City of Canton approximately 20 blocks from the center of town.[9] A series of three contiguous allotments, the District was developed by George A. (Jake) Leonard and the Leonard Agency between 1918 and 1940, with the majority of its significant buildings having been erected in the decade 1920 to 1930. The name of Ridgewood is attributed to Mrs. Leonard, who was quite taken with an allotment which she had visited in Springfield, Ohio, called "Ridgewood." Of the 190 buildings in the District, 58 Post World War II buildings provide background. There are no intrusions.[10]
Most of the homes were built between 1919 and the depression. The model for the allotment was a design by John Sherwood (Fritz) Kelly, built in 1919 at 234 19th Street NW. The earliest of the Tudor Revival style homes, built in the same year at 145 19th Street NW, was designed by Herman Albrecht. Over the next decade Albrecht designed more than a dozen homes in the District, as did Charles E. Firestone. J. Kelly, working with his brother-in-law Arthur Brothers, was responsible for nearly two dozen houses in the District.[11]
The District is typical of other such residential areas in that its homes are relatively large, set back from the street and enhanced by mature overhanging trees and lush plantings. While most of its streets are laid out in a grid pattern, University Avenue and 22nd Street NW, and the west portion of 22nd and 24th Streets NE are curved to provide variation in lot shape and vista, and to discourage the use of the streets as thoroughfares. No unsympathetic commercial strips, and no gas stations or parking lots mark the District.
While the buildings were built at more or less the same time, the District exhibits none of the sameness and homogeneity found in post-World War II residential developments. Its buildings are architect-designed for the most part and demonstrate the enormous variations of shape, skin, and sensibility that characterize the European Revival styles favored by a number of architects working in this period. Nor is there skimping in the use of materials and craftsmanship. Windows of beveled and leaded glass, multifaceted roof lines featuring slate in various shapes and hues, hand-cut stone, tapestry brick, gazebos, battlements, and turrets abound, as do variations in cornice treatments featuring the modillions, dentils, and corbelling of the original styles from which these dwellings take their themes. The District's ambiance recalls the quality and substance deemed appropriate in their homes by pre-Depression gentry.
The following are typical examples of buildings found throughout the District:[12][13]
- Mitchell House (Albrect, Wilhelm, and Kelly, 1921)
- Ball House (J. Kerr Griffen, 1929)
- Giessen House (Charles Firestone, 1928)
All three buildings feature, in various executions, pargetting, leaded and multi-lighted casements, voussoirs, Tudor-arched entries, coursed stone first stories and half-timbered second stories, and potted chimneys in massed arrangements.
- Harris House (John S. Kelly, 1930)
- Fischgrund House (Louis Hoicowitz, 1927)[14]
- Obermeier House (Louis Hoicowitz, 1930)
Both feature wall dormers and window bays, plastered entries, hipped roofs (suggestive, if not directly imitative of the mansard), and multiple roof levels.
- Lavin House (Kelly, 1930)
- Blake House (Albrect and Wilhelm, 1930)
Both feature pedimented entries with fan lights, dentilled cornices, shuttered, double-hung sash windows, brick skins, and other elements appropriate to this type.
In addition to the revival styles of the majority of Ridgewood buildings, several buildings exhibit the transitional features characteristic of the spreading suburban architecture being built in other cities. One such effort, the Fawcett House (John S. Kelly and Arthur Brothers, 1921), was built as a spec house to entice investment in the new allotment. Its rolled roof, suggesting thatch, and its rows of paned casements give its eclecticism a "modern" feeling belying the revival remnants of its Doric-columned entry, arched window moldings suggesting Palladians, and its fan-lighted gable.[15] Another atypical building for the District is the Lehman/Belden House, the earliest house in the area (1890), a substantial vernacular building with Queen Anne and Eastlake elements.
In spite of variations such as these, however, the District has the unified, slightly Europeanized flavor characteristic of other developments of its period, and represents the best in elegant American suburban architecture.
