The Oregonian online had one of those clickbaity real estate advertorial pieces. It featured mid-century modern in Salem, and these are not well documented here, so it seemed worth reading.
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| They mixed up Otto Wilsons! |
It turned out to be very interesting, for good and for bad reasons.
The good? It's right on the south side of City View on a funny dead-end that has been a little mysterious. There's an older home near it, and there must be some history to learn. The piece also invoked early bike and car dealer Otto J. Wilson.
The residence [built in 1957] was first owned by Salem businessman Otto Wilson, who sold bicycles — early brands such as Columbia, Cleveland, Hartford, Raycycle, Schwinn and Vedette — and owned the city’s first car dealership, said [the current owner].
In 1903, Wilson drew a crowd at the Southern Pacific freight depot to watch the unloading of his $700 Oldsmobile, the first motor car in Oregon owned outside of Portland, according to the Oregon Statesman Journal. Wilson used the car as a traveling advertisement and sold five cars that year.
The bad? The bike dealer and owner of the 1903 car, Otto J. Wilson, Sr., died in 1942.
Any house built in 1957 would have been for his son, Otto J. Wilson, Jr. (1917 -2007).
Somebody is mixed up, though it's an easy confusion.
Still, it's an interesting house in the history of mid-century modern here in Salem and also in the history of car dealers.
And there is more.
Two doors down from the Otto J. Wilson, Jr. house is an old house and old lot, what looks like an old four-square. It has been a mystery also. It led to an interesting place!
The trail started with a new manager for the Marion Hotel, Del Milne, in the early 1950s.
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| October 10th, 1952 |
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| November 30th, 1952 |
He found a home he liked and after purchasing it, got permits for some remodeling. It had been associated with a Clarence Emmons.
The Milnes didn't like the street name Lorida, however, and they worked to change it.
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| May 14th, 1954 |
They must have been successful. Two years later Otto J. Wilson, Jr. got permits for his new house on "Birdshill." (That's the one for sale.)
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| July 24th, 1956 |
The paper featured it and another house on "Birds Hill" in the society pages within a couple of years. It had become a hot address.
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| February 17th, 1957 |
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| February 16th, 1958 |
There might be more to learn about the street name. The current street is "Birdhill," singular and one word. It would be interesting to find out if Birds Hill was a place name prior to the street name and new addressing, or if that was purely a creation of the Milnes.
As for the origin of that old house, you might have recognized a name from that 1952 remodeling note: Clarence Emmons is the father of Terence Emmons, whose book on his grandfather Walter D. Pugh was recently published!
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| February 6th, 1938 |
Emmons starts his book mentioning his memories starting with the "hilltop couple of acres up Hoyt Street, behind the Pioneer and City View Cemeteries."
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| The Pugh/Emmons home (Pioneering Architect W. D. Pugh) |
Especially if it could be shown that Walter D. Pugh built the house and was associated with it for a good period before Clarence, who I think was a son-in-law, resided there, it might be worth a good bit more notice and a place in our local histories. (It's just outside of SCAN, and technically excluded from their "heritage neighborhood" project.)
There are details to confirm and more to learn here, but the houses right there are very interesting indeed!
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