St. Paul house, an early work of famed architect Cass Gilbert, is named a city historic site

Caleb Hensin, Pioneer Press
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The Dwight and Clara Watson House and Barn, designed by master architect Cass Gilbert, is the newest St. Paul Heritage Preservation Site after a city council vote Wednesday.

The home on the West Side is among Gilbert’s earliest works. Born in 1859, Gilbert grew up in St. Paul and died at the age of 74 in 1934. He’s famous for the state Capitol building in St. Paul, the Woolworth building in Manhattan and the U.S. Supreme Court building in Washington.

Mark Thomas, the current owner of the home and a retired physician, says he originally bought the house at 402 Hall Ave. so he could walk to work. By the time he purchased the house in 1993, it had passed through the hands of two other families since 1914 and was clad in asbestos shingles.

Thomas noticed that the house had a unique design, one that told him its architect had a very particular eye for the room layout and exterior. Curiosity piqued, he researched the original owners of the house: the Watson family. Dwight Watson, who purchased the land in 1886, was the son of George Watson, a three-time state senator who would later die in the house. An economic downturn led the family to sell it to a contractor.

Thomas also discovered a link between the Watson and Gilbert families: they crossed paths in Connecticut in 1706, an encounter that may have led to the Colonial-inspired interior of the late Victorian-style house. Thomas said that, as one of Gilbert’s early works, the house’s eclectic style was a way for the fresh graduate of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s first architecture program to display his skills.

“Someone with a real eye for architectural history could see Gilbert’s interests as a young architect,” Thomas said.

Further research with the New York Historical Society uncovered a well-preserved and fully intact set of plans for the house that bore Gilbert’s name and confirmed him as the original architect.

The discovery, Thomas said, changed his life. “It was a way for me to personalize American history.”

In 2019, the property was included on the National Registry of Historic Places.

Thomas said he hopes the house’s status as a St. Paul preservation site will become a community asset, and play a permanent role in West Side history. He also encouraged others to look at the history that may be hidden in plain sight all around them.

“The city landscape is full of clues to our history, and they haven’t all been discovered.”

Christine Boulware, historic preservation specialist at St. Paul’s Planning and Economic Development Department, said a property has to meet one of seven criteria to be designated a Heritage Preservation Site.

The Watson family house meets two: “The properties are identifiable with a person or persons who significantly contributed to the culture and development of the City of St. Paul,” and “The properties are identifiable as the work of an architect, engineer, or master builder whose individual work has influenced the development of St. Paul.” The person in question in both of these cases is Gilbert, who contributed to St. Paul’s character with architecture splashed throughout the city.

Designation as a preservation site means that changes to the building’s exterior have to be reviewed by the city council and that any maintenance, repairs, replacements or new construction “should be in kind” or consistent with the original designs, according to Boulware.

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