A "Dandy" Sears Princeville in North Aurora

110 Oak St., North Aurora. Capture from Google Streetview.

 

The Sears Princeville, also known as the Sears No. 173.

I believe this to be a Sears Princeville in North Aurora. Technically, it would be a No. 173, since it was sold before Sears Roebuck named their houses, but we will refer to it as a Princeville for the sake of brevity and easier typing.

I know you are thinking right now: Girl, do you have eyes?! Let me just say that the previous owners believed this house to be a Princeville, and they may have some evidence to support that. Let's take a step back and take a look.

Obviously the biggest difference between the catalog illustration and the actual house is the second floor. The original dormers have been removed and the second floor expanded.  

The three piers on the front porch are still there, with original trim. One of the distinguishing features of the Princeville is the square bay window off of the stairwell.

You can see the squared bay window from the front. The house required a 35-foot wide lot, which meant few people in the city of Chicago could build one. Photo from Realtor site.

The Princeville came standard with cypress wood siding. Photo from Realtor site.

 

The Princeville was about 1,200 square feet. It had large living and dining rooms, and a kitchen with a separate walk-in pantry.

A fireplace was not standard with the Princeville. Photo from Realtor site.

There are triple windows facing the front. Photo from Realtor site.

The Princeville has a second set of triple windows in the living room. There once was a colonnade opening to the dining room, which came standard. Photo from Realtor site.

An office was added off the dining room where there once was a window seat. The decorative windows face the rear yard. Photo from Realtor site.

An original door leads to the backyard. Photo from Realtor site.

That is the door to the basement. Note the inset for the original chimney in the left corner as designated in the floor plan.

 

The walk-in pantry. This was a luxury feature in a small bungalow. Photo from Realtor site.

If you walk up the stairs, you come to the box window with the window seat. Photo from Realtor site.

The three bedrooms were small. When the house in North Aurora was expanded, the owners squared off the second floor. This allowed for the bedrooms to be more spacious.  

The door on the right is a hall closet and the other door leads to the front bedroom. Even with the expansion of the second story, the layout did not change here. Photo from Realtor site.

Photo from Realtor site.

The house still has three bedrooms. The ceilings were originally eight feet, but now they have been raised in parts. Photo from Realtor site.

A Pittsburgh toilet is a lonely basement toilet installed in the middle of unfinished basements. I have never seen one in real life other than the one in my grandma's basement in Pittsburgh. Photo from Realtor site.

Dr. Cyrus H. Cutter bought the lot in May 1913. He appears to have paid cash for the house. Cutter was a physician. 

Mooseheart is a residential child care facility near North Aurora. 

Cyrus died in 1934, and his wife, Hattie, died in 1942. In 1946, the Cutter estate sold the house to James H. Voss, who became the mayor of North Aurora a few years later in 1955.

The Sears Kimberly--the Skywater's Big Sis

In 1927, Sears Roebuck introduced two new models that looked very similar: The Kimberly and the Skywater. 

The Sears Kimberly, from the 1930 Modern Homes catalog. It was sold from 1927 to 1931. The little window in the front is in a bedroom closet.

The Sears Skywater. It was sold from 1927 to 1938.

The sticker price of the Kimberly was double or triple the price of the Skywater, depending on the year.

Why the difference?

The Skywater was classified as a mere summer cottage, while the Kimberly was of top "Honor-Bilt" quality.

The Skywater was a smaller house, despite the resemblance to the Kimberly on the exterior. It didn't have a full bathroom or a basement.

The Kimberly floor plan.

The Skywater floor plan. All you get is a toilet.

Some of the construction specifications for Honor Bilt homes like the Kimberly. Honor Bilt homes were the finest quality sold by Sears. Joists, studs, and rafters were to be spaced 14 3/8 inches apart. 

Some of the construction specifications for the summer cottages like the Skywater.

The Kimberly did not sell well nationally and only a few have been identified. 

1031 Logan, Elgin. The front entryway has been enclosed, and the little window in the closet has disappeared. The Kimberly in Elgin has a reversed floor plan. Photo from Realtor site.

The house layout today reflects the original floorplan. On the left side is a bathroom sandwiched between two bedrooms. There is a large addition on the rear that accommodates a new kitchen. Photo from Realtor site.

Undated photo of the Kimberly. The entrance was already enclosed back then. Photo from Elginbungalows.com.

The enclosed side porch. Photo from Realtor site.

In the Kimberly, the front door opens directly into the living room (just like with the Skywater). The arched window now looks out onto the enclosed porch. Photo from Realtor site.

There is a dining room next to the living room, when originally it was kitchen. The kitchen is now in the rear of the house in a new addition. Photo from Realtor site.

Photo from Realtor site.

There is a new galley kitchen in a large rear addition. Photo from Realtor site.

This is the front bedroom and the front-facing closet that abuts the front door. Photo from Realtor site.

The attic is ready for another bedroom. Photo from Realtor site.

Robert  F. Spears received financing from Sears Roebuck in November 1928. He was a watchmaker for the Elgin Watch Company. In 1954 he moved to Arizona.

According to researcher Rebecca Hunter, the owner retains all the original paperwork from Sears Roebuck.

A Cinderella Story

In the years after WWII, many consumers were tired of the boring tract homes going up all over the country. Tens of thousands of ranches were built, and the suburban sprawl seemed endless.

In 1953, designer Jean Vandruff had the idea for affordable ranch houses that looked like the cottages depicted in fairy tales. He named his creations Cinderella Homes. 

9070 Lubec St., Downey, CA. This is the first Cinderella house that Vandruff designed. Photo from Realtor site.

The houses included such stylistic features as steep gables, upturned eaves, shake roofs, scalloped fascia, diamond-shaped window panes, decorative shutters, and other "gingerbread" touches.

Vandruff and his brother rolled out a development of 168 Cinderella homes in West Anaheim in 1955, and other developments in southern California soon followed. When the first model homes opened, there was so much customer demand that the builders started showings at 4 a.m. 

One of the thirteen original Cinderella models.

The Cinderella homes were a massive hit with the public. Vandruff's house designs were licensed to other builders, who in turn built them elsewhere in California and also in places as far away as Texas and Oklahoma.

Another Cinderella model, from the Cinderella Homes sales brochure.

There is a gorgeous book about Vandruff and his houses called The Cinderella Homes of Jean Vandruff  by Chris Lukather, if you are looking for more information.

As someone who finds houses, I wondered... are there storybook ranches in the Chicago area? The Vandruff brothers did not have any developments here. However, other architects in the 1950's and 1960's created similar designs in order to capitalize on the Cinderella craze. 

One day, I stumbled across the Brickman Manor subdivision in Mount Prospect.

This development was constructed around 1960-1961. 

There were initially six models available for purchase in Brickman Manor. One of the houses was the "Broadleaf" ranch.

The Broadleaf was three bedrooms and 1.5 baths. Doesn't look Cinderella-y.

The architect of the houses in the Brickman Manor subdivision was A.J. Del Bianco who specialized in budget ranch houses. Del Bianco wanted to give customers options and also wanted the houses to look different. So, with each model, there were three elevations from which customers could choose.

An alternate elevation for the Broadleaf was a fairytale look. 

1214 N. Crabtree Lane, Mount Prospect. The windows have been replaced, but the decorative bargeboard remains. 

Another Broadleaf at 1210 N. Crabtree Lane, Mount Prospect.

Floor plan for the Broadleaf.

Later the company sold a bigger, more expensive storybook ranch with four bedrooms and two baths called the Westleigh. I didn't see one of these in the neighborhood, but I may have missed it.