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Most of the finished woodwork items came from the 17-acre Sears Sash and Door Plant at Norwood, Ohio near Cincinnati. To keep pace with its competitors, Montgomery Ward began to offer mortgages in 1926. This plan proved successful at first, with the company claiming its highest ever kit house sales data in 1929.
Look at the exposed beam, joists, rafter in the basement, crawl space or attic of the house for the marked lumber. If those are unavailable, the bathtub’s plumbing access doors might allow access to the framing lumber. A couple of our floor joists have grease pencil markings on them, but they are not noticeable without a flashlight. Finding the shipping label is a little like striking gold because it is so unlikely to be in a place that is visible , but some owners of Sears homes have found them, so anything is possible.
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1930 catalog, which was probably the last catalog Montgomery Ward produced.
It is unlikely that any of the original faucets are still in the house, but if they did some may be marked with the initials “SR”. While you trace back the ownership of your home to determine when it was constructed, see if you can find out who financed the first mortgage. If it was Sears, you are probably the owner of a Sears home. If you are not sure when your house was built, check with your county auditor. Before you sharp-eyed proofreaders point out that I previously stated that Sears only published home catalogs through 1940, I will let you know that they continued to ship kits from their inventory through 1942.
Kit house
Move a wall or change the size, work with our team to make your home design unique to you. We can also work with a plan that you might have seen elsewhere. Choose between full log, hybrid, clapboard or timber home. Ltd. – a branch plant, of the Michigan-based Aladdin Homes, the largest kit home seller in Canada, its Canadian headquarters were located in the Canadian Pacific Building, in Toronto. They operated across the whole of Canada, from 1905 to 1952. They were truly pre-cut, and need very little skill to assemble.
Any time you do remodeling, keep a sharp eye out for grease pencil markings or stenciled numbers. Also, be aware that there were options available sometimes that altered the floorplan. The Starlight was sold with or without an indoor bathroom. Ours had the indoor bathroom, but the floorplan was flipped. Some of the homes had optional items like bay windows or porches. To further complicate things, the home may have been remodeled over the years.
Books
The mortgage program would prove to be the Wardway brand’s undoing, however, when the financial difficulties of the Great Depression left many customers unable to make their mortgage payments. Wardway Homes had sales offices in Chicago , Fort Worth, Kansas City, Portland and St. Paul. But unlike most of the other major kit house producers, Montgomery Ward never owned or operated lumber yards that cut and packaged kit houses.
In addition, some companies, including Sears, Montgomery Ward, Gordon-Van Tine, and Harris Brothers, offered cash discounts and generous mortgage terms. For most homeowners, the complete cost of building a kit house was about double the catalog price, allowing for the construction of a foundation and labor costs. The price of land or a city lot on which to build would be another expense. Although none of the traditional kit house companies are still in business, pre-cut log home and geodesic dome kits are offered by a number of manufacturers.
Kit house companies
I like the exterior on this one with interesting exterior with siding on the first floor and shingles on the second floor. Montgomery Ward closed down their Wardway Homes division in 1931 as a result of the declining sales and unprofitable mortgages from The Great Depression. I'm not clear whether Dante ever lived in the house or whether he built it as an investment.
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Either way, by 1940, Dante and his family were living in Chicago. Dante Mitrovi took out a mortgage for $5050 from Wards in November 1930 to build the Drexel. There have been many changes to the exterior of the house, but, believe it or not, this is an authenticated Wardway Drexel. Today we feature two Wardway models in the Northern suburbs.
This American Foursquare’s has a central entrance and a bedroom on the first floor . In 2015, Rose Thornton found an example of the Orlando model in Beckley, West VA. This model could be argued that its not a American Foursquare since it doesn’t have the hip roof. The Bellevue seems to be on the larger side considering the description notes that this model “gives more living space than any other design”.
The picture to the right shows an example of a Harris Brothers home called “The Harris Model 6.” This home appeared in the 1913 – 1915 Harris Brothers Homes catalog. The Vagabond Historian is a scholar of local history, specializing in knowledge of early American history. Popular as a speaker, he has graciously agreed to contribute his column to Pickerington Online. For now, we hope you enjoy some of the content from our c.
As much as the public obsesses over Sears kit houses, there are thousands of Montgomery Ward houses all over the country that are overlooked. Montgomery Ward sold high-quality homes that are still as welcoming today as they were 88 years ago. The popularity of kit houses was attested in a roundabout way in the 1920 silent comedy One Week starring Buster Keaton, which shows Keaton constructing a build-it-yourself house that turns out all wrong. In addition, with some companies, homebuyers could choose the quality of materials. Gordon-Van Tine offered discounts for customers who chose lesser-quality siding, roofing, doors, windows, and trim.
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