Sears No 137 In Mendham, New Jersey, Morris County

Oh my heavens! Last week, thanks to an Instagram post by @HomesOfHistory, I was treated to my first Sears No 137. Isn't this a beauty!?  I've never seen one before. This one in Mendham has the window detailing and the half-timber detailing (with a slight difference, in that the diagonal strips were left off) of the catalog image. 

Sears No 137 • 7 Orchard Street, Mendham, New Jersey (Photo courtesy of @HomesOfHistory)

Sears No 137 in the 1911-1912 Sears Modern Homes catalog

In the Google Streetview image above, there is a little squiggle (that happens with Streetview sometimes), making it look like there are two chimneys on this side, but it was difficult to get just this perspective... to show how the side windows, and upper bumpout, all match up nicely to the catalog image. The chimney, actually, should be jutting out of the roof of the side gambrel, but it's not, and I've decided that's okay. 

According to Houses By Mail, the No 137 was first offered in 1911. I've never seen a 1910  catalog, but I can say that it's not in my 1908 catalog, and it is in my Schiffer re-print 1912 catalog, so 1911 sounds right (actually, this catalog may have been published in 1911 -- there is no publishers date on the version that is uploaded on Archive.org, here, but they list it as 1911... the price is lower in this Archive version, so it may be a 1911). It was never offered as a pre-cut house, and never had a name, other than its number moniker, so the last time that we see it in a catalog, is in the late-1916 publication (thanks, Dale Haynes, for scanning and uploading that edition!). 

This style of house has a Gambrel roof... in fact, it has two gambrels, so we'd call it a double gambrel or a cross gambrel style. You might be thinking, "Oh! Hey! I've seen this house before!", hold on... many companies in the early part of the 1900s, offered houses with variations of this style. Sears had several, other kit companies had a few, plan-book companies like Radford homes, had several -- I did a blog post about this one, in St. Joseph, Missouri, a few years ago, and showed a few examples of offerings from other companies, if you're interested. We usually think of them as reminiscent of what we expect to see on a barn roof. 

Fortunately, this house was listed for sale a few years ago, and so we can follow along a bit, with real estate photos from that old listing. Let's start with a look at the catalog floor plan:

Sears No 137 floor plan, in the 1911-1912 Sears Modern Homes catalog

The room layout is pretty straightforward. Here's the upstairs, front bedroom, that has that nice bay window:

And the bedroom behind that one, has the squared-off side bumpout with the three windows... here's what that looks like:

This house on Orchard Street does not have a fireplace in the living room, as is shown in the floor plan from the catalog, but you can see, in this photo, that side of the house, with the living room couch placed right where the fireplace would have been, and you can see into the dining room, to see the stretch of three big windows on that side of the room:

The parlor, on the other side of the front of the house, has an additional little bay window added on, that is not shown on the floor plan in the catalog. This photo of that room does show us the big, 3-part window area of that side of the front of the house:

You can see the slight curve of the added bay window, here on the left side of the house, then the expected side doorway that is shown on the catalog floor plan. The rest of the windows on this left side match up nicely to what we see on the floor plan.

The front porch has been nicely screened in:

A No. 137 in Canisteo, New York

Lara Solonickne ( Sears Homes of Chicagoland ) is the researcher who added the first No 137 to our national database of Sears houses in the U.S. It's this one, in Canisteo, New York, at 40 4th Street:

Probable Sears No 137 • 40 4th Street, Canisteo, New York (on Bing Maps)

This house doesn't have the half-timber effect that the catalog shows, but, Lara checked it over, to be sure that all of the windows and doors seem to be correct (the correct number, and the correct placement). This house also has an older real estate listing... the photos aren't great, but we do get to see the original colonnades and a stained-glass window. The 1911-1912 catalog listing mentions the colonnades:

Description of the Sears No 137 in the 1911-1912 Sears Modern Homes catalog

Probable Sears No 137 • 40 4th Street, Canisteo, New York

Probable Sears No 137 • 40 4th Street, Canisteo, New York

Probable Sears No 137 • 40 4th Street, Canisteo, New York

Where else is there a Sears No 137?

According to Houses By Mail, this model was also built in:

• Coytesville, New Jersey
• Long Island City, New York
• Canadensis, Pennsylvania
• Racine, Wisconsin

And Rebecca Hunter's Putting Sears Homes On The Map book also lists:

• Rochelle, Illinois (Rebecca has given the address as 8180 S Main St, and it looks good)
• Lehighton, Pennsylvania

Of course, if you happen to know of where this house might be found in one of those towns (or elsewhere!), please let me know! Remember... there are many similar houses... we'd expect to see all of the windows and doors and pop-outs to be in the same spots as this house, on the sides, and in the front.

What's that next door??

Now, when I found out the address of this house, I found out that there is another Sears house right next door: a Sears Uriel, or the later Conway...depending on when it was built. The Uriel was not offered until 1920, so these houses were not built at the same time, and, of course, I know nothing about the story of how these two Sears houses happened to be built next to each other... but, sometimes, families bought lots next to each other, and sometimes, if one member of the family had relied on a kit from Sears, another member of the family might be inclined to do the same. So, perhaps the first residents were related? But, that's all supposition on my part. If anyone from Morris County historical society happens to have a city directory for this area, from the 1920s, perhaps, and could give me a name for one of these two houses, that would be much appreciated. Please feel free to use my contact info here on the blog, or email me at SearsHouseSeeker@gmail.com.

Here's the Uriel in its first year in the catalogs, 1920:

This is another of those models that has the feature of two full-sized windows flanking the front door, that I pointed out in my most recent blog post, about the Sears Norwood. Again, I was lucky enough to find a recent real estate listing to give us some photos of the house:

5 Orchard Street, Mendham, New Jersey • Sears Uriel or Conway

Two nice, big windows flanking the nice Craftsman style front door.

So, two splendid Sears houses next to each other, right here on Orchard Street, in Mendham, New Jersey -- more Sears houses in Morris County!  You can read about others that have been found in Morris County, here, in this previous blog post of mine.

Sears Norwood In Paris, Kentucky

Sears Norwood • 24 Massie Avenue, Paris, Kentucky

The Sears Norwood in a 1918 catalog

I don't think I've ever posted about the Sears Norwood model... and here, we have one that was recently for sale, and in really nice, renovated condition, in, of all places, Paris! Paris... Kentucky. Last August, I featured a Sears Silverdale in Paris, Kentucky, and the only other two Sears houses that we had on our national database, in Paris, were two Norwood models, side by side, on Massie Avenue... both in original, but rather tough condition. Now, sadly, only one remains. But, it has been nicely renovated, keeping much of the remaining detail. Care to see?

The Norwood was first offered in 1918, and I should note that we have come to realize that the Norwood had a slight change to the floor plan, beginning in 1921. In 1925, an additional window was added to an upstairs bedroom. Here is a comparison between the 1918 and 1925 layouts:

The Sears Norwood was offered from 1918-1928, with only a slight change to the layout.

We can tell by this, that the Norwood here on Massie Avenue is from 1921 or later. The added fireplace puts a chimney right about where the side window on that upstairs front bedroom would be, so we can't tell whether the house is pre-1925, or post-1925.

One thing I love about the Norwood, is the placement of two nice, big windows, on either side of the front door. Several Sears models include this design element (the Conway/Uriel, the No 126 ) or even a pair of windows on each side of that door (the Oakdale bungalow--here's another one, in Kansas). The Wardway homes Florence model is a little, straight-line bungalow that is opened up nicely by the addition of that feature, too. 

And, here's what that looks like, from the inside.

One of the changes shown on the floorplan, between 1918 and 1921, was a difference in the amount of steps leading up to the first landing of the staircase. The earliest floor plan shows only one step, and the later version has three, as you see on this house. The staircase newel is one that we see in the early building supply catalogs, but that we don't encounter regularly in Sears houses that we find:

This is a snippet from my 1918 Sears Building Supplies catalog.

Living room, looking into dining room, and into the kitchen, where you can also see that an enclosed back porch has been added.

Here, we also see a plinth block used to connect two different sizes of floor moulding, which is a trick that Sears suggested to their home buyers who were building on their own, and not comfortable with making tricky angle cuts to connect moulding. 

This side of the Massie Avenue Norwood, shows how it matches the window and back-porch we see, shown on the 1928 catalog image of this model:

Sears Norwood model as offered in the 1928 Sears Modern Homes catalog, its last year in the catalogs.

The window configuration is correct for this side, but the house was not built with the side entry door here.

While we're at it, here is the Google maps Streetview of this house, before it was renovated for re-sale. 
On this side of the fence, stood another Norwood, which was torn down.

Let's take a look at the rest of the real estate listing's photos. If you compare them to the catalog's floor plan, you'll see that doorways to closets and staircases, as well as openings between rooms, and windows, all follow the second version of the floor plan. While it's always sad to see original wood flooring replaced with laminate, we are still really pleased to see that so many original features are still in place: original doors, original Stratford model door handle hardware, original craftsman style trim from Sears, and even original Sears butterly-style half-mortise butt hinges!

This is known as the Molded Cap craftsman trim, and here it is in the 1929 Sears Building Supplies catalog:

That would be the doorway to the pantry, which also opens to the doorway to exit through the back.

This butterfly-shape half-mortise butt hinge was only offered by Sears, as far as we have seen.

There should be a side exit door off of the side where the staircase is, but this house has it over here, off of the back porch. All of this trim, and the door, look original, so this must be original to the house.

The 1928 catalog mentions that back-band craftsman-style trim (which this is not) is standard with the Norwood model, and it also mentions it coming with 2-cross panel doors... but this house has neither of those. Other years say that it will have 5-panel doors, "and trim to match"... and, this house has 5-panel doors. 

This is from the description in the final year that the Norwood was offered, 1928.

The 1923 catalog (see the page, here) describes 5-cross panel doors, which this house has.

And, here are options that were available, as listed in the 1928 catalog:

Options for a slight up-charge. Heating, plumbing, wiring, and electric fixtures (and shades!) were part of the kit, but, as there were different options for those, they were an add-on cost.

The 1928 catalog has a lengthy description of the house:

The Sears Norwood model, as described in its last year in the catalogs, 1928.

Another thing that we are thrilled to see still in place on this original Sears Norwood model on Massie Avenue, is the Sears five-piece eave bracket. The tracery on top is fabulous, too-- that is usually gone by now, on these old models.

This is the explanation of why we call this bracket a 5-piece bracket (from this previous blog post about a Sears Sunbeam in Turtle Creek, PA).

A Few Other Norwood Examples

We often find that existing Norwoods have been vinylized, even covering the brackets with vinyl, but here are a few that we've found that still look original.

This one is actually a 1940 tax photo-- it looks quite a bit different, now.
4531 Carpenter Avenue, Bronx, NY

Andrew found this one, through historic mortgage records. 
38 Fairmount Ave, Yonkers, NY

Andrew found this one -- it has been completely opened up and modernized.
310 3rd Avenue, Pelham, NY (listing photos)

All opened up inside (310 3rd Ave, Pelham, NY)

Nigel found this one, and Cindy has connected it to a couple who built various Sears houses around Cincinnati. 4357 Virginia Avenue, Cincinnati, Ohio

Nigel came across this one in Muskegon, Michigan, at 230 Strong Avenue.

The interior of this one in Muskegon, on Strong Avenue, shows original wood floors, and a staircase of the post-1920 floor plan. (Listing photos)

Andrew ran across this one in the real estate listings. It has been vinylized on the outside, but still holds a good bit of charm on the interior. 53 Parkview Avenue, Newport, Kentucky

Original wood flooring, original staircase newels, and original trim and doors, on the Newport, Kentucky, Norwood.

More nice interior photos (from this listing) for 58 Parkview Avenue, Newport, KY.

Karen located this Norwood, at 812 Monteiro St, Pittsburgh, PA

Lara located this Norwood through a building permit which listed Sears Roebuck as architect.
It has been added onto in the front, by creating a fully-enclosed front porch that is integrated into the main living area, and also added onto in the back. 1034 S Elmwood Avenue, Oak Park, IL (listing)

1034 S Elmwood Avenue, Oak Park, IL (listing)

1034 S Elmwood Avenue, Oak Park, IL (listing)

That's it! Of course, if you know of a Sears model, please contact me (be sure to include a return email address, so that I can get back to you).