A GREAT DISCOVERY: The Lost Newman Mansion

Today, on the NE corner of 12th Street and State, Emporia, is a church. The church, completed in 1948, replaced an extraordinary house, one of the finest in Emporia. The 1892 house was designed by architect Harry Jones, of Minneapolis.

The house was commissioned by G. W. Newman, who owned Newman’s department store in the city. I blogged about it, here.

 

But this house of great beauty was smashed to the ground.

 

For several years now I have heard stories that parts of the Newman house had been salvaged and incorporated into at least two new structures.

Then, recently I received an email which made me jump out of my skin.

Lori wrote that she had found a 1947 Emporia Gazette article which mentions her home, which she and her husband, Raymond, have owned for thirty years. The article states that their home, designed by architects Brinkman & Hagan, was completed in 1947 and incorporated components from the Newman house, including “inlaid wood floor block” in the foyer.

Lori thought: What blocks? As the existing floor was modern tile.

A later email stated: “Raymond chipped up 3 layers of floor to uncovered the hardwood inlaid floor in the 1947 Gazette article!”

And she attached an image.

 

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This was no flooring from a 1947 house.

This was 1890s flooring.

I begged for a tour. As Kenny was at the Cross House stripping woodwork in the Sewing Room, I knew he absolutely needed to join the tour as a special treat.

Arriving at the house, I was struck by its delightful cottage-like nature. There’s a mansion in there?

 

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Walking inside, Kenny and I were just gobsmacked at the parquet flooring. It was gorgeous. Lori worried that it could not be restored. I assured her that Justin Combs could restore the floor, and that I would talk with him.

While drooling at the floor I could not help but scan everything else in sight. There was a wonderful staircase behind me but it was not 1890s. It was clearly 1947. All the trim looked 1947. My heart sank. Was the floor it?

At last, we were asked to step into the living room. My heart soared, for I assumed the room would have a Newman mantel and other bits of fabulousness.

My heart sank. The room, while beautifully detailed and with a lovely mantel, was also true to 1947.

Same for the dining room.

My poor heart.

Then Lori asked Raymond: “Should we show them the mantel in the basement?”

My heart sprang back to life. Albeit warily.

We walked down the stairs to the beasment. And discovered something. Something quite tantalizing.

 

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EGADS! This was no 1947 stair. This was an 1890s stair! But it was certainly not the main stair of the Newman house. Servant’s stair? Kenny wondered if it came from the Newman carriage house?

But, nonetheless, excitement was underfoot!

Turning, I gasped. Before me was a stunning oak 5-panel door with incredible 1890s hardware. It looked totally out-of-place in a basement. But it was an 1890s door.

The excitement was now overfoot!

Opening the door, I looked into a room and knew, without question, exactly what Howard Carter felt like upon first entering the intact tomb of the 18th-Dynasty Pharaoh Tutankhamun in November, 1922.

My excitement was overwhelming.

But I could not quite take in all the treasures confronting me. I just stared, blinking quickly.

Finally, three words slowly came from my mouth: “Oh. My God.”

My eyes were damp with tears of joy.

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Yes, I was freaking’ out, man. Freakin’ out!

This was unquestionably a custom-designed 1890s mantel and overmantel. The Cross House has nothing like this, as all its mantels are from catalogs.

I drooled.

I had trouble breathing.

My brain was close to short-circuiting.

Then Kenny causally said: “Did you see the built-in sideboard over here?”

Several circuits tripped in my brain. But not all.

 

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We were obviously standing in the lost dining room of the Newman house.

To the right of the sideboard, was the aforementioned oak door:

 

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And, to its right, was a built-in china cabinet. Note the wood-paneled walls.

 

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The walls have paneled wainscoting and, unusually, horizontal oak boards on the upper walls.

 

The room is a treasure beyond compare. Lori and Raymond said it sold them on the house.

The basement has a seven-foot-high ceiling. The Newman house would certainly have had, at least, a ten-foot ceiling. This means that three-feet had to removed from all this glorious wood. Yet, there was no ready evidence of such decapitation. Closer inspection though revealed a very low base molding. This would have originally been, perhaps, about 12-inches high. The Newman house also likely had a twenty-inch-high frieze. So, even with a ten-foot ceiling, only about seven-inches perhaps needed to be removed in order to fit the woodwork from the Newman dining room into its new location.

 

Did the sideboard have legs originally?

 

Remember this detail above the mantel?

 

The same detail, truncated, above the china cabinet. Does it continue up into the joist void? I am dying to find out!

 

Remember the sweet corbels above the mantel?

 

They looked tacked-on above the china cabinet. Were they originally higher?

 

The bottom of the oak door has been cut down. This would support the idea that the adjacent sideboard was also higher.

 

I have been in numerous reconstructed rooms over time and most looked chopped up and badly pieced together.

Not this room. Somebody took great pride in reconstructing the room. I found almost no sloppy work.

Well, my joy was infinite. Things could not get better.

Then Lori said: “Would you like to see the other mantel?”

And that is when, officially, my brain exploded.

 

 

Nailed to a wall in the laundry room was another Newman mantel. From the parlor? Library?

 

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I was reeling.

Then Raymond said: “There’s something on the second-floor you might like.”

Kenny and I looked at each other, our eyes wide.

 

One bedroom had wall-to-wall carpeting. This is sooooooooo not 1947.

 

While quite worn in places it, too, is a treasure.

 

The 1940s were not a time of preservation consciousness. During the Truman administration the entire interior of the White House was gutted and almost all the historic fabric was tossed into a dump, save the 1902 paneling in the State Dining Room.

So, how did all this come about?

The house was designed for the Johnson family. Were they the initiators of this extraordinary endeavor? Or, was it the architects, Brinkman & Hagan? Or the contractor, Dave Jones?

Stay tuned to this channel!

 

 

12 Comments

  1. mlaiuppa on March 27, 2022 at 9:51 pm

    Wow. A miracle it was preserved and serendipity it was rediscovered.

    There is a bunch of stuff behind that second mantel in the laundry room. Looks like more paneling and some weird curved thing above. Like it was more salvage that is stored there.

    That is what they did. Likely the house was being constructed with an unfinished basement, then when the Newman mansion was coming down, likely it was the construction company/contractor of the Johnson house that offered them a cheap way to finish their basement. Perhaps the contractor was also hired to demolish the Newman house and saw this as an opportunity to double dip, being paid to demolish and also paid to salvage. He may also have been a member of the parish of the new church being built. But one way or another, he had an inside contact to the Newman House and that is likely how the Johnson’s came to acquire the bits and pieces of the Newman house that they did. I doubt the architects would have been involved as they would either have installed those pieces upstairs and even accommodated rooms to fit them or they would have shunned them completely as being old and an offense to their modern design. To me this wreaks of a waste not want not contractor that valued craftsmanship and old woodwork.

    It could have been the Johnsons but I suspect it was their contractor. If you can track down who built the Johnson house and then look for other houses he built at that some time period, you may find other bits and pieces incorporated into them; windows, railings, columns, wainscoting, more mantles, more doors and hardware.

  2. Architectural Observer on March 27, 2022 at 10:09 pm

    Mind blown. This is amazing… especially given the time period! The re-installation of these fantastic remnants of the Newman house into the basement of a newly-constructed house in 1947 says a lot about that era; while the owners of the new house clearly valued these salvaged architectural elements, they did not value them sufficiently to give them a place of honor on the main level (aside from the parquet floor). Preservation consciousness was indeed in its early infancy! Had the oak magnificence seen in the basement been installed in the living and dining areas upstairs, alterations in height would have been less likely or less severe.

    The thinking of the day must have been something like, “This stuff is too good to throw away, but not quite good enough to showcase in our living or dining room!” This really boggles the mind. Sadly, there are still many people today who value whatever the current fad is much more than quality work of a different era; I guess we really haven’t evolved all that much. Some people, but not the culture as a whole. What a fascinating discovery — I hope you will be able to learn more.

    • mlaiuppa on March 28, 2022 at 3:50 am

      My parents are like that. While they both grew up at the end of the depression and lived through WWII they still hate vintage furniture. I suppose what they have now will be considered vintage in another 20-30 years. But that meant that when I asked my Dad gave me his childhood bureau, which has been shoved under the workbench in the garage for 65 years. The matching mirror has sat outside behind the garage for the same amount of time. But I get them both and am going to refinish it all. Already did one drawer. It’s oak with a lovely grain. And I did a little research. It’s from around 1900 give or take a decade. That would be about right for my Grandparents getting some cheap second hand old stuff for my Dad, born in 1929. I also got my Mom to give me the old “toy chest” which is actually an armoire with cedar veneer inside. I don’t remember what the outside was because she painted it white and put Disney decals of Bambi on it when I was a child so it has always been the toy chest. I will be stripping that paint and how for a nice surprise underneath. It could be 40s or 50s as she likely did this around 1960, so something old enough to be out of fashion and cheap but not old enough to be an antique. They are both MINE! I doubt my sister would want them either, especially in their current state. She got some pristine furniture from my Aunt’s estate and likely doesn’t value it much except that it was free. Beautiful veneer and likely French polished. She also has a piano from the early 20th century that was badly abused and she has done nothing in the decades she’s had it. All of the ivory keys were slowly replaced over the years by our piano tuner who was also slowly bringing it up to pitch. But she has done nothing about the finish despite my telling her to just take some denatured alcohol and a rag and start rubbing on a spot not too noticeable. It could be beautiful as I think the wood outside is as beautiful as the wood inside that has not darkened.

      I must have been left on the doorstep by time travelers or antiquarians because I don’t belong in this family. I’m also the only Democrat.

  3. LS on March 28, 2022 at 12:32 am

    Oh, my beautiful woodwork! (Clutches pearls) for the first picture of the mantel, I thought, I would buy that house just because of that! Wow! How awesome that it has been preserved and intact since it’s was re-installed. I think i would be investigating all the floors in the house. How absolutely lovely, and wonderful of them to share it with you in the tour.

  4. Dan Goodall-Williams on March 28, 2022 at 2:47 pm

    Ross, I’m with you! My brain would have shorted out! What a tremendous find. Thank you for sharing this!

  5. Barb Sanford on March 28, 2022 at 4:24 pm

    Wow. Love that you’ve solved part of this mystery. Who knows what bits of Emporia history might be lurking in some other lucky house’s basement or attic?

  6. Laurie L Weber on March 28, 2022 at 5:22 pm

    Wow! What a story! I live for stuff like this! Thank you!

  7. Raymond on April 23, 2022 at 2:16 pm

    There is another room that you didn’t see.

    • Ross on April 23, 2022 at 6:11 pm

      Where? Where? Where?

  8. Raymond on April 25, 2022 at 3:59 pm

    Hidden in a dormer is a children’s playroom

  9. Ls on April 25, 2022 at 5:22 pm

    Oh wow! How cool! Have you unearthed anymore tiles?

  10. Debora Broderson on April 26, 2022 at 6:50 pm

    Will you share the new surprise from the hidden dormer?

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