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100-Year-Old Model Homes in Ravenswood Manor Still Standing Strong

 Ravenswood Manor's model homes, all more than 100 years old, were highlighted during a recent walking tour.
Model Homes of Ravenswood Manor
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RAVENSWOOD MANOR — Wanna know what Ravenswood Manor looked like in the early 1900s?

Head to 2907 W. Eastwood Ave., where the Manor's very first home, built in 1909, still stands, nary a nip or tuck to be found.

The Stockton-Nurrie House is one of 15 model homes developer William Harmon constructed to lure buyers to his new subdivision, situated on 40 acres adjacent to the then-newly constructed Francisco Brown Line station.

"The model homes were the genesis of our neighborhood. These were the homes Harmon built to sell the neighborhood and his vision," said Athene Carras, a Manor resident and architect who led a weekend tour of the "Harmon homes" as part of the ongoing centennial celebration of the formation of the Ravenswood Manor Improvement Association.

 Athene Carras, right, leads a tour of Ravenswood Manor's original model homes.
Athene Carras, right, leads a tour of Ravenswood Manor's original model homes.
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DNAinfo/Patty Wetli

2907 W. Eastwood Ave.: "Nothing Else Was Here"

When Harmon began developing the Manor, "you have to think of it as Naperville" in terms of perceived distance from downtown, said Carras, who, along with Jim Peters, headed up the association's centennial research and tour committee.

A permit for the Stockton-Nurrie house, the only model of its kind, was issued in March 1909, when "nothing else was here," she said. "There were just sticks for trees."

Harmon's source of inspiration for the Manor was Oak Park, evident in the Stockton-Nurrie house's vaguely Prairie-style feel, she said.

Early ads pitched the neighborhood as a "motorboat community" that would be accessible via the Chicago River, though there's no evidence to suggest that promise ever came to fruition, according to Carras.

Vacant lots originally sold for $690-$990, and minimum construction costs ranged from $2,500 to $4,000.

2731 W. Windsor Ave.: Bungalow Ban, Sort Of

"We think of Ravenswood Manor as a bungalow neighborhood, but Harmon didn't want that," said Carras. "He wanted something more affluent and upscale."

His lone concession: a model bungalow at 2731 W. Windsor Ave., built in 1911.

"It looks more like a California bungalow than Chicago," she said.

Though Harmon may have been aiming for a more high-falutin' clientele, the Ohio native made sure average wage earners could afford to live in the Manor — Harmon essentially popularized the concept of buying a home on the installment plan, according to Carras.

Census information shows the Manor was solidly middle class in the 1920s and '30s, with early residents employed as school teachers, factory foremen, railroad supervisors, salesmen and even a tug boat pilot, Carras said.

2936 W. Leland Ave.: Variations on a Theme

Harmon would present prospective homeowners with a book of "patterns" — standard house designs they could then customize with options like brick vs. stucco, front vs. side entrance, or open vs. enclosed porch.

"There are little variations," said Carras. "Some are very subtle."

The American Foursquare, as seen at 2936 W. Leland Ave., built in 1909, was a common style of model and proved a popular choice with customers. Foursquare houses feature symmetrical layouts, with four rooms upstairs and four rooms downstairs.

Jen Jessen Lunt and her husband Brian Lunt bought their Foursquare at 4721 N. Sacramento Ave., built in 1909, not knowing it was a model home.

They learned of its origins when a previous centennial tour stopped out front in February.

Asked what it's like to own a bit of history, Jessen Lunt replied, "It feels like it's our home."

But the eldest of the couple's three young children admitted, "Some of it feels really old-fashioned."

2848 W. Wilson Ave.: "Land of Tunneling Trees"

The model at 2848 W. Wilson Ave. — built in 1909 and distinguished by its parapet wall — was not a favorite with buyers.

"It was a little too modern, maybe, for the 1910s," Carras conjectured.

But in at least one way the house is typical of those eventually constructed in the Manor: it sits on a double lot.

Extra-wide lots — 1½ or twice the size normally found in Chicago — lend the Manor an almost suburban feel, albeit one sandwiched between the busy thoroughfares of Montrose and Lawrence avenues to the south and north.

Carras recalled the moment she first discovered the community, having ventured up the Brown Line from Lincoln Park for the Manor's garden walk.

"I got off the train and it was, 'I think I'm in love,'" she said.

The year was 1987 and she finally moved to the neighborhood in 2008.

Patrick Duffy, who moved to the Manor with his wife, Megan, nine years ago, had a similar reaction.

The former Lakeview resident had frequent cause to cross the Wilson Avenue bridge into the Manor prior to becoming a resident.

"It was just 'Wow,'" he said.

The tour, Duffy said, was an eye opener.

"I couldn't have picked those 15 out as the first," he said of the models.

For Lois Long, who's lived in the Manor on Leland Avenue since 1968 — "It's alliterative, 'Lois Long of Leland'" — the neighborhood is as charming to her today as it was more than 60 years ago, when she and her friends would ride their bikes to the Manor from North Center.

"We called [the Manor] the land of tunneling trees," said Long, a name inspired by the arches that formed when branches reached out across opposite sides of the street to meet in the middle.

Even during the turmoil of the 1960s and '70s when so many Chicagoans fled the city for the suburbs, the Manor held on, she said.

"We used to say, the only way you left the Manor was if you moved to Florida or the Great Beyond," said Long. "You have an appreciation, knowing how the city has become more dense, here's this green."

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