Friday, February 15, 2008

Dunbar's Double?

Continuing speculation on the Dubar birthplace and childhood home.

Knowing that this was a double and the rough form based on the Sanborn description one can make an educated guess on what the house might have looked like. Kevin Moran, in his comments to the previous post, notes that the coding on the Sanborn indicates the house was wood.

It just so happens that the Lutzenberer collection has this image of two double houses just west of the downtown, on Maple Street just west of Wilkinson (now the Sinclair campus), which might be similar to the Dunbar house:

The one on the corner is wood, and has a 1 1/2 story rear addition, and a 1 story porch or shed addition at the very back. So perhaps the Dunbar birthplace looked like this, or a wood version of the one next door, which seems slightly smaller.

This neighborhood would have nearly as old as the Haymarket, being one of the first expansions of the city westward beyond the orignal town plat.

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