Building date: 1853
Original use:
Corner structures:
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Structures with similar masonry details:
Masons who worked on building: M. Smith
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Map views courtesy Google Maps. Address is Google Earth confirmed; 41°19'03.47"N 81°19'50.22"W. Current owner of record, Kessler as of the 2019 Tax Roll.
City of Aurora and Portage County Maps.
The Chester Risley Howard house at 411 East Garfield Road, Aurora, is one of two cobblestone buildings in the state of Ohio. The other is the Cobble-Cote - Barton Home. Howard was a prominent miller. In 1853 he razed an old frame house and mason M. Smith built this Gothic Revival style cobblestone house for Howard. It has two stories and three wings. The walls are 20 inches thick. It was placed on the National Register in 1974. Richard Palmer blog.
The Chester Risley Howard House at 411 E. Garfield St., Aurora, Ohio, is one of the most architecturally unusual houses of the pre-Civil War period in northern Ohio. It is one of two cobblestone houses in the Western Reserve region.The mixture of Greek and Gothic Revival details is handled with unusually good judgment. It is located on the Chagrin River at the place formerly known as Aurora Depot, half a mile east of Aurora Center, a flourishing 19th-century mercantile town in an important cheese-producing region. Howard was a sawmill owner, and the mills and manufacturing establishments were located on the river. The house was built in 1853 by M. Smith. It is a two-story stone dwelling with three wings of nearly equal importance. The walls are faced with cobblestones, and the corners have stone quoins. The road facade has a steep gable whose eaves have a delicately sawn vergeboard a scrolled design, terminating in a slender octagonal pinnacle and pendant. - Owen, Lorrie K., Ohio Historical Places Dictionary, Vol. 2, Page 3, 1999. It has two stories and three wings. The walls are 20 inches thick. It was placed on the National Register in 1974 (74001602.)
Letters written by Eleanor J. Elkins detail information she has about her descendants. Her great grandfather Tyrus Smith and his brothers were carpenters and masons by trade, and it is implied that M. Smith who built the C R Howard house was a brother of Tyrus. To-date that has not been verified. Unfortunately, copies mentioned by Eleanor of the June 8 and 26, 1967 letters from then Cobblestone Society and Museum president, Olaf William Shelgren, would provide additional context, but have not yet been found in the Cobblestone Museum archives. Note that the son of Tyrus, Merritt, was born in 1852; therefore, could not be the M. Smith on the 1853 date stone.
Cobblestone Construction in the New World, A restoration case study, by John Burnell, The Journal of the Building Limes Forum, Vol. 15 2008, pages 15-20. Reprinted with permission of the Building Limes Forum. Initial referral by Richard Palmer email 10/18/2020.
C.R. Howard Cobblestone House Restoration, by Mason's Mark LLC, Builders-Conservators, Kent, Ohio.
Historic American Buildings Survey data sheets included with photograph and architectural drawings below in "Photographs" section. Library of Congress. Historic American Historic Buildings Survey - 1936.
C.R. Howard House, DBPedia database content. Also see: LandmarkHunter.com
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National Register of Historic Places Registration
- "Cobblestone Masonry", 1966, Carl Schmidt: Name reference, None
- Page 216
 master-pnp-habshaer-oh-oh0200-oh0279-photos-128380pu.jpg ¹ June 19, 1936 |  Howard House Aurora Ohio.jpg ² |  Screen Shot 2018-03-22.jpg ² |  kessdate2.jpg ² |
 Screen Shot 2020-10-17.jpg ² |  master-pnp-habshaer-oh-oh0200-oh0279-sheet-00000a.png ³ June 23, 1936 |  master-pnp-habshaer-oh-oh0200-oh0279-sheet-00001a.png ³ June 23, 1936 |  master-pnp-habshaer-oh-oh0200-oh0279-sheet-00002a.png ³ June 23, 1936 |
¹ Photography courtesy Carl Waite for the Historic American Buildings Survey on June 19, 1936. Library of Congress.
² Photography courtesy Richard Palmer. Attribution Bill Eichenberger.
³ Photography courtesy Library of Congress. Historic American Historic Buildings Survey - 1936.
