Old Hospital Building in NC prior to restoration

City Hospital-Gaston Memorial Hospital, Gastonia North Carolina

Date added: May 10, 2024

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City Hospital began operating as a small privately-owned institution in a downtown Gastonia dwelling in 1908 and quickly grew in physical size and mission. By 1924, when the hospital occupied a new four-story building on North Highland Street, the facility encompassed a nurses' training school and served as the surgical hospital for the general public as well as the Southern, Piedmont and Northern, and Chicago and Northwestern railways. The institution remained one of the largest in the region through the 1930s and was in dire need of additional space by the early 1940s.

In hopes that public ownership would provide the means to improve conditions, Gaston American Legion Post No. 23 coordinated a fundraising effort to purchase City Hospital and conveyed it to Gaston County in 1946. The facility was renamed Gaston Memorial Hospital in honor of the county's approximately 330 World War II veterans and a nonprofit corporation with a twelve-member board of trustees was created to oversee the hospital's management. The new ownership status and organizational structure made it possible for the institution to benefit from the federal, state, and local funding made available by the Hill-Burton Act of 1946, which provided for healthcare facility improvements throughout the nation. Gaston Memorial Hospital's 1951 building was erected as part of the ensuing hospital modernization campaign. When completed, the new 150-bed hospital featured five "scientifically-equipped" operating rooms, private and semi-private rooms for up to four patients, central nursing stations on each floor, a fourth-floor maternity ward with three nurseries, a laboratory, an x-ray department, a medical library, and a kitchen. By 1955 the hospital staff included more than seventy physicians and fifty nurses.

Columbia, South Carolina architect Charles Coker Wilson's design for the four-story City Hospital erected on North Highland Street in 1923-1924 manifests classical architectural elements that evoke a sense of tradition and permanence. The imposing brick edifice features a metal cornice with a tall frieze below square modillions, a flat-roofed east entrance portico supported by paired Tuscan columns, and slightly recessed round-arched window surrounds on the facade's first story. The 1947 Nurses' School and Dormitory emulates the 1924 hospital's design in its Classical Revival features such as the tall wood cornice; the raised-panel door, five-pane sidelights, and fanlight within the main entrance's three-centered-arch surround; and the brick quoins at the building's corners.

Walter Hook and Associates of Charlotte, a firm with many mid-twentieth-century hospital commissions, designed the 1951 Gaston Memorial Hospital building, which displays the sleek lines, smooth facades, flat-roofed entrance canopies, and aluminum-framed plate-glass windows, doors, and curtain walls that characterize the Modernist design aesthetic and present an up-to-date image. The four-story, six-bay-wide addition that connects the 1924 and 1951 hospitals and the small emergency room wing that extends from the 1951 building's south elevation were constructed in 1957 and are almost identical in exterior appearance to the 1951 building's secondary elevations. The 1951 hospital's operating rooms and corridors in the surgical suites reflect progressive 1950s institutional design in their pale green spandrel glass tile wall sheathing, "non-conductive" composite floor tiles, built-in stainless steel and glass storage cabinets, and stainless steel swinging doors.

The City Hospital - Gaston Memorial Hospital continued to function at this location until moving to a new facility in 1973.

Historical Background

Gastonia's growth in the late nineteenth century encouraged five physicians to open new practices in town. Two of these men-Lucius Newton Glenn (1873-1964) from the Crowder's Creek area and Mecklenburg County native James Marshall Sloan (1870-1926) were subsequently among the founders of Gastonia's first hospital. J. M. Sloan graduated from Louisville Medical College in Kentucky and returned to North Carolina, where he settled in Gastonia in 1890 and traveled throughout the county as needed. L. N. Glenn began his practice in McAdenville in 1897 and moved to Gastonia in 1903.

In 1908, Drs. Glenn and Sloan partnered with Gastonia drugstore owner Frost Torrence and physicians McTyeire G. Anders and H. M. Eddleman to establish a hospital. The men contributed $200 each and secured $1,300 in loans to equip the facility, which initially occupied a former boarding house with ten rooms on West Airline Avenue opposite Gastonia's Southern Railway station. The hospital and the associated nurses' training school moved to the third, fourth, and part of the fifth floors of the Realty Building on West Main Avenue in 1911, but soon required additional space.

In 1923, the hospital's board of directors, which consisted of Fred L. Smyre, A. G. Myers, Thomas Lee Wilson, and Drs. Glenn and Sloan, began planning for the construction of a new hospital. Gastonia cotton merchant David M. Jones assisted with the institution's reorganization and facilitated the construction of the new building. The hospital board purchased two lots on North Highland Street for $14,000 and the Manufacturers Record, which reported new construction throughout the South, announced prolific Columbia, South Carolina architect Charles Coker Wilson had been awarded the design contract for the "City Hospital Ward." The Palmer-Spivey Company, a Charlotte-based general contractor, erected the four-story Classical Revival-style edifice at a cost of $162,000. The fireproof hospital was sheathed in variegated brick manufactured in Kingsport, Tennessee.

At the time the hospital opened, the first floor included administrative and doctors' offices, examination rooms, three private patients' rooms, a kitchen and dining room, and storage rooms. The second and third floors housed patients, while the fourth floor encompassed x-ray and operating rooms and the maternity ward. The building featured "commodious sun-parlors" on the north and south elevations, designed so that copper screens could be inserted in the window openings during warm weather and glazed windows during the winter. Other amenities included the most up-to-date sterilizing plant, x-ray, laboratory, and operatory equipment; emergency gas lighting; blanket warmers; linen and trash chutes; a dumb waiter system; telephone service in every room; and steam heat.

Drs. Sloan and Glenn continued to practice at the new location, which was intended to accommodate forty-six patients. The physicians' reputation as skilled surgeons led the Southern, Piedmont and Northern, and Chicago and Northwestern railways to designate the institution as their surgical hospital.

Jessie Maxwell Heaton, the first nurse to graduate from City Hospital's training school, remained the hospital's superintendent, a position she held from May 10^th, 1920 until her retirement on April 1^st, 1946. She also served as a surgical assistant and laboratory technician. Mary Lineberger was the assistant hospital superintendent. In addition to their other duties, the women facilitated the nursing school's operation in conjunction with the hospital. Fourteen nurses attended classes five nights a week in March 1924.

City Hospital was in dire need of additional space by the 1940s. The facility, which then had a capacity of seventy-nine patients, was sometimes so overcrowded that beds and cribs lined the halls. In hopes that public ownership would provide the means to improve conditions, Gaston American Legion Post No. 23, under the leadership of Commander Brown W. Wilson, coordinated a fundraising effort and purchased City Hospital from Dr. Glenn and his associates in 1946. Numerous individuals and organizations including the Gaston County Medical Society contributed to the hospital acquisition fund. The American Legion conveyed the property to Gaston County after changing the name to Gaston Memorial Hospital in honor of the county's approximately 330 World War II veterans, including Commander Wilson. A nonprofit corporation with a twelve-member board of trustees oversaw the hospital's management.

The new hospital administration immediately pursued accreditation for the nursing school, hiring Presbyterian College of Charlotte graduate Nancy Jenkins in September 1946 to organize a three-year program leading to registered nurse certification. The Gaston Memorial Hospital School of Nursing officially opened on January 15^th, 1947 under the direction of Clara Krueger and actively recruited high school graduates between the ages of eighteen and thirty to the three-year program. Tuition was free, although students paid an average of seventy dollars for textbooks. The nursing school provided lodging in the newly constructed dormitory, board, uniforms, and laundry service at no charge as well as a fifteen-dollar monthly allowance for each student's incidental expenses. In return, the young women worked six days (forty-eight hours) per week in addition to attending classes. After completing thirty months of classes and practical training in Gastonia, the students moved to Bellevue Hospital in New York, where they studied for six months prior to their final examinations.

The two-story dormitory behind the hospital housed students from 1947 until 1957, when a new residence hall was erected. The original building then served as hospital offices. Gastonia manufacturing companies including Textiles Incorporated and Threads Incorporated supported the education of young women with families employed at their mills by establishing nursing scholarships in 1960. The Gaston Memorial Hospital School of Nursing graduated 307 women by the time it closed in 1973.

A statewide initiative to update North Carolina's medical facilities began in 1945 in response to the Medical Care Commission's findings that most hospitals were inadequate. The Hill-Burton Act, a federal law enacted in 1946 and also known as the Hospital Survey and Construction Act, provided the means to facilitate hospital improvements nationally through a federal grant and loan program. The North Carolina General Assembly supplied matching funds in 1947 and 1949, and the North Carolina Medical Care Commission delineated statewide needs, determining that thirty-three counties had no hospitals and more than fifty percent of the state's counties contained insufficient facilities. With a goal of providing convenient and affordable treatment to all residents, regardless of their location or ability to pay for care, the Medical Care Commission created 103 hospital districts and approved 57 hospital expansion or construction projects under the auspices of the Good Health Plan by June 30^th, 1951. Communities including Lenoir, Burlington, North Wilkesboro, Smithfield, Greenville, Laurinburg, and Albemarle erected new 100-bed hospitals, most of which were executed in a streamlined Modern architectural style in an attempt to convey the most up-to-date image.

The Hill-Burton Act also provided financing for the construction of small community health centers and nurses' residences. Local municipal and county governments were required to provide funds to supplement the federal and state construction grants and loans, as well as to demonstrate their ability to maintain the proposed facilities. In addition to these initiatives to improve physical plants, the North Carolina General Assembly sponsored the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill's medical school expansion and established a revolving loan program to subsidize the salaries of young medical, dental, and nursing school students who made commitments to practice in rural areas for four years.

The Good Health Plan's success depended upon the collaborative efforts of medical professionals, community and political leaders, and private citizens. Big band leader Kay Kyser recorded a song called "It's All Up To You" with Frank Sinatra and Dinah Shore to generate public support for the plan and the tune dominated radio station playlists. Private donations were a significant component of the initiative.

Gaston County residents' fundraising campaign to match the federal and state funding allocated for the construction of a new wing at Gaston Memorial Hospital eventually contributed about $300,000 of the $1.2-million project cost. Walter Hook and Associates of Charlotte designed the four-story Modernist building and Robert S. Ormand of Bessemer City served as supervising architect. Gaston County awarded the construction contracts to Barger Construction Company of Mooresville (general contractor), Joe K. Mace Company of Hendersonville (heating, ventilating, and plumbing), Gaston Electrical Company of Gastonia, and Westinghouse Electric Corporation of Charlotte (elevator installation).

When completed in 1951, the new 150-bed hospital featured five "scientifically-equipped" operating rooms, private and semi-private rooms for up to four patients, central nursing stations on each floor, a fourth-floor maternity ward with three nurseries, a laboratory, an X-ray department, a medical library, and a kitchen. The first floor offered amenities including a large waiting room, a soda shop, and a pharmacy. The 1924 hospital's interior was renovated after patients were moved to the new facility.

Fred C. Hubbard Jr. served as the hospital administrator at the time of the new building's opening, supervising personnel including surgeons, physicians, nurses, technicians, pharmacists, and dieticians he deemed "the most competent and conscientious that could be found in any hospital." By 1955 the hospital staff included more than seventy physicians and fifty nurses.

Gaston Memorial Hospital was enlarged in 1957 by the construction of a four-story brick addition that connected the 1924 and 1951 hospital buildings. Patient rooms flanked the central corridors of the upper three floors, expanding the hospital's capacity by thirty beds. A one-story wing was erected on the 1951 building's south elevation at the same time, creating a new emergency room suite. R. H. Pinnix Construction Company of Gastonia served as the general contractor for the approximately $205,000 project, which also included renovations to the 1951 building's kitchen and other departments. The former operating suite on the 1924 building's fourth floor was converted into a physical therapy department.

In February 1957, soon after the addition was completed, the Duke Endowment awarded Gaston Memorial Hospital a $50,000 grant toward the construction of a new nursing school across the road from the hospital at 416 North Highland Street. These funds, in conjunction with a Ford Foundation grant and state and federal allocations, subsidized the new facility's $410,000 cost. The building encompassed classrooms, laboratories, dormitory rooms, a lounge, an assembly room, a library, and a kitchen. Nursing students moved into the facility in December 1957. Edna Perry served as the school's director and Louise Taylor oversaw the nurse education program at that time.

Gaston Memorial Hospital hired three African American nurses, the first to be employed by the institution, in 1963. Registered nurse Edna Jarvis graduated from Columbia General Hospital's nursing school in South Carolina, while licensed practical nurses Mary Charles Moore and Barbara Love were educated at a Charlotte nursing school.

Gaston County leaders began to plan for the construction of a new hospital in 1966, and a nine-story, 479-bed facility was completed in 1973. The county enclosed the windows in the hospital's 1924 wing and the 1947 nurses' dormitory shortly after 1973 to facilitate their new use of the space. The North Highland Street facility then housed the Gaston-Lincoln Mental Health Inpatient Clinic as well as other county departmental offices (Rural Police and Detectives, Probation and Parole, Transportation, Emergency Services, Recreation and Parks, Civil Defense, Fire Marshall, State Alcoholic Beverage Control Board) until 2005.

The Landmark Group and Rehab Builders began the adaptive reuse of the City Hospital - Gaston Memorial Hospital complex to serve as affordable housing in August 2011.

Building Description

City Hospital - Gaston Memorial Hospital is located northwest of downtown Gastonia at the northwest corner of North Highland Street and Mauney Avenue. The complex, which contains the 1924 City Hospital, the 1951 Gaston Memorial Hospital, and the 1957 addition that connects them, as well as a 1947 nurses' school and dormitory, occupies a 2.49-acre parcel owned by Gaston County. The area surrounding the hospital is primarily residential, but also contains commercial, institutional, and religious buildings.

The hospital's facade faces east toward North Highland Street and the nurses' building is oriented toward Mauney Avenue with the main entrance on its south elevation. Concrete sidewalks lead from the asphalt parking lots east and west of the buildings to the entrances. Brick, stone, and concrete retaining walls ameliorate the grade change in the landscaped areas and parking lots west of the 1924 building. A tall stone wall delineates the south end of the parcel's western property line. Landscaping includes deciduous trees and evergreen foundation plantings.

The hospital's original section, erected in 1924, stands at the northwest corner of North Highland Street and Mauney Avenue. The imposing four-story brick edifice is twelve bays wide and three bays deep and features Classical Revival-style elements including a flat-roofed east entrance portico with a denticulated cornice and paired Tuscan columns, a metal cornice with a tall frieze below square modillions, and slightly recessed round-arched surrounds on the facade's first story. The main block's remaining window openings have flat soldier-course lintels. All of the window openings in the 1924 building originally contained one-over-one double-hung sash.

The fourth story, which rises above the metal cornice, is slightly shorter than the lower three levels. A continuous soldier-course band surmounts the fourth-floor windows. Metal coping caps the flat parapet walls.

The east entrance door and sidelights are replacements and its transom has been enclosed with plywood. The brick quoin detail at the main block's south end is repeated on the west elevation's slightly projecting central stair and elevator tower bay. A flat-roofed metal canopy shelters the rear (west) entrance.

Shallow wings on the hospital's north and south ends initially served as sunporches and were illuminated by large double-hung windows flanked by narrow double-hung sidelights. Operable louvered shutters allowed for ventilation and light control. The third floor features segmental-arched window surrounds. The wings were initially only three stories tall, but a fourth floor was added above the cornice between 1930 and 1950, making them the same height as the main block. A one-story brick hyphen constructed in 1951 connected the 1924 and 1951 buildings, but was removed along with the north wing in 1956 to make room for the four-story addition between the two buildings, which was completed in early 1957.

The county enclosed the windows in the 1924 building and the 1947 nurses' school, removing the wood double-hung window sashes and frames and infilling the window openings with brick, shortly after the hospital moved to its new location in 1973 to facilitate their use of the space as offices. Metal single-leaf doors were installed in the south wing's central window bays and a four-story metal fire escape added at that time to provide an emergency exit.

The rehabilitation contractor removed the bricks from the facade and south elevation's second stories and the west elevation's first and second stories in late August 2011. The remaining windows will be opened during the course of the renovation, and one-over-one, double-hung, wood-sash windows that match those illustrated in a historic photograph will be installed throughout the building.

The 1924 building's interior has been remodeled several times, but the original floor plan remains substantially intact. The east entrance opens into a small foyer with a reception desk behind an aluminum-framed glass window on its south side. The long central corridor runs north/south and is flanked by offices, restrooms, storage rooms, and a mechanical room of various sizes. The first and second floors were used as county office space until 2005 and were thus updated with dropped acoustical tile ceilings, fluorescent lighting, commercial carpeting, and wallcoverings ranging from wallpaper to faux-wood sheet paneling. The door surrounds are original, but replacement doors have been installed in most locations and the transoms have been covered.

The third and fourth floors manifest a higher degree of integrity as they were utilized primarily as storage for many years. Most areas retain plaster walls and ceilings, wood baseboards, slightly recessed panels in the wood door and transom surrounds, and original wood doors. Many transoms are still operable. The vinyl tile floors were added and the bathrooms were updated as part of the 1951 and 1970s renovations. The building's exterior terra cotta block walls and interior wood-framed partition walls are visible in some areas with spalling and missing plaster. The room that historically served as an operatory at the fourth floor's northeast corner retains a small hexagonal tile floor and tile baseboards, while marble wainscoting sheaths the nearby bathroom's walls.

The four-story, brick, 1951 Gaston Memorial Hospital, erected north of the 1924 building, epitomizes mid-twentieth-century hospital construction. The expansive building is five bays wide and nineteen bays deep. The Modernist facade's three-bay central section projects slightly farther east than the 1924 hospital and then steps back, with the building's mass extending to the west. The variegated Roman brick veneer is laid in running bond with the exception of the cornice, which consists of concave header sections separated by stretcher columns, creating an undulating effect. Pre-cast concrete coping caps the flat-parapet walls.

Pre-cast concrete walls support the flat-roofed, copper-edged, reinforced-concrete canopy that shelters the facade's first story. The projecting entrance vestibule features an aluminum-framed, double-leaf, plate-glass door flanked by matching sidelights and a three-part transom. One original Modernist sconce with a black metal body and an opaque white glass globe remains on the door's north side. Pink marble wainscoting sheathes the vestibule's interior side walls.

Aluminum-framed curtain walls with large square glass panes illuminate the lobby. The curtain wall that wraps around the lobby's northeast corner is four panes tall and three panes wide on the east elevation and four panes wide on the north elevation. The curtain wall at the lobby's southeast corner was originally identical. Although this section remains the same height, the curtain wall's east elevation width has been increased to five panes and the south elevation enclosed.

The extra space created by the shorter curtain wall at the entrance vestibule's north end is open. A concrete pilaster and square concrete column support the canopy's north end. Central concrete steps and a concrete ramp with a metal railing provide access to the slate entrance terrace. The concrete planters at the terrace's outer edges serve a duel function as retaining walls.

Concrete is also used to frame the tall, narrow window bands on the projecting entrance bay's upper three floors. Each band encompasses three double-hung, aluminum-framed sash separated by two pale green spandrel panels.

The window openings on the 1951 building's side and rear elevations also contain aluminum-framed sash, but are more simply finished, with concrete sills serving as their sole embellishment. The window fenestration is regular with the exception of groups of six small, square, glass blocks that illuminate each level of the stair halls close to the north elevation's east end and the south elevation's west end. The site's grade slopes to the west, which allowed for the installation of basement windows and doors near the building's west end. Some of the window air conditioning units that cooled the building are still in place. Metal gutters move water from the roof to French drains around the building's perimeter.

The shallow two-story bay that extends from the 1951 building's rear (west) elevation is pierced by three windows on each of the upper two stories but the west wall is blind at the basement level, as the space, which is adjacent to the kitchen, originally contained refrigerators and food preparation areas. The sub-basement foundation wall is concrete. Concrete steps provide access to the below-grade sub-basement entrance.

A flat-roofed, copper-edged, reinforced-concrete canopy shelters the double-leaf entrance near the 1951 building's southeast corner. Concrete steps lead to a concrete landing outside the entrance. The entrance on the east side of the flat-roofed, one-story-on-basement emergency room wing that projects from the south elevation is protected by an identical canopy. Concrete steps and a concrete ramp with a metal pipe railing provide access to the doors that lead into the emergency room suite and the 1951 building. The emergency room wing was constructed in 1957, at the same time as the four-story, six-bay-wide addition that connects the 1924 and 1951 buildings. The 1957 additions are almost identical in exterior appearance to the 1951 building's secondary elevations.

The four-story 1957 connector's interior configuration is evident from the exterior. Pairs of aluminum-framed one-over-one sash windows with concrete sills illuminate each of the three patient rooms flanking both sides of the upper three floors' central corridors. The first floor's south elevation contains four windows in the three offices on the corridor's south side, while high horizontal windows light the canteen on the corridor's north side. A flat-roofed, copper-edged, reinforced-concrete canopy shelters the single-leaf entrance at the connector's northwest corner.

The 1957 emergency room wing's first floor encompasses an office, a sizable exam room, a medicine dispensary, a storage closet, and a restroom. The sloping grade also allowed for a full basement, accessed through a double-leaf door on the west elevation. The basement contains two large storage rooms and a transformer room.

The 1951 and 1957 buildings also have similar interior finishes including plaster walls, terrazzo floors and baseboards, and built-in closets, cabinets, lockers, and reception desks, many of which are still intact despite later remodeling campaigns and a series of fires. The 1951 hospital's basement encompassed storage areas, the autopsy room, and the kitchen. The first floor's eastern end served a primarily administrative function, with a rectangular corridor surrounding a central row of small rooms-an admitting room, a superficial therapy room, a waiting room, restrooms-as well as the elevator tower and a Stair hall. Parallel east-west corridors provided access to offices, a waiting room, and the canteen. The emergency room wing projected from the south elevation's center, and the floor's southwest corner contained the staff dining room, locker rooms, and lounges. The rooms lining the north elevation's west end housed laboratories, the radiology department, and the pharmacy. Stair halls near the building's northeast and southwest corners lead to the upper floors.

On the second floor, the rectangular corridor provided access to the central nurses' stations, utility rooms, and bathrooms, as well as the patient rooms lining the building's exterior walls. The third floor's east end also housed patients, while the west end contained operating, treatment, storage, and locker rooms. The fourth floor had a similar arrangement, with the west end serving as the maternity ward (labor and delivery rooms and nurseries).

The operating rooms and corridors in the surgical suites employed the most up-to-date design of the 1950s. The lower three-quarters of the walls are sheathed in pale green spandrel glass tiles, which was not only an easily disinfected surface but was intended to reduce glare and the potential for eye strain. The floors are "non-conductive" composite tile, which eliminated the danger of fire from equipment sparks. Steam and high-temperature instrument sterilizers, stainless steel warming cabinets for fluids and blankets, built-in stainless steel and glass storage cabinets, and stainless steel swinging doors in the surgical areas also contributed to the hospital's efforts to maintain a hygienic environment. These significant interior features are still intact.

Nurses' School and Dormitory, 1947

The two-story-on-basement brick nurses' school and dormitory stands on the west side of the 1924 hospital. The flat-roofed rectangular building is three bays wide and seven bays deep. The site's slope to the west allows the basement elevation to be fully exposed on the west elevation.

The nurses' school and dormitory emulates the 1924 hospital's design in its Classical Revival features such as the wood cornice with a tall frieze; the raised-panel door, five-pane sidelights, and fanlight within the main entrance's three-centered-arch surround; and the brick quoins at the building's corners. The sidelights have been covered with exterior wood panels and the fanlight with an interior panel for security purposes, but the panels will be removed during the rehabilitation.

An almost full-width, one-story, flat-roofed front porch supported by square brick posts spanned by a solid brick kneewall extends across the facade (south elevation). The porch retains its original wood cornice, beadboard ceiling, and a terra cotta tile floor. A matching portico shelters the rear (north) entrance bay. A double-leaf metal door and an aluminum-framed glass door provide access to the basement from the west elevation.

Flat soldier-course lintels surmount the first- and second-story windows and a continuous soldier-course band capped with an all-header band wraps around the building's north, west, and south elevations above the basement's windows and doors. The county removed the original double-hung wood-sash windows and enclosed the window openings with brick shortly after the hospital moved to its new location in 1973 to facilitate their new use of the space as offices. The rehabilitation contractor removed the bricks from the south and east elevation's second stories and the west elevation's first and second stories in late August 2011 and temporarily boarded up the openings. The remaining windows will be opened during the course of the renovation, and six-over-six, double-hung, wood-sash windows that match those illustrated in a historic photograph will be installed throughout the building.

The building's interior has been remodeled several times, but the original floor plan remains substantially intact. The south entrance opens into a small foyer and a central corridor that runs north/south to the rear entrance and is flanked by offices, restrooms, storage rooms, and conference rooms of various sizes. The building was used as county office space until 2005 and was thus updated with dropped acoustical tile ceilings, fluorescent lighting, commercial carpeting, and faux-wood sheet paneling on the walls. The door surrounds are intact, but the door opening size has been reduced and replacement doors installed at most locations. However, a few raised-horizontal-panel doors remain in closets and in the interior partition walls between rooms. The central, open stair, with its simple wood railing comprised of square newel posts, narrow rectangular balusters, and a molded handrail, is also original. The stair rises from south to north in a straight run. Some partition walls were added in the basement to create a mechanical room and storage rooms and the area was finished in the same manner as the first and second floors.