REPORT ON DESIGNATION LPB 760/13

Name and Address of Property: Judge Ronald House -421 30 ^th Avenue South

Legal Description: Lots 5 & 6, block 17, Wood's Suppl. Plat of blocks 16 & 17, Burke's 2 ^nd Addition to Seattle, according to the plat thereof in volume 2 of plats, page 68, records of King County, Washington, Together with the vacated East 7 feet of alley adjoining, designated on the plat as Short Street South situated in the County of King, State of Washington.

At the public meeting held on November 20, 2013 the City of Seattle's Landmarks Preservation Board voted to approve designation of the Judge Ronald House at 421 30 ^th Avenue South as a Seattle Landmark based upon satisfaction of the following standard for designation of SMC 25.12.350:

B. It is associated in a significant way with the life of a person important in the history of the City, state or nation.

D. It embodies the distinctive visible characteristics of an architectural style, or period, or a method of construction.

F. Because of its prominence of spatial location, contrasts of siting, age, or scale, it is an easily identifiable visual feature of its neighborhood or the City and contributes to the distinctive quality or identity of such neighborhood or the City.

DESCRIPTION

INTRODUCTION

When Judge Ronald resigned from the King County Superior Court in 1949 after 40 years in that position, he was nearly 94 years of age--still carrying a full judicial schedule and competently doing the work he loved. A young attorney, J.T. Ronald moved with his wife and daughter to Seattle in 1882. Within a year, he was appointed King County Deputy District Attorney and was elected mayor in 1892. He became an advocate and recommended the purchase of land parcels for city-owned parks. He served on both the Seattle School Board and the University of Washington board of regents. In 1909, he gave up his lucrative law practice to accept the governor's appointment to the King County Superior Court. On the bench, he presided over the landmark Everett Massacre trial in 1916, and in the 1930s, issued orders to restrain Dave Back and his powerful Teamsters. Off the bench, he was instrumental in the movement to build a West Coast highway from Vancouver, B.C. to the Mexican border. Judge Ronald was known for his upstanding character and no-nonsense ethics. His observations and actions during the anti-Chinese riots and his stance against political corruption in Seattle's decades of explosive growth provide grist for enriched interpretations of our region's history.

Judge J.T. Ronald purchased the house on Rainier Street, now called 30th Avenue South, in 1889 and then renovated and expanded it into the unique Neoclassical mansion that you see there today. Renovations were completed by 1904, in time for his daughter, Eva's wedding in June of 1905. According to Ronald's granddaughter (Eva Benson's daughter), Betty Runstad, (1913-2008), this mansion was the hub of cultural and political events in Seattle's early history, as the site of concerts, lectures and meetings.

The house has been noted as historically significant in numerous newspaper articles, studies and publications including: Centennial Snapshots: Historic Places around King County from the First Twenty-five Years of Statehood (Lentz, 1991), Where the Washingtonians Lived : Interesting Early Homes and the People Who Built and Lived in Them (Lagehager & McDonald,1969), and listed as "Significant to the City" in Nyberg and Steinbreuck's Madrona, Leschi and Madison Park Inventory of Building and Design Resources (1975, Historic Seattle PDA)

Listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 1975, the current owner has undertaken efforts to restore the house and a City of Seattle Landmark Designation would make it possible to further these efforts and better protect the house from future deterioration and historically detrimental alterations.

PHYSICAL DESCRIPTION

Setting

The Ronald house is located on Rainier Ridge in the Leschi Neighborhood of Seattle on block 17 of Wood's Supplemental Plat of Burke's Second Addition to Seattle. Located just a block east of the Jackson Street commercial corridor, the house sits mid-block on the west side of 30th Avenue South between South Jackson Street and South King Street. Both sides of 30th Ave S on this block are primarily lined with large residences on landscaped lots. Frink Park is a block to the east where the ridgeline descends into steep wooded parklands that stretch toward the western shores of Lake Washington. An alley bisects the block from north to south behind the Ronald house and on the west side of the alley, facing onto 29th Ave S, is a large 2-story apartment building dating to 1967. The Central Area Senior Center, constructed in 1959, is located less than a block away at the southeast corner of 30th Ave S. and S. King St. The institutional campus sits on the entire northern portion of the block.

Site

The Ronald House is situated toward the north side on its double lot which is 90 feet wide at 30th Ave S and 112 feet deep. Two large, mature trees, a Big Leaf Maple and an Elm, are on the parking strip in front of the house. The lot is relatively flat and sits a few feet above the grade of the sidewalk at the front and meets the street grade at the alley in the rear, west. A paved parking area for 3 cars is at the rear, southwest corner of the lot and is accessible from the alley. The landscaped yard is enclosed by a low white wood balustraded fence that matches the Neoclassical style of the house. The fence is situated on top of a low rock wall along the front sidewalk to make up for the difference in the grade. An opening in the fence allows access to a wide paved walk that leads to the front porch entry. The yard has lawn and is landscaped with both mature trees, smaller trees and evergreen and flowering shrubs, and other ornamental plantings around the foundation, in landscaped beds and around patios and decks. A large mature walnut tree is near the southwest corner of the house on the southwest edge of a patio and a row of tall evergreen shrubs forms a hedge along the rear, west fence line. A small shed is near the southwest part of the property, adjacent to the parking area.

Exterior

The Judge Ronald House is a two-story frame building on a brick and concrete foundation with detailing reminiscent of Neoclassical Revival style that was influenced by the Beaux Arts movement following the World's Columbian Exposition of 1893. Neoclassical style was a sub-type of the Eclectic movement that also fused earlier Classical and Greek Revival styles popular in the earlier part of the nineteenth century.

The house is basically square in plan with a truncated and bellcast hip roof. The exterior is clad in HardiePlank fibercement lap siding and the roof is clad primarily in asphalt composition shingles with a small section of tar down cladding on the flat surface where the widow's walk once was. Windows are vinyl sash, including a mix of 12-over-one sash, 9-overone sash, one-over-one sash, and fixed sash. Most of the central portion of the front facade is behind a two story pedimented portico supported by four fluted columns, each with plinth, base and composite capital. Above the columns rests an architrave-frieze box and wide cornice arrangement fairly correct in terms of the composite order, with dentils and scroll sawn soffit decoration. The porch ceiling is recessed flush with the overhanging soffit. In the triangular recess of the pediment there is a semicircular fanlight with a decorative keystone in the enframement. The pediment is the end of a gable roof covering the portico that continues back with its ridge joining the main roof level with the truncation. There is a corresponding bellcast at the cornice on the gable which has the same overhang and detail as is continued around the main roof. The deck of the portico is at the head of a short stairs that extends across the full width in front. Running in between the outside columns and the front wall of the building is a railing with turned balusters and baserail.

Directly behind the outside edges of the two central columns is a rectangular one-story enclosure extending the formal entrance hall a few feet forward from the remaining wall plane. The original leaded transom glass remains above the front door and its sidelights. On top of the projecting entrance is a second story balcony, its cornice overhanging about a foot in front with large scrollwork brackets at the outside corners and smaller brackets in between. Directly above the large brackets, newel posts surmounted by urn finials support a balustrade similar in design to the others previously described. A true divided light glass door with an arched upper section leads out onto the facade's second story balcony.

All of the windows on the front elevation are symmetrically placed, one above another at generally frequent intervals. The first floor windows have 12-over-one light vinyl sashes and second floor windows have 12-over-one and 9-over-one vinyl sashes. The heads of second floor windows all abut the frieze above. The band of first floor windows is enhanced by alternating triangular and semi-circular shallow pediments.

The north side elevation features a two story bay that is square on the second story and has canted corner windows on the first story. A small shed-roof pantry addition is at the junction of the exterior wall and the northeast corner of the bay. Bay windows have groups of three one-over-one sash with single sashes on the sides.

The west rear elevation has a large deck and arbor structure projecting from the northwest corner of the house and a Juliet balcony projecting from the second-story above the French doors that lead from the house to the deck. A square two-story tower-like bay projects from the center of the facade and at the southwest corner is a one-story shed-roof addition with basement that projects slightly beyond the tower section. Windows include sliding sash and larger fixed sash types.

The south side elevation has a newer wood deck projecting from the center with paired stairs at each end that align with the single doors leading into the living room and flank the fireplace on the interior. The doors are panel doors with divided lights in the upper half. Rising from the roof just above and behind the south wall of the house is a substantial chimney with decorative string courses and a corbelled cap. Facing south flanking the chimney is a pair of small dormers.

Interior

The interior retains some of its original features, though it has undergone numerous alterations over the years. The first floor is organized around a basic central hallway and front stairs plan. To the left upon entering, is a long great room/living room. The wide entrance to the room has a fluted column on either side with capitals that match the exterior front capitals. The fireplace mantel with dog-ear and floral ornamentations are original. The dentil moulding on the inside of the entrance to this room is original. The leaded glass that constitutes the front secondary entrance door and interior sidelights and transoms of the secondary entrance is all original, as is the dentil moulding above this glass. Dentil mouldings in the dining area are original. To the right upon entering is a music/library room that was once Judge Ronald's study and library. The original oak fireplace surround is intact and includes a wide mirror and glazed tiles surrounding the opening and on the hearth.

A large study/family room is in the rear, southwest corner of the first floor and a large kitchen is in the rear northwest corner of the first floor. Behind the central stair, between the study and kitchen, is a bathroom and a pantry separated by a short hallway. To the right of the pantry, in the southwest corner of the kitchen, is a French door leading to a deck and the backyard.

The second floor is arranged around the central stair with a hall on either side of the stair. Three bedrooms are located off of the north hall and aligned along the north side. A door on the west end of this hall leads to a small Juliet balcony. Three rooms are located along the south hall and are aligned along the southwest side, southeast corner, and east side of the house. The east room between the northeast and southeast corner rooms is smaller and has a door leading to the balcony that is above the front porch. Two bathrooms are centrally located on the rear, west part of the second floor.

Alterations

The main doorway was originally surrounded by colored, leaded glass sidelights and transom lights. The original transoms remain; however, the sidelights have been replaced with clear glass.

On the south side of the house there was originally a semicircular one-story open porch-balcony combination extending across most of the south wall and skirted all around with semicircular steps. The details included columns, entablature and balustrade of the same style as on the front portico; however, this porch has been removed. There is currently a porch/deck that extends off of the south side of the house in its place.

At one time there was an open walk, sometimes called a "widow's watch," with balustrade crowning the main roof and a one-story addition was built in the rear of the house in 1982. Sometime before 2002, the original six-over-one wood sash windows were replaced with vinyl sash windows.

Since 2006, restoration work to the exterior has been undertaken by the current owner. The original narrow clapboard siding had been covered with aluminum siding in the early 1960's, and as a result the corner mouldings and the frieze were covered over, and the window enframements were removed. In 2006 the aluminum was removed and replaced with a narrower HardiePlank fiber-cement siding. Additionally, the window enframements, including the pediments and sills, were restored, as were the other decorative mouldings and the original frieze was revealed once again.

A Juliet balcony was added to the second story, rear, west facade at an opening that previously was an egress for exterior non-original stairs and landings that had been removed.

STATEMENT OF SIGNIFICANCE

Leschi Neighborhood History

The Ronald house is located on Rainier Ridge in the Leschi Neighborhood of Seattle on block 17 of Wood's Supplemental Plat of Burke's Second Addition to Seattle. The Leschi neighborhood is located east of the Central District, south of Madrona Park, north of the Mount Baker neighborhood, and west of Lake Washington, which it borders. The neighborhood was named after the Nisqually Chief Leschi (1808-1858), who had been involved in the Battle of Seattle between settlers and local Indians in 1856 and was later hanged for his involvement.

Development of logging roads along old Indian trails made the area more accessible to pioneers and day-trippers and eastside farmers used these routes and portage sites that had been established by the natives to transport produce to Seattle along the early wagon roads.

In 1870 Seattle's population was only 1,107 according to the census. At that time travel to and from Pioneer Square to outlying areas was difficult via the few unimproved wagon roads and many pioneers still traveled by foot. The majority of residences were located in the Pioneer Square business district which was also the hub of shipping and commercial industries.

The first plat on the logged hillsides east of Pioneer Square was the Edes and Knight plat. It was platted during the Territorial Period in 1870 and encompassed 40 blocks from 10th to 20th Avenues between Cherry and Union Streets. Other areas further south were also platted in the 1870s. Additional plats and significant development of these plats into suburban residential areas did not begin until transportation routes from Pioneer Square improved in the 1880s.

With the anticipation of the arrival of the Transcontinental Railroad, the town began to grow steadily, reaching a population of 3,533 by 1880. The 1880s marked the beginning of a population and development boom spurred by the arrival of the railroad in Tacoma in 1883 with extensions and service to Seattle expanded in the following years. In that decade the population grew to 42,837.

Burke's Second addition to the City of Seattle was platted in 1883 and encompassed much of the area along the Lake Washington waterfront that became the Leschi neighborhood. Wood's Supplemental Plat of blocks 16 and 17 to Burke's Second Addition was established south and west of the Burke's second addition in 1887. The following year the Lake Washington Cable Railway established a streetcar line from Pioneer Square to Lake Washington along Yesler and Jackson streets to Lake Washington, where a ferry landing took passengers across the lake to the Eastside. The transportation improvements spurred residential development of the area. Within a year over 1,500 new homes were constructed along the railway line and Seattle's first real estate boom was underway. The development of the Leschi neighborhood was part of this early street-car suburban development period that continued into the early part of the 20 ^th century. By 1893 a community with a school and stores had grown up in the vicinity of South Jackson Street and 26th Avenue South. This commercial district still retains some of the older buildings from the early street-car era development of the neighborhood.

Essentially the streetcar connection to Lake Washington, through Leschi, was the first network of a significant intermodal transportation route linking downtown to the eastside. Besides the commercial benefits, it became a significant route as a recreational pursuit for locals who enjoyed the views and amenities of the lake and the subsequent development of parks and amusements on the steep hills and on the lake shores. Leschi Park attractions included a casino, gardens, boat rentals and a zoo. The sternwheeler Leschi was one of the early ferries operating from the piers beginning in 1900. It carried both foot passengers and automobiles across the lake and was the last ferry operating on the lake until the 1940s.

Numerous additional electric railway lines were quickly developed by real estate entrepreneurs eager to bring buyers to their newly developed plats in outlying areas. As the street railway systems continued to be extended to outlying areas, residential development boomed in these areas and commercial development centered along the transportation routes.

John McGilvra developed an electric street railway on Madison Street in 1890, linking Downtown and Elliott Bay with Lake Washington. He also developed the Madison Park shore with piers and bathing facilities and other amusements as public amenities to attract new property owners to his lake front properties. Later, a ferry landing at Madison Park extended transportation connections to areas east of Lake Washington from the piers. Both Madison Park and Leschi Park were eventually developed as part of the parks and boulevards system planned by the Olmsted Brothers firm.

There was a brief lull in development during the economic downturn of the Panic of 1893, but the Klondike Gold Rush of 1897 spurred the local economy again. By that time both the Great Northern and Northern Pacific Railroads had reached Seattle and prospectors and immigrants began pouring into the city. By 1900 the city's population reached 80, 671. Census data for that year noted 11,872 dwellings to house them, most of which were single family residences.

In 1905 Henry Seaborn established a marina on Lake Washington and in 1906 John Frink donated Frink Park to the City. Frink had established the Washington Iron Works and like many of his contemporary business colleagues that were shaping the early economic and physical landscape of the city, established a fashionable residence in the Leschi neighborhood.

In the early part of the 20th-century Seattle began to develop into a modern metropolis. The streetcar system became consolidated and municipal utilities were developed to provide improved transportation, including paved roads, and to provide communities with electricity, water and other modern amenities. The 1909 Alaska-Yukon-Pacific Exposition drew yet more newcomers to the city.

In anticipation of the 1909 Alaska-Yukon-Pacific Exposition various city improvements were undertaken, including enhancements to Frink Park. The Olmsted Brothers parks and boulevard plan, beginning in 1903, also influenced the development of Leschi Park and Lake Washington Boulevard, linking several parks and residential developments along Lake Washington. The recreational amenities were a destination point for local urban dwellers and an especially appealing destination for visitors seeking to enjoy the natural beauty of the Pacific Northwest, during the AYPE. In 1909, Leschi Elementary School was built on a portion of Henry Yesler's Donation land Claim. The Jacobean Revival style school was expanded in the 1960s and then demolished in 1988 when a new building was constructed.

Although increases in population were less dramatic in the following years, the metropolis experienced continued significant population and economic growth up through the prosperous 1920s.

After the construction of the floating bridge across Lake Washington in 1940 ferries ceased operating on the lake within a few years and the demise of the streetcar system occurred at about the same time. The wooded hills and parks and boulevards of the Leschi neighborhood continued to provide opportunities for relaxation and recreation with majestic views, but at a more leisurely pace. The predominately residential neighborhood with recreational parks and lakefront marinas has not undergone any dramatic changes since the mid-century. The character of the development of the area was primarily influenced by its geographic features, views, lake shore access and transportation connections. Today the parks and marinas serve less as destination points for urban citydwellers and more as neighborhood amenities.

Judge James T. Ronald

James T. Ronald was born in Missouri in 1855. By his family's account he was a descendent of Ronald, Lord of the Isles and Edith of Lorne who were central figures in Sir Walter Scott's epic poem, "Lord of the Isles." His parents were of Scotch and Irish descent. Both were born in Virginia and moved separately to Missouri.

Ronald was the son of a poor farmer living in primitive circumstances. His family was nearly self-sufficient, growing their own food while spinning and weaving flax and wool for clothing. In his memoirs, Ronald describes his childhood in minute detail including the farming and craft methods of his parents. He tells of exchanging eggs for calico at the store, systematically avoiding the paper money then in circulation known derisively as "shinplasters."

He studied at North Missouri State Normal School at Kirksville, where he met the girl who would later become his wife. After graduating at the age of 20 in 1875, he borrowed $150 and departed for California, seeking work as a teacher. After a series of bitter disappointments following up leads that sent him traveling all over California, in a state of depression with only 15 cents remaining, he stumbled across a position in a one room school at Danetown. This was a small farming community where they were only able to pay him a subsistence salary of $50 per month, less than half the prevailing compensation. Rotating his lodging from family to family provided his room and board.

Ronald left this job after one year and transferred from district to district---eventually securing a paying position. He then wrote to his fiancee in Missouri, requesting that she come to California to be married. For reasons of economy he asked that she travel alone without his returning to Missouri to accompany her, "advising her truthfully that such was quite a usual, economical and practical step in the West." Although their fares would have cost three times as much, she refused to journey without him on the grounds of propriety. Eventually she did make the trip in the company of an older mutual friend who was able to go back to Missouri for his own wedding. The friend and his new bride were able to convince her that this arrangement was considered perfectly acceptable in California, under the circumstances. The Ronalds were married in Greenville on March 4, 1877. Their first child was born in 1879.

Ronald soon undertook the study of law, reading on his own time in the offices of Cheyney and Bruner. During this period he was elected principal for the public schools in Lincoln, a town north of Sacramento. He failed the bar exam in 1881 but passed in 1882.

The Ronald family moved to Seattle in July of 1882, traveling on a six-day voyage aboard the "Geo. W. Elder." As Ronald wrote in his memoirs, "We took a room... up among the stumps on Fifth [Avenue] between Union and Pike Streets." About a month later they shared a small cottage on 10th St. (now Avenue) with a young couple they had met on the boat.

Ronald promptly formed a law partnership with W.D. Wood. Their combined equipment consisted of one small, second-hand table with four plain chairs and two copies of the Code of Washington Territory. There were 43 lawyers then practicing in Seattle, and business was extremely slow. He lost his first two cases, one a contingency claim defending a man for beating a woman. He sold real estate and kept books for a local meat market to keep up with expenses. Mr. Wood then quit the partnership declaring, "Ronald, I don't believe you will ever make a lawyer---I don't think that you are cut out for one."

Ronald was appointed Deputy District Attorney in 1883 at a salary of $20 per month to be paid from divorce fees. By the arrangement then in effect, the District Attorney went unpaid if sufficient fees were not collected. In two years he received less than $100.

During these years he caused the arrest of Lou Graham, Seattle's most notorious madam, and the trial that ensued was a free-for-all with little attention paid to legal niceties. At one point Ronald was so provoked that he struck the defense attorney in the face.

The district was subdivided by the Territorial Legislature in 1883, reduced from its earlier mammoth proportions, and Ronald was elected District Attorney for King, Kitsap and Snohomish Counties at a guaranteed salary of $125 per month.

He was the prosecutor following the anti-Chinese riots of 1885-86, during which Chinese were driven from their homes in many Northwest cities. Some Chinese had been killed and public sentiment supported the murderers. The only convictions that Ronald was able to obtain were on charges of riot. The situation steadily worsened to the extent that martial law was declared by the Governor. A grand jury was convened and it was Ronald's responsibility to prepare the evidence.

During his second term as District Attorney in 1887, he formed a law partnership with S.H. Piles. Piles also served as Deputy Prosecutor without salary. The firm prospered.

Following the expiration of his second term in office, Ronald was retained by striking miners to defend them against charges of murdering non-union members in Newcastle, a mining community near Seattle. During the trial, Seattle's business district was nearly consumed by the devastating fire of 1889. In the attempt to remove what they could to safety, "trucks" (wagons) charged and collected as high as $100 an hour. Ronald's belongings were moved to safety by twenty of the striking miners who returned several times to move his books and furniture as the fire advanced, repeatedly threatening locations earlier thought secure. The miner's help was unsolicited, and they asked for no compensation.

Following the fire Ronald purchased the home on Rainier Street, now called 30th Avenue South, in the Leschi neighborhood of Seattle, that is the subject of this nomination. He remodeled and expanded the house at a cost purported to be $30,000---a considerable amount of money at that time.

In 1892 Ronald was elected Mayor of Seattle as a Democrat. This began, he wrote, "the two years of the most unhappy experiences of my whole life." Upon election, the chief of police attempted to bribe the new mayor in an attempt to prevent closure of the many thriving gambling establishments and houses of prostitution. The chief suggested that only favored individuals be allowed to operate, paying a percentage of their take for the privilege. Ronald refused to cooperate, forced the chief to resign, and proceeded to close down the illegal casinos and brothels with the assistance of a new police chief. Even the "respectable" businessmen pressured him privately to relax the enforcement policy, claiming that it discouraged commerce and forced sailors and "traveling men" to stop at other ports where such pleasures were permitted.

There were also many problems associated with patronage jobs and political appointments. Mayor Ronald was not partisan enough to satisfy those who had helped elect him, while at the same time he was subjected to the traditional abuse of the spirited opposition. Newspapers printed allegations of corruption, inferring collusion with the same powerful criminals that he publicly denounced.

Seattle was suffering from a severe economic depression during Ronald's administration, and in an attempt to provide work for local married men with families, he issued a regulation specifying that hiring preference should be given family men on a $350,000 sewer bond project. However, he was unable to gain the cooperation of entrenched subordinates who had already assumed patronage powers of their own. This program was a failure.

Although the records of Ronald's term as mayor are shrouded in controversy, respected historian Clarence Bagley wrote only words of praise in 1916. It is probable that the story as told in Ronald's memoirs is basically an accurate account.

As a result of the by then worldwide depression of 1893, the period following his mayoralty was one of great financial hardship for the family, which by then included three daughters. Economic conditions gradually improved and so in turn did his legal practice. Eventually Ronald was appointed to the Seattle School Board and the Board of Regents, University of Washington, serving from 1905 to 1909, at which point he was appointed Superior Court Judge for King County by Governor Hay. He presided for 40 years at the bench, retiring in 1949.

In addition to his legacies in Seattle, Judge Ronald's donations and efforts aided considerably to the growth of Shoreline, Washington. Many places in Shoreline came to be named after him, including Ronald Methodist Church, Ronald Voting Precinct, Ronald Place (the brick road), Ronald Sewer District, Ronald Bog, Ronald Station, Ronald Neighborhood and Ronald Room at the Shoreline Center. The historic Ronald School was established in 1906 on property that Ronald had donated. As the community expanded, a new brick school with a bell tower was built in 1912, (with Judge Ronald donating the bell) and an addition was made to it in 1926. In 1951 a separate school building, dubbed "the new Ronald School" was built next door.

Mrs. Ronald died in 1923, and Judge Ronald died on December 27, 1950.

Later Ownership / Occupancy

The house at 421 30th Avenue South (originally Rainier St.) was built between 1888 and 1889. 1889 is the first year that the King County Tax Records show the improvement to the lot. The improvements that year were appraised at $800. According to an article in the Seattle Times, October 22, 1944, the house originally had about three rooms upstairs and two downstairs. Judge Ronald hired an architect from Virginia and had the house remodeled and expanded in the Neoclassical style. Judge Ronald sold the house circa 1930 during the Great Depression. He claimed the home was too big and lonely for him in his memoirs, and he wanted to be closer to the downtown courthouse where he worked. Over the years there have been many interior alterations to the house, and many different uses. According to the same article, "First, a family named Babcock turned it into a boarding house---evidently a very select one. After some time, the building passed into other hands and each owner ran a boarding house... The present owner [1944] is Mrs. Alia Tyrrell, and she runs the house for Boeing workers---all males." In 1944 Mrs. Tyrrell applied for and received permits for alterations to her rooming house. The architectural drawings are on file at the DPD downtown Seattle, and they show how part of the living and also the dining room were converted into bedrooms. Later the house became a daycare center with apartments, a halfway house for men newly released from prison called Ronald Hall. A Seattle Times Article, August 24, 1966 describes how "In-as-Much House" was going to buy the Judge Ronald House, then referred to as Ronald Hall, to create a halfway house for newly released prison inmates.

Later the house served as a home for women, then a drug rehabilitation center run by a church group as the Washington Drug Rehabilitation Center in the 1980s.

Neoclassical Architecture

The Eclectic movement of the 19th-century and 20thcentury was inspired by academic eclecticism of European-trained architects who began to design period houses for wealthy clients. These Beaux Arts-trained architects drew on the architectural traditions of the past for stylistic inspiration which stressed relatively pure copies of these traditions as they were originally built in Europe or in the New World colonies. Variations of eclectic styles included Italian Renaissance, Chateauesque, Tudor, Colonial Revival, Neoclassical and Beaux Arts.

Neoclassical style became extremely fashionable particularly after the World's Columbian Exposition of 1893, which stressed historically correct interpretations of European styles and featured many prominent state pavilions with dramatic colonnaded buildings. These drew heavily on earlier Classical Revival and Greek Revival styles that had been popular in the first half of the 19th-century, but with more elaborate porchsupport columns, cornices, doorways, and windows. The style was especially popular with the wealthy elite eager to display their status with the most fashionable architect-designed residences of the time.

Identifying features include a facade dominated by a fullheight porch supported by classical ornate columns with Ionic or Corinthian columns and a facade with symmetrically balanced windows and center door. Most commonly the porch does not extend the full length of the facade, with a classical pediment and gabled roof similar to early Classical Revival and Greek Revival styles.

In houses built before 1920, porch support columns are commonly fluted and have ornate Ionic or Doric capitals. Doors commonly have elaborate, decorative surrounds. Neoclassical houses typically have a boxed eave with a moderate overhang, frequently with dentils or modillions beneath and often a wide frieze band beneath the cornice loosely based on Greek Revival precedents. Windows are rectangular with double-hung sashes with multi-pane or single-pane upper sash and a single-pane lower sash. The presence of bay windows, paired windows, triple windows (except Palladian types), transomed windows and arched windows distinguish Neoclassical from Greek Revival and Early Classical Revival styles. Many elaborations found on these earlier styles also appear on Neoclassical examples, but roof-line balustrades, in particular, are much more common in Neoclassical houses.

The Neoclasssical style was a dominant style for residential architecture at the turn-of-the-century but was never as popular as the closely related Colonial Revival style. During its early employment hipped roofs and elaborate, correct columns were emphasized, up until the 1920s. Later, Neoclassical houses more often had side-gabled roofs and simpler, more slender columns from the 1920s until midcentury. Other Eclectic styles were becoming more popular beginning in the 1920s.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

NOTE: A great deal of the content of this nomination was drawn from the National Historic Register nomination prepared by Margaret A. Corley of the Seattle Historical Society in June, 1969.

City of Seattle Department of Planning and Development, permit data.

Corley, Margaret: National Register Nomination Form for Judge James T. Ronald House, 1969.

Dodrill, Beth: City of Seattle Landmark Nomination for 1523 E. Madison Street, 2013.

King County Tax Assessor Files online property tax records http://www5.kingcounty.gov/iMAP/viewer.htm?mapset=kcproperty

King County Tax Assessor Property Record Cards and Tax Roll Files. Washington State Archives, Puget Sound Regional Branch

Kroll Atlas of Seattle, c. 1926

"In-as-Much House Plans to Buy Home," Seattle Times Article, August 24, 1966, page 66.

Lentz, Flo. Centennial Snapshots: Historic Places around King County from the First Twenty-five Years of Statehood. National Park Service, 1991.

McAlester, Virginia and Lee. A Field Guide to American Houses. New York, NY: Alfred A. Knoph, 2005.

McDonald, Lucile. Where the Washingtonians Lived. Seattle: Superior Publishing Company, 1969.

Nyberg, Folke and Victor Steinbrueck. An Inventory of Buildings and Urban Design Resources: Madrona, Leschi and Madison Park. Seattle: Historic Seattle, 1975.

Ronald, Judge J.T., edited by Mildred Tanner Andrews. Reflections Along the Wayside of Life. Shoreline Historical Museum, 2003; originally written in 1926.

Strachan, Margaret Pitcairn. "Early Day Mansions No.8-Judge James T. Ronald," Seattle Daily Times, October 22, 1944;pp.3439.

Sanborn Fire Insurance Maps of Seattle, c. 1893 ; c. 19001905.

Seattle Neighborhoods: Leschi -Thumbnail History: HistoryLink.org Essay 3434

Other sources:

Interviews with Betty Runstad, Ronald's granddaughter, conducted by Jeffrey Moidel, 2004.

Eva Ronald Benson's unpublished auto-biography, privately printed, courtesy of Betty Runstad, copies at the University of Washington Library, "Eva Ronald Benson Papers," 1978.

Runstad-Benson Family Papers (news clippings, photographs, memorabilia, correspondence)

The features of the Landmark to be preserved include: the site and the exterior of the building.

Issued: November 21, 2013

Karen Gordon

City Historic Preservation Officer

Cc: Jeffrey Moidel

Meredith Wirsching, Chair, LPB

Diane Sugimura, DPD

Alan Oiye, DPD

Ken Mar, DPD

2

Administered by The Historic Preservation Program The Seattle Department of Neighborhoods

Judge Ronald House Landmark Designation Photos