The Renaissance Neighborhood History Project

For folks who are as enraptured as I am with houses as I am, here is a place to archive house related content. I'll add to this as I get more suggestions and discover more content with houses as a main character!   READ The Yellow House:  A Memoir by Sarah M. Broom Winner of the 2019 National Book Award in Nonfiction A brilliant, haunting and unforgettable memoir from a stunning new talent about the inexorable pull of home and family, set in a shotgun house in New Orleans East. Red House:  Being a Mostly Accurate Account of New England's Oldest Continuously Lived-In House by Sarah Messer Sarah Messer explores America’s fascination with history, family, and Great Houses. Her Massachusetts childhood home had sheltered the Hatch family for 325 years when her parents bought it in 1965. The will of the house’s original owner, Walter Hatch—which stipulated Red House was to be passed down, "never to be sold or mortgaged from my children and grandchildren forever"—still hung

  East Dial Building Telephone technology has evolved exponentially such that, chances are, you may even be reading this on your phone.  A concept that would have been inconceivable for those living and working in 1929 when Southwestern Bell Telephone Company designed and built the East Dial Building in what we now call the Renaissance Neighborhood.   The elegant two-story building at 1204 S. Harvard Avenue features buff brick with ivory terracotta trim.   T he double front doors facing Harvard on the south end of the building are flanked by large lighted sconces and a large ornate awning above.    The motif lining the awning is of small robed human figures, hands connected, heads tilting down as if gazing on those who pass below.    Above the awning the ornate terracotta decoration continues consisting of more human figures, scrollwork, flowers, and a pair of shield wielding lions.    These are all classic art deco designs which are true to the period of the building.    East Dial Bui

Dorothy McCormick Dorothy McCormick moved into her home on Gary Avenue in 1936 at 7 years old.  P. Casey Morgan and I interviewed her about the house, neighborhood, events and her life.   As many of her stories were personal and she continued to live independently, it wasn’t possible to share them before now.  I’m sharing them now.  Dorothy passed away in 2021 and her home belongs to someone new.  In this blog post I am paraphrasing and organizing her words for chronology, flow and ease for the reader.  However, I have decided to share the recording of the original conversation with her, that took place in her home in October of 2019.    (See link at end of the post.)  Let’s make sure her 85 years on Gary Avenue isn’t forgotten. ***** Dorothy’s parents were William and Phoebe (Moulder) McCormick.  The McCormick’s would have been a family of five, but their first born son died in infancy.   Another son, Don was born and then Dorothy came along in 1929.   In 1936 the family was living in

  Mary Jane Perryman Plummer Over the course of her life, Mary Jane Perryman would know four husbands, give birth to seven children, bury two of them, relinquish all her land allotment and bear witness in a sensational murder trial. She would live to see the full development of her home and farm into a neighborhood dotted with 1920’s and ‘30’s brick cottages, all in a relatively short lifetime of sixty-five years.  Let’s get into it. ***** Mary Jane Perryman was born to Clarissa Hodge and Lewis W. Perryman on June 3rd, 1894. Mary Jane was the third of five children Clarissa and Lewis had together. Clarissa’s mother and sister were both named Mary Jane, so certainly she was named after one or both. Clarissa’s father was Alvin T. Hodge, a prominent Muscogee man, Tulsa judge and benefactor of land for Oaklawn Cemetery. Mary Jane’s father, Lewis W. Perryman, was a direct descendant of Benjamin Perryman who removed from Alabama to Oklahoma in the 1820’s and was an important Muscogee

  Part I:   Rosemont Heights Rosemont Heights was one of the earliest divisions or ‘additions’ of land that was graded, platted with lots for sale in what is now as the Renaissance Neighborhood.   It was platted in 1911.   Originally Muscogee Creek land, it was allotted to Mary Jane Perryman in the early 1900's.   Mary Jane  would have been about 17 years old in 1911.  She  had married young and by 1911 she and her first husband, John Robert Harkness, already had three children.   It would be very interesting to know how much she was paid for the property when purchased by a Mr. John P. Given.  According to her niece, Wavel Ashbaugh, interviewed in 2015 by Voices of Oklahoma, Native people were often taken advantage of with complex land contracts and white settlers"...didn't pay very much for it...".   The present-day boundaries of Rosemont Heights are Delaware Avenue to South Florence Avenue and Thirteenth Street to Fifteenth Street.   Note:   The original plats