John C. and Kate D. Griffith House (1467 Court St NE) Salem, Oregon
National Register of Historic Places Data
The John C. and Kate D. Griffith House (1467 Court St NE) has been listed on the National Register of Historic Places as part of the Court Street--Chemeketa Street Historic District. The following information has been imported from the National Register database and/or the Nomination Form . Please note that not all available data may be shown here, minor errors and/or formatting may have occurred during transcription, and some information may have become outdated since listing.
- National Register ID
- 87001373
- Date Listed
- August 26, 1987
- Name
- Court Street--Chemeketa Street Historic District
- Address
- An irregularly shaped area of appr. 38.57 acres bounded by the closures of Court Street & Chemeketa St. on the west, Mill Creek on the north & east, and on the south by the rear lot lines of properties on the south side of Court St.
- City/Town
- Salem
- County
- Marion
- State
- Oregon
- Category
- district
- Level of Sig.
- local
- Areas of Sig.
- EXPLORATION/SETTLEMENT; POLITICS/GOVERNMENT; ARCHITECTURE
Description
Text courtesy of the National Register of Historic Places, a program of the National Parks Service. Minor transcription errors or changes in formatting may have occurred; please see the Nomination Form PDF for official text. Some information may have become outdated since the property was nominated for the Register.
Assessor's Map 26BA 7-3W
Tax Lot 86010-140 Owners: Neil and M. J. McGill, 1467 Court Street, NE, Salem, OR 97301 Primary Contributing
This is a large, two-story vernacular Colonial Revival house with two-story bays at either side, forming a T-plan. The hipped roof extends beyond this T-form in broad eaves and encompasses the projection of the bay window above the front porch. The columned and balustraded porch extends the full width of the south-facing front of the house and wraps around to the east side.
Siding is clapboard, and most of the windows are double-hung sash; in contrast, some of the windows have criss-cross diagonal framing creating a diamond pattern.
A separate garage, presumably original, with a fan window above its entry stands to the rear of the house on the west side, facing south.
The front lawn is planted with flowers; a particularly beautiful street tree, a Japanese maple designated as a Heritage Tree in 1982, also stands in front.
History
Text courtesy of the National Register of Historic Places, a program of the National Parks Service. Minor transcription errors or changes in formatting may have occurred; please see the Nomination Form PDF for official text. Some information may have become outdated since the property was nominated for the Register.
The house was probably built for Dr. John C. Griffith, a dentist, and his wife, Kate Dalrymple Griffith. She was the daughter of J. J. Dalrymple, who came to Oregon from Massachusetts in 1866, went to work as a clerk in the general merchandise business of R. M. Wade, and later became a partner in this firm and a prominent merchant in Salem.
John C. Griffith was the son of the Waldo Hills pioneer, Lewis C. Griffith. Lewis Griffith had come to Oregon by wagon train in 1850 with his parents, who took up a donation land claim in the Waldo Hills. In 1858, Lewis Griffith married Susan Margaret Savage, daughter of Dr. John Savage, who with his family had come west on the same wagon train as the Griffiths and who also lived in the Waldo Hills. Lewis and Susan Griffith's son was John C. Griffith, who married Kate Dalrymple in 1895.
John and Kate Griffith probably built their house on Court Street that same year, and they are listed at this address in the 1896 Salem City Directory. The senior Dalrymples acquired the land in the 1890's, and the property was officially put in Kate Dalrymple Griffith's name in 1900. John C. Griffith died in 1919, leaving his widow and three children, Lewis, John, and Wallace.
The young Lewis, after his own marriage, lived in the house across the street at 1456 Court (cf. commentary on #13), where his son, John S. Griffith, was born and continues to live today. Kate D. Griffith lived in house #12 until 1944.
