Gustavus Holmes House Astoria, Oregon

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 Some information may have become outdated since the property was nominated for the Register.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 Gustavus Holmes House, constructed in 1892, is located in an area known as Uppertown.
The massive Queen Anne/Eastlake styled house has retained a high degree of integrity,
having been occupied by only two families since its construction.

Oriented to the West, the property occupies Lots 7 and 8 of Block 37, Adairs Port of
Upper Astoria Addition, Astoria, Clatsop County, Oregon, and is otherwise known as
Tax Lot 1000, 150 feet square in dimension, located in the NE 1/4 of the SW 1/4 of Section 9,
Township 8 North, Range 9 West of the Willamette Meridian.

The two and one-half story mass is 42 x 52 feet in plan. Of balloon-frame construction,
the exterior is covered in numerous variations of horizontal, vertical and diagonal
wood sheathing. Various horizontal belt courses delineate floor separation, sill and
lintel placement, and cornices.

Many of the windows in this house are partially or totally built of stained glass and
many of these are leaded. Others are of etched glass and almost all of them are high,
narrow one-over-one sash windows, but the ones in the squared bay to the northwest are
wide undivided glass, probably built that way to give residents inside an unobstructed
view of the Columbia River bar, Cape Disappointment and the town of Astoria, all lying
to the northwest of the house.

Exterior textural interest is provided by the numerous projecting bays and towers. A
characteristic slanted-bay projection appears on the north elevation. It is decorated
with sawn, pierced brackets, drop ornament, carved window frames and corner boards,
various panels and board and batten siding. Variations of this decorative scheme appear
in the center (west) gable above the porch, and in the less projecting gable on the south.

The house is dominated by a square tower on the northwest corner, set at a 45° angle to
the massing of the house. Its elongated hipped-roof complements the main hipped-roof
and gables on the house, all of which are covered in composition shingle. On the southwestern corner, an equally interesting slanted oriel bay appears, topped by a tented
roof structure. Another gable hipped-roof wing appears to the east and there, the house
exterior is somewhat plainer. There are two one-over-one windows on the second floor,
but on the first, a lattice-work covered porch area to the south hides these.
Attached to this part of the house is a double garage, also decorated with
lattice work to match the old part of the house. There are a total of two tall chimneys
projecting from the roof.

Of particular interest is the west elevation porch. Circular patterned panels, pierced
screens, turned posts and balusters, sawn brackets and attached ornament provide an
Eastlake pattern, below which appears a latticed surround. The house is currently
painted white.
There is a concrete basement under the house which was dirt-floored when the house was
first built in 1892. A stairway leads down from the lattice-covered back porch.
There is a concrete drive leading from the southwest corner of the lot to the double
garage in the rear which has been added in recent years. Originally, a garage stood at
the corner of the lot.

A unique feature of this house is the entry hall which has two sets of double doors,
glassed with transoms above. One opens to the vestibule and the other to the central
hallway. This is a practical feature in a house which faces directly into the path of the Pacific
Northwest's famous storms.

Perhaps no other Victorian era residence in the historic city of Astoria has been so
little changed through the years. All of the moldings, doors, windows and other trim
in the house are original. Even the wallpaper in the dining room above the wainscoting
is original and is an odd textured type of paper resembling today's leatherette. Many
of the original furnishing were sold with the house and remain there today giving
Gustavus Holmes House an authentic air.

The main hallway on the first floor runs east and west with a staircase at the east end
leading up in three flights to the second floor. On the first landing, there is a
doorway leading into a small office. There is a second office with a partition eight feet
high with etched glass for privacy. The top of this partition is decorated with
extensive spindlework, and is located at the front of the house.

The living room with an interior corner fireplace, is on the northwest end of the front
of the house, and on the southwest end is the parlor, both separated by the main hallway. The fireplace has a decorated cast iron door and is original. It is very shallow and
probably burned coal.

The dining room with wainscoting is east of the living room with a connecting door to
the kitchen behind that. Huge pocket doors connect the living and dining rooms. East
of the parlor are two rooms which were once the serving room and the pantry, but which
today serve as bathrooms.

There are bedrooms on the second floor in each of the northwest and southwest corners,
and another to the east of both of these. There is another bath and still another small
bedroom behind these. Each of the three principal bedrooms have bay windows.

At the rear of the second floor, there is another smaller staircase which leads down to
the kitchen area. The attic on the third floor is wooden-floored, but is unfinished
and used for storage.