The Sears Houses of Pleasant Ridge (Cincinnati)

Oh Cincinnati, I haven’t forgotten you.  In fact, no serious Sears House researcher would ever forget about Cincinnati.  Why?  Because it’s the home to the most Sears Houses ever built.  That have been located so far, that is.

I’ve been on numerous day trips to Cincinnati to get pictures of some of the houses that have already been located, and every time, I spot a few more.

And as several researchers, including myself, are still diligently going through a bunch of old mortgage books on line looking for the houses that were financed through Sears, we are continuing to document some of the houses already found, and locate even more.  It’s never ending.

Just in the last couple of days, researcher friend Andrew Mutch located a couple of Sears Houses through those old mortgage records, on Woodmont Ave in Cincinnati.  When he posted them in our little tiny Facebook research group, he wondered what neighborhood Woodmont was in.  So…..right to the Hamilton Co Auditor’s website I go, and look it up.  It’s in Pleasant Ridge.

Well, on my very first day trip to Cincinnati several years ago, I met up with a fabulous lady named Donna Bakke, and she took me to several Cincinnati neighborhoods, Pleasant Ridge being one of them.  But we didn’t go down Woodmont, which is a “No Outlet” street.  Did Donna know about the Sears Houses on Woodmont?  We’ll never know for sure, as she has since passed away, and all her knowledge has been lost.  Sad.

But, I do have my great memories of that first Sears House hunting day trip to Cincinnati, and a whole bunch of pictures.  Yes, they are old pictures.  At least three years!  But they are new to this little blog, and I want to share them with anybody who happens to stumble across this site.  Houses we didn’t go past, or ones located after my trip are shown with Auditor of Google Map photos.

Here they are, in alphabetical order, mostly.

The one and only Sears Aurora.   6416 Grand Vista Ave.  Documented with a mortgage record.  The open porch has been enclosed, and it has been added onto.

Sears Homewood 6225 Fairhurst Ave. Photo from Hamilton Co. Auditor. Documented. Building permit lists Sears Roebuck, plans.

 

A possible customized Sears Kilbourne.  The front porch and the dormer have been swapped from what is shown in the catalog.  This change would be possible as this model is basically a rectangle, and the porch and dormer are simply design elements.  Or maybe……they put the house together wrong.

Possible Sears Kilbourne  5619 Lester Rd

 

Sears Langston 3118 Auten Ave.  Not documented

 

 

Sears Marina 3010 Mapleleaf Ave.  Not documented.

There are two other Sears Marinas in Pleasant Ridge.  One is at 3137 Gloss Ave. but there are a lot of trees in the front yard, so views are not great.  The third is located at 3151 Auten Ave.

Sears Norwood 5899 E Woodmont.  Photo from Hamilton Co Auditor.   This house is one of the new ones Andrew just located, but is not documented.

Sears Norwood 5901 E Woodmont.  Photo from Hamilton Co Auditor.   Andrew has documented this one with his mortgage record research.

Sears Osborn 5623 Lester Rd.  Some Osborn models seem to have been built without the swoopy peaks shown in the catalog.

Sears Pittsburgh 6423 Lisbon Ave.  Photo from Google Map.   Documented with a mortgage record.

 

There are three Sears Puritans in Pleasant Ridge.

Sears Puritan 5907 Woodmont. Photo from Hamilton Co. Auditor. Andrew has documented this one with his mortgage research.

The other two Puritans in Pleasant Ridge are at 3265 and 3281 Beredith Pl.  Neither are documented.  Yet.

Sears Roanoke 3147 Mapleleaf Ave. Not documented. The hood over the second floor windows and the side porch have either been removed, or were never built there to begin.

There is another Roanoke at 5622 Lester Rd.

Cincinnati has loads of Rodessa models, but there is one in Pleasant Ridge that is my all time favorite.

Sears Rodessa  3114 Mapleleaf Ave.  Not documented but so close to original who would think it wasn’t from Sears?

There is a second Rodessa in Pleasant Ridge at 5553 Bosworth Place.

Another popular little Sears House was their Starlight model.

Pleasant Ridge has a nice one.

Sears Starlight 6320 Fairhurst Ave.  Documented with a mortgage record.  Photo from Hamilton Co Auditor.

 

There are two Vallonia models in Pleasant Ridge.

Sears Vallonia   3149 Mapleleaf Ave.   Not documented.

Sears Vallonia 3331 Orion Ave.  Photo from Hamilton Co Auditor.  Not documented.

Another great bungalow model from Sears was The Westly.

Sears Westly 3249 Woodford Place.  Photo from Hamilton Co. Auditor.  Not documented.

 

Hard to see this one due to the landscaping.

Sears Whitehall 3119 Auten Ave. Not documented but my friend Donna Bakke said it is one.

Just located this Windsor model while I was reviewing the Pleasant Ridge houses for this blog post.  It’s right next door to a Rodessa that had already been identified.  And that’s how it goes in Cincinnati!  We find new ones every time we look around!    The roof line looks a little off, but the window arrangement and the exterior dimensions of the house match.  I will need to take a look at it in real life some day.

Possible Sears Windsor  5551 Bosworth Place.   Photo from Hamilton Co. Auditor.

 

Sears Woodland 3123 Mapleleaf Ave. Not documented.

And last, but not least is this sweet little house.  The body of the home appears to be a Sears Delevan, but the front porch is more like the one on The Somerset.  Sears would make changes to models for a small fee.

Sears Delevan with a different front porch. 3132 Mapleleaf Ave. Not documented.

There they are!  26 so far in Pleasant Ridge.  Bet we find more.