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The
Bellarmine Women’s Council 2004 Designers’ Show House is an imposing
residence at 2531 Ransdell Avenue that has been home to many prominent
Louisville families through the years. It is a home that reflects the beauty
and splendor of a neighborhood created in the early 1900s that years later
would become known as the Cherokee Triangle.
According to the Cherokee Triangle Preservation District, the birth of the
Highlands was supported by two main events. The first was the introduction
of electric trolleys in 1889 which provided quick access from the Highlands
to downtown. The second significant event was the opening of Cherokee Park
in 1892, then called Eastern Park. The park was designed by nationally
renowned landscape architect, Frederick Law Olmsted who designed Central
Park in New York City. With these developments, a migration began from Old
Louisville, home to many wealthy residents, to the suburban area called The
Highlands.
The
oral history of the neighborhood is rich with stories about growing up in
one of the first suburbs of Louisville. There was a great sense of
community and connection. The children played in the alleys where
basketball goals were found on every garage. Saturday afternoons were spent
at the Uptown matinee. Slaughter’s Field, located where Glenmary Avenue is
today, provided grazing for cows, gardening, and open fields for the
neighborhood children to play. Early residents recall “Chigger Hill” and a
pond where they skated in the winter. Cherokee Park, adjacent to this new
suburb, was a key part of life in the neighborhood. Imagine the thrill of a
park only a stone’s throw away that provided golf, ice skating, tennis, and
many other forms of recreation. When the time came, the young women
attended Collegiate and then Vassar while the young men were off to Yale,
Cornell and other Ivy League universities.
The
homes in the area were occupied by doctors, Main Street executives
(Presidents and Vice Presidents) from companies such as Belknap, Louisville
Dry Goods, Stewart’s, and the L&N Railroad. The street where the house is
located, Ransdell Avenue, was named by a previous landowner in the area,
Clayton Longest, whose grandfather’s middle name was Ransdell. The house at
2531 Ransdell was built circa 1909 by George Grevemeyer, an attorney for the
Bernheim Distilling Company. He built the three-bay, stucco covered house in
the Second Renaissance Revival style with a roof of red tiles and eaves that
overhang the structure. The woodwork in the house is remarkable with oak
floors throughout the first floor, a grand maple staircase, and mammoth
wooden pocket doors. In November, 1910, soon after the construction of the
house, it was featured in the “New Homes of Louisville” section of the
Courier Journal newspaper.
The
entrance of the house is adorned by original leaded glass laid out in an oak
leaf and acorn pattern. This pattern was the logo of the Bernheim Distilling
Company, where Mr. Grevemeyer was a senior executive. Isaac Bernheim also
used the pattern years later as the logo for Bernheim Forest. The oak leaf
and acorn pattern in use at this early period more than likely reflects
Isaac Bernheim’s dream of a botanical garden and arboretum long before it
came to fruition with Bernheim Forest; and the association between George
Grevemeyer and Isaac Bernheim obviously brought the pattern to the new home
on Ransdell Avenue in 1909.
In
1911, Henry and Stella Klauber purchased the house at 2531 Ransdell Avenue.
Henry was the son of renowned pioneer photographer Edward Klauber. Then in
1918, Ashton Harcourt, of the jewelry and engraving business (where school
rings have been purchased for generations) bought the house. The Harcourt
family lived at 2531 for 19 years. Through these years, the house was
featured in the Louisville newspaper twice, first in the “Beautiful Homes in
Louisville” section of the Herald Post in 1924 and then again in 1930.
While the Harcourts resided in the house, legend has it that their
grandmother was such an avid cook that the Harcourts installed a second
kitchen in the basement to accommodate her visits. The kitchen was later
taken out. Under the Harcourts stay, there was also a magnificent billiards
room in the left bay of the house. In the billiards room, there were eight
shoe shine style footrests located under the window to the garden where
people could sit and watch the game. They were later removed when a new
owner converted the room to a library/den.
The
Woodruff family purchased the house on Ransdell in 1937. Mr. George Ezra
Woodruff was a man of independent means who, looking for higher ground in
reaction to the 1937 flood, decided to move from Old Louisville to the
Highlands. His children grew up on Ransdell and he lived in the house for
nearly thirty years. Mrs. Woodruff was given a budget of $25,000 in 1937 to
redecorate when they moved in.
The
Woodruffs were friends with both the Speed and Stewart families, all
prominent old families of Louisville. J. Adger Stewart, head of the
Louisville Axe and Tool Company, president of the J.B. Speed Art Museum and
The Filson Club, built the house next door at 2525 Ransdell and his son, J.
Alexander Stewart built the house at 2526 Glenmary which backed up to 2525
Ransdell. They created a sort of “compound” between the two residences on
Ransdell and Glenmary. The Speeds lived on Glenmary. The children of these
three families were lifelong friends and in 1966, John Speed and his wife,
Anne Carter Stewart Speed, purchased 2531 Ransdell from the Woodruffs. The
Speeds lived in the house until 1982.
From 1982 until 1984, Sallie Bingham, whose father was publisher of the
Courier Journal, owned the house at 2531 Ransdell; however, she never
actually lived in the house. She decided not to leave her home at Bassett
and Willow. Instead, Sallie sold the house in 1984 to Kate and Scott Wilson,
a physician and attorney. Kate’s father was Ray Barrett, Jr. of the
Barrett Funeral Home business. The Barrett family was featured in the
Herald Post in 1930 in the “Louisville’s Most Attractive Children” section
coincidentally opposite the feature on the Harcourt’s home on Ransdell
Avenue, a house which Ray Barrett’s daughter would own some fifty years
later.
In
1994, the Wilsons sold the house to Grahame Horsell, the current owner.
Grahame is from the South London area of the United Kingdom. He came to the
States on full scholarship to Bellarmine University via a student exchange
program arranged by the English Speaking Union. Since graduating from
Bellarmine, Grahame has made Louisville his home. He and his wife, Lisa,
have a daughter, Meghan.
The
Bellarmine Women’s Council appreciates the Horsells allowing us to present
their home, one of the Grande Dames of the Cherokee Triangle area, as the
2004 Designers’ Show House.
(Information and research assistance: The Cherokee Triangle Association;
The Filson Club; Jefferson County Courthouse; Louisville Free Public
Library; Connie Meyer, archivist of the Bernheim Foundation; Samuel Thomas,
former archivist of Jefferson County and author of several books on the
local history of Louisville.) |
