We’re picking up the “Rediscovering the Beauty of Dutchtown” series which was left off at Number 20.

Whenever I come across a cluster of wood frame houses mixed in with later “suburban” brick houses from the early Twentieth Century, as I did on Minnesota Avenue just north of Delor Street, I get suspicious. Why are there such old houses here out in what was the countryside? I checked, and this was very near the large quarry that was until only a few years ago, still unfilled along Virginia Avenue (facing the famous Virginia Theater) until relatively recently. There’s a similar and larger cluster of what I believe were the quarry workers’ houses on Compton Avenue.

Below, next to a vernacular neighbor, is a super rare Italianate wood frame house, which might be easy to miss, but is a very important survivor.

But then, as the neighborhood became more urban, the brick houses started to appear, as the area became more permanent and the famous law requiring brick came into force.