• Style: Modern
• Architect: David W. Gee
• Builder: C. D. Hills

Description

In 1977, owner C.D. Hills received permit #570579 to build this modern house, designed by David W. Gee. C.D. Hills was the contractor as well.

History

The current house is actually the second house built on this site. In 1902, P. Booker Reed obtained Permit #15163 to have architects Robertson and Blackwell design a house to be built by George W. Wilder. The house was described as a 12-room residence, of Swiss design, built with concrete and pressed brick, and native wood finishing.

P. Booker Reed was a former mayor of Louisville, and also a very successful businessman. During the Civil War, Reed served as a private in the Confederate army (in the Ninth Kentucky Infantry). After the war, he studied at the University of Louisiana and received a medical degree. In 1884, he was elected mayor of Louisville (by a 7:2 margin). Mayor Reed was a fiscal conservative who balanced the city budget and worked to reduce corruption in government.

C.J. Erickson bought the original house between 1906 and 1910. The C.J. Erickson Construction Co. helped build Seattle and much of the Puget Sound. His company received a contract for part of the Denny Regrade, and dug much of the Lake Washington Ship Canal. The 'Montlake Cut' was originally called 'The Erickson Cut'. He built a railroad to supply Port Angeles' mills with logs. At the Bremerton Navy Yards, he built the largest U.S. Government dry dock (863 feet). Erickson was also president of Erickson Shipbuilding and the Seattle North Pacific Shipbuilding Company, which built steel vessels for the U.S. World War I emergency fleet. He also founded Adelphia College in Capitol Hill, whose former campus is now the site of Seattle Preparatory School.

The Ederer family, living to the south of the original house on 14th, bought the property around 1940. The King County Property Card lists the exterior and interior in poor condition, and indicates that the house was torn down in 1942.

In 1977, C.D. Hills obtained a permit to build the modern house currently on the site. David W. Gee, who received his Masters in Architecture from the University of Washington, and who had previously worked at The Richardson Associates, designed this house.