Over our 20+ years in real estate, we have come across some fascinating, quirky and downright haunting stories about houses. Of course we are bound by our ethics and confidentiality laws and won't be able to share those stories, but we'll share our stories of hearsay and focus on a couple homes we owned, and how you too can research the history of your house.
We bought our first house in 1997 in the Kenny Neighborhood of South Minneapolis, a 1949 built 1.5 story Cape Cod where we were only the second owners. Without much research, but more neighborhood gossip we found out the previous owners did not have children to ding things up. They were so particular that they Hi-Lex bleached their sidewalks, put rubber snakes on the roof, and had plastic covers for their furniture, and in nearly 50 years of ownership had never used the beautiful fireplace! Our second home in the Kingfield neighborhood was a 1918 built Craftsman Bungalow, HUD fixer-upper, previously owned by a doctor that sadly became a hoarder and filled the house with QVC purchases and take out food packaging, and eventually had to be removed by the police. Since this we have been fascinated with the history of our homes.
An announcement for a Thimble Bee Club meeting at our house in 1915.
Ad for the sale of our lot and yet to built house.
Over the years we have come to find there is a ton of information freely available on the internet if you are willing to do the research. One cautionary note, this can be a Pandora’s Box that in my case absorbed a full 2.5 days, but it was fascinating. I found all sorts of information about our current house in the Kingfield Neighborhood of South Minneapolis, which had started to be built in1914. We found the original permit notification printed in the Finance and Commerce news paper showing an initial build cost of $3,500. Other newspaper postings included a notice of a Thimble Bee Club of The Order of the Eastern Star meeting at our house on Thursday, March 4th 1915 hosted by the then owner Edith Greening (Husband Alexander Greening).
The Greening’s sold the house for around $4,750 to Cora Mattison (Widow of Joel Mattison who died in 1914). Cora lived here with her son Charles until 1923. After the Mattison’s, Knute and Margaret Borhus bought the house. Knute’s father Hans was a widow who worked as a blacksmith and immigrated from Norway with his 4 children (Ingeborg, Christian, Knute and Henrietta) around 1888, Margaret’s family came to the United States around the same time. The Borhus’s never had children and lived here until their passing in 1948 and '49.
In 1950 the Rieger family bought the home and owned it for nearly 70 years. They raised 4 children here, the only children to have been raised in the home in its 105 years. We bought it in 2018 from the youngest Rieger child, we are the fifth family to own the home. This is just a small snippet of the information we found. We have come to realize that even though we currently own the home, it is not just ours, it has a history that lives in the memories of others that have lived here or visited as friends or family.
An ad from the 1920’s or 30’s for the sale of our neighbors house, our house in on the right.
Now you might be saying, what about our home? Well, here are some great resources to start your own research project on the history of your home:
Now you might be saying, what about our home? Well, here are some great resources to start your own research project on the history of your home:
Hennepin County Library: Resources for researching the history of homes, buildings and neighborhoods | Hennepin County (hclib.org). Here you will find a list of resources for researching homes in Hennepin county. The most useful I found was the old Minneapolis Directories, but they also include a photo archive and plat maps that are quite interesting.
Don’t live in Hennepin County? Here is a similar link to St. Paul Directories and other Ramsey County maps: Saint Paul Collection | Saint Paul Public Library (sppl.org)
1916 ad for the sale of our house.
Minnesota Historical Society: Research | Minnesota Historical Society (mnhs.org) This is where I found a few newspaper clippings that included the original permit notification, three for sale listings and the Thimble Bee Club meeting notice.
FamilySearch.org: FamilySearch • Free Family Trees and Genealogy Archives — FamilySearch.org I stumbled upon this while trying to find free access to U.S. Census data. This site, once you create a free account, allows you to search the census data but also has birth and death records, marriage applications, draft registrations and more.
1940 U.S Census showing Knute and Margaret Borhus as residents at 4008 Pleasant.
One struggle we ran in to was finding current information on the house. Up to 1940-1950 was easy, but after these dates the directories and census data ended. I am sure there are other resources out there, these will get you started. If you don’t live in Hennepin or Ramsey county, I would start with your local county to look up tax records or your local library to see what resources they have. Have fun and happy hunting! If you need some help give us a call, we are happy to do some digging.