Palmer House

Charles B. Palmer House, 1900, Classical Revival Style, 632 State Street, Adrian

Of the homes built along State Street, the Charles B. Palmer House stands out for its Classical Revival architecture--a style that mainly showed up in public buildings and businesses such as banks, as seen in Adrian’s current City Hall (formerly the Lenawee County Savings Bank).

The Classical Revival, also known as Neoclassical architecture, nods back to ancient Greek and Roman architecture, particularly the columned temples built in Greece and Rome. The World’s Columbian Exposition, held in Chicago in 1893, incorporated many classical buildings that sparked widespread American interest.

While even older buildings in Adrian feature classical details, such as Adrian’s Greek Revival-style Croswell House, Classical Revival structures such as the Palmer House stand apart from them by being much larger and grander in scale, with extensive use of Doric, Ionic, or Corinthian columns, full triangular gables, dentil work, and Palladian windows.

The Palmer House is a large two-and a half-story frame house, standing out from its neighbors. The full-width front porch with its semicircular portico, fluted Doric columns, balustrades, and dentil moldings, exhibits the finest of classical detailing. Extensive dentil molding is also present under the eaves of the house. Although Classical Revival architecture dominates, the house also incorporates some holdover features from the earlier Queen Anne style, such as the cross gables and the curved corner windows.

The front and each of the side facades incorporate a Palladian window, one of the key features of Classical Revival architecture. Renaissance architect Andrea Palladio pioneered this design, which consists of a large arched window flanked with smaller rectangular windows on each side. First-floor bay windows on each side of the house add additional visual interest. Originally, balustrades also crowned each bay window, as well as the porch roof.

The word "dentil" comes from a Latin word meaning “tooth,” and sure enough, the dentil work on Classical Revival buildings looks a little bit like a row of teeth.

The interior of the Palmer House blends an overall Classical design with the more lavish details of the Queen Anne. The house incorporates five bedrooms, along with a living room, music room, dining room, kitchen and pantry. Stained-glass windows and elaborate stairway banisters with scrollwork make the interior a beautiful spectacle of late Victorian-era extravagance, with egg and dart moldings adding Classical influence. Inside the master bedroom, visitors see a Classical cornice with medallions and dentils, added by a later owner to mimic the home’s exterior theme. The narrow stairway leading up from the kitchen to the servants’ quarters contrasts with the elaborate furnishings in the rest of the house.

The Classical architecture used for the Palmer House contrasts with the elaborate Queen Anne designs that Matthes constructed a few years earlier, such as the Presbyterian Manse at 435 Dennis Street, featured in this ad in the 1897 Lenawee County directory.

The home's neighborhood was originally part of an 80-acre tract of land purchased from the U.S. Government by Elias Dennis in 1826. In 1844, Dennis sold the property, now encompassing the Dennis Street and State Street neighborhoods, to Langford and Ambrose Berry, who platted it and began selling off lots in 1852. The north end of State Street--close to downtown--attracted Adrian’s wealthier citizens, while the area around 632 State was built up as a primarily working-class district. Langford Berry sold the lot at 632 State in 1865, and a small house was probably built in the early 1870s. Charles B. Palmer, an agent for the New York Life Insurance Company and a member of Adrian's First Presbyterian Church, bought the property in 1891.

Palmer, who had earlier spent time out West and met Sioux Chief Sitting Bull, had won an impressive reputation for his skill at selling insurance--enough to merit an award for his efforts. Eight years later, Palmer decided to tear down the house then standing on this lot and build a much larger Classical Revival home in its place. During construction, Palmer and his family lived in the large carriage house at the rear of the property.

For the construction of his house, Palmer hired the well-known Adrian contracting firm of C.F. Matthes & Son. At the turn of the century, Christian Frederick “Fred” Matthes stood at the top of Adrian’s builder class, constructing everything from homes to commercial storefronts to public buildings like the Adrian Public Library, now the Lenawee Historical Museum. He was assisted by his son Arthur, who took over the business after his father’s death in 1910. Though his specialty was Queen Anne architecture, Matthes adjusted quickly when Classical and Colonial styling became more popular around the turn of the century. Although C.F. and "Art" Matthes were accomplished architects themselves, the sophisticated Classical design of the Palmer House actually resulted from the involvement from a Toledo architect whom Palmer consulted.

The Palmer House has several notable owners and many of them have left their own distinctive imprint. Ozias T. Goodwin, who bought the house from Palmer in 1925, stood out as an important figure in Adrian. Besides working as secretary-treasurer and manager of the Michigan Producers Dairy Company, he also served as president of the National Bank of Adrian and president of the Adrian Chamber of Commerce. Goodwin helped to build the dairy company into a major corporation with five plants located throughout Michigan. When Goodwin died in 1941 at only 52 his wife Corinne continued to live in the house until 1945. Later owners included the Dillon family (1945-1950), the Sackett family (1950-1971), and Harry and Virginia Qualls (1971-1979). The Qualls meticulously restored the interior after visiting Colonial Williamsburg for inspiration, including re-creating the scrollwork on the stairway banisters. In 1986, WABJ news director and current Lenawee Historical Museum volunteer John Kuschell purchased the house. Kuschell restored the fluting on the porch columns and replicated the original porch balustrades which had been replaced by unsightly iron railings, thus restoring an important piece of the home’s original architecture. Kuschell sold his home to Katarina DuMont and Nicholas Sears in 2023, who renovated the kitchen wallpaper, flooring, and paint after a fire in 2024 resulted in smoke damage to the kitchen.

Today, the Palmer House still stands as a magnificent piece of Adrian’s history from the turn of the century.

The architect and builder C. F. Matthes's handiwork is especially notable in the beautifully crafted main stairwell of the Palmer House. Photograph by Katrina DuMont.

The Palmer House's fireplace surround features Ionic columns--typical of the Neoclassical style. Photograph by Katrina DuMont.