210 S Albany St Ithaca

Year built from Tompkins County Department of Assessment.

Source: Henry St. John Local Historic District Nomination, Sara Johnson and Kristin Olson, Historic Ithaca, Inc., 2012.
Description:
210 South Albany Street is located on a small, shallow lot one lot south of West Green Street near the northern edge of a principally residential neighborhood southwest of downtown Ithaca. It is a one-and-a-half-story wood frame house built ca. 1843 in the Greek Revival style, one of the oldest houses on this block of South Albany Street.
The house is rectangular in plan with a low-pitched, side-gable roof and an addition on the west. Walls are clad in clapboard with wood corner boards. The stone foundation, raised to accommodate a basement level, is coursed dressed ashlar on the east façade and coursed rubble on the north and south façades. The asphalt shingle-clad roof has wide molding along the gable ends and a wide cornice with returns. A single multiple-light frieze window is in the center of the east façade. Two gable dormers extend from the cornice through the roof on the east façade. The dormers are clad in wood shingles and have wide trim in the gables.
The three-bay east façade has a large window located below each dormer and a single door slightly south of the center of the house. A flat-roofed porch covers the doorway and the center bay of the east façade. Triple porch rail-height classical columns support the outside corners of the open porch. Most windows, including the dormers, have a diamond light upper sash and single-light lower sash.
A narrow driveway on the south side of the house leads to a single-bay, hipped roof automobile garage. It is clad in shiplap siding and has an overhead garage door that appears to be a replacement.
Significance:
Contributing. Architecturally significant. Historically significant.
Garage contributing and architecturally significant.
210 South Albany Street is architecturally significant as an early, modest example of a Greek Revival style residence. The small scale of the house is unique for the Henry St. John district, especially in comparison to its neighbors on the north and south. It retains many elements of its original construction, including wood clapboards and corner boards, wide cornice with returns, and substantial stone foundation. The gable dormers, diamond-light window sash, and east porch are later additions (possibly ca. 1893-98), and reflect the incorporation of late 1890s Colonial Revival design elements into the existing Greek Revival style structure.
The small, hipped roof, single-bay early automobile garage is architecturally significant, retaining most of its original exterior features. Like the similar adjacent garage for 212 South Albany Street, this was constructed between 1919 and 1929.
210 South Albany Street is historically significant as one of the earliest remaining houses built south of Green Street on Albany Street and for its association with early prominent village of Ithaca merchants. The house is located on the south half of lot #32 of the lots laid out south of Green Street by Simeon DeWitt. It is likely that the house was built for Frederick Barnard sometime after his 1843 purchase of the property from Erasmus Corning, John Norton and Joel Rathbone, all of Albany, New York. Frederick Barnard was a partner in Barnard & McWhorter, a grocery firm that operated on Owego Street (now State Street). The house appears on the 1851 Bevans map of Ithaca.
In 1865, Barnard sold the property to John and Emily Clary, who sold it to Warren King the following year. King assumed the $900 mortgage on the property, which had been held by Barnard. Warren King was a partner in A. King & Sons, who were grain and lumber dealers as well as being active in the real estate business in the 1850s and 1860s. Warren King sold 210 South Albany Street to Ira C. Rockwell in 1870.
Ira C. Rockwell, who operated a Seneca Street lumberyard, owned the property from 1870 until 1888, living in it from approximately 1870 through 1884. Rockwell constructed the house known as 212 South Albany Street on the southernmost section of this lot ca.1883-84 and 212 was subdivided from the property in 1901.
It is possible that Rockwell, like other Ithaca businessmen, built 212 as a rental property. This was a common practice in the Henry St. John district. In 1886 Rockwell boarded at 305 West Green Street, the home of Herman Estabrook located immediately northwest of 210 South Albany. In 1888, Rockwell sold 210 South Albany to Estabrook’s son William B. Estabrook, who also lived at 305 West Green Street. This property included 210 and 212 South Albany Street. The deed noted that the sale included the contents of 212 South Albany Street.
Sources:
Bevans, John. 1851 Map of Ithaca, Tompkins Co., N.Y. New York: John Bevans, 1851. The History Center In Tompkins County, Ithaca, NY.
Ithaca directories, 1864-1981.Historic Ithaca, Inc., Ithaca, NY.
Tompkins County Department of Assessment. Tompkins County tax assessment photographs, 1954. Historic Ithaca, Inc., Ithaca, NY.
Tompkins County, NY. Deeds and survey maps, 1850-2010. Office of the Tompkins County Clerk, Ithaca, NY.

Source of Building Data: 1910 Sanborn Fire Insurance Atlas;
Multi-Family Construction: ; 
Roof of Main Structure: Shingle; 
Additional Sections: Section 1, back left side inset (WS), 1 story, non-combustible roof; 
Porches: Porch 1, back of Section 1, 1 story, non-combustible roof; 
Outbuildings: ; 
Other: ;