206 S Geneva St Ithaca

Street Address History:
Earlier street address 22 S Geneva St.
The city renumbered its streets in 1899 (see Crandall City Engineering Map, 1899).

Source of Building Data: 1910 Sanborn Fire Insurance Atlas; 
Multi-Family Construction: ; 
Roof of Main Structure: Non-combustible; 
Additional Sections: Section 1, left side (S), 2 stories, non-combustible roof / Section 2, left side (S), 2 story, non-combustible roof / Section 3, back (W), 2 story, non-combustible roof; 
Outbuildings: ; 
Porches: Porch 1, front (E), circular at right (N) side, 1 story, non-combustible roof / Porch 2, right side (N), 1 story, non-combustible roof / Porch 3, back right side (N), 1 story, non-combustible roof; 
Other: Bay 1, right side (N);

Source: Henry St. John Local Historic District Nomination, Sara Johnson and Kristin Olson, Historic Ithaca, Inc., 2012.
Description: 
206 South Geneva Street is located on a small lot on the west side of the street, one lot south of West Green Street. Ithaca’s commercial neighborhood begins across West Green Street to the south. The houses on this block of South Geneva Street are closely spaced on lots that are generally smaller than those south of West Clinton Street and the house almost touches its neighbor to the south, 208 South Geneva Street.
The two-story wood frame house was built ca. 1851-53 in the Greek Revival style. It is rectangular in plan with a flat-roofed west wing projecting to the north and south and a two-story bay window on the north façade. A one-story, single-bay automobile garage with a hipped roof is built into the corner of the primary section and the west wing. The south façade has a shallow one-story shed-roofed addition and a shallow two-story rectangular bay addition.
Walls are clad in clapboard with wood corner boards. The low-pitched front-gabled roof features cornice returns and dentil trim in the gable end. The wide cornice is topped dentils and runs under the eaves around the house, including the garage addition. The primary entrance is located in the south bay of the three-bay east façade. A front-gabled portico with fluted classical porch posts shelters the glazed double front doors. Windows are 1/1 replacements, evenly spaced in the original openings, with simple casings topped with a row of dentils.
The shed roof of the narrow one-story addition at the southeast corner connects to the gable roof of the portico. The addition has a doorway and leads west, connecting with a two-story rectangular bay projecting from the south façade. The bay has a shed roof, is clad in clapboard, and has a single rectangular stained glass Queen Anne-style sash on the second story. The west wing projects behind this bay.
A paved driveway runs along the north façade to the attached single-bay garage. The hipped roof garage is clad in clapboard and has a single overhead garage door.
Significance: 
Contributing. Architecturally significant. Historically significant. 
Garage contributing and architecturally significant.
206 South Geneva Street is architecturally significant as an example of a Greek Revival style residence. Though it has lost some integrity through the replacement of window sash and the addition of the small shed-roofed entryway at the southeast corner, it retains many of its original exterior features, including decorative wood window, gable, and cornice treatments, as well as well-integrated additions from the late 1800s. The garage addition, constructed between 1919 and 1929, is architecturally significant as an example of an early automobile garage.
206 South Geneva Street is historically significant for its association with the Mack family, who owned multiple properties in the district from the 1830s through the 1880s. Horace Mack Sr. was the twentieth village president and had 115 West Green Street built ca. 1837. His son, Horace Mack, was a real estate agent, accountant, Cornell University Clerk, and assistant in the land office of Cornell University. The younger Horace Mack owned this property 1851-64, subdividing it in two sections. 206 South Geneva Street was the southern section, which he sold to Philip Case in 1853. It is possible that Mack developed the house on the lot, because a house appears near this location on the 1851 Bevans map. It is also possible that Philip Case, a carpenter and builder, constructed the house for himself. Case was also a farmer with twenty acres under cultivation. In 1864, Case sold the property to Charles Clapp, a house, sign and carriage painter.
From 1866-1871, the property changed hands frequently, and was purchased by Charles M. and Addie Rolfe Clinton in 1871. Charles Clinton was an inventor and designer of the tools used in the Ithaca Calendar Clock Company and the inventor of the Peerless typewriter, manufactured by the Ithaca Gun Company. The Clinton and Rolfe families owned the house until 1929.
Alterations: 
Between 1893 and 1898, the north bay window, south rectangular bay, and a small east porch had been added to the structure, which previously consisted of the gable-front section with a two-story L-plan wing on the west. From 1904 to 1961, Sanborn maps indicate the presence of a full-width east porch. It is not known when this porch was removed. It is not shown in a 1954 photograph of the house, which shows the existing portico. 2/2 wood sash were replaced sometime after 1987 and it is not known when the secondary east entrance was constructed.
Sources: 
Ithaca directories, 1864-1981. Historic Ithaca, Inc., Ithaca, NY. 
Levine, Jeffrey. Building-Structure Inventory Form for 206 South Geneva Street, Ithaca, NY: 1987. Historic Ithaca, Inc., Ithaca, NY. 
Sanborn Map Company. Ithaca, NY fire insurance maps, 1888-1961.The History Center In Tompkins County, 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.