Sandwiching In History Program
First Hotze House
By: Elizabeth A.
James
Preservation Outreach
Coordinator
Arkansas Historic Preservation Program
April 6, 2007
Introduction:
Welcome to the
April edition of Sandwiching in History at the beautiful
Hotze House. My name is Elizabeth James and I am the
Preservation Outreach Coordinator for the Arkansas
Historic Preservation Program. The Sandwiching in
History tour program visits a different location in
central Arkansas each month. Next month we will be at
Trinity Episcopal Cathedral in Little Rock. The house
we are visiting today was rescued by its owner in the
late 1990s. Richard Butler is here with us today and he
currently lives in this house. When he obtained the
property in 1998 the house was it terrible condition
after having sat vacant for fourteen years. At the time
this property was an afterthought to the owners of the
larger Hotze House behind this building because it was a
single lot that contained the First Hotze House and the
larger Hotze House. However, in 1998 they were able to
separate the property and sell this as a single
structure on its own lot.
History:
The Hotze House
was built in 1869 by Peter Hotze, one of Little Rock’s
most influential early citizens. Peter Hotze was born
in 1836 in Innsbruck, Austria and moved to the United
States at the age of 20 with his brother Conrad. Peter
Hotze was well educated, could speak several languages,
and was described as honest and highly refined. While
his brother remained in the north and practiced law,
Peter moved to Little Rock and was successful in the
general mercantile business. He fought in the
Confederate Army in Company A of the 16th
Arkansas Infantry Regiment and participated in some of
the Civil War’s bloodiest battles. He was wounded and
taken prisoner at the battle of Franklin in Tennessee in
1864 and remained a prisoner at Camp Chase, Ohio for the
duration of the war.
Peter returned
to Little Rock in 1865. While he was away at war his
brother Conrad purchased Block 166 in Little Rock, where
we are now standing, and Peter had the deed recorded up
on his return. In 1868 Peter married Johanna Krause and
built the First Hotze House on his land shortly
afterward. Peter went into business with his company
commander Col. John G. Fletcher, who was married to
Johanna’s sister, Adolphine Krause Fletcher. Fletcher
and Hotze eventually dealt exclusively in cotton and by
1873 the business required the Hotze’s to move to New
York where they sold the cotton that Fletcher purchased
in Arkansas. The business was exceptionally
prosperous. Hotze remained in New York for 27 years,
and returned to Arkansas upon retiring in 1900.
The First Hotze
House didn’t seem to fit the amount of wealth that the
Hotzes had amassed during Peter’s career as a cotton
broker. In 1908 they built the larger Hotze house on
the same lot as this house facing the next street over.
Sadly, Peter Hotze died just one year after the
completion of the larger Hotze House. He was buried in
beautiful Mt. Holly Cemetery along with his wife and
near his longtime business partner, John Fletcher.
Over the years,
this smaller Hotze House had varied uses. It remained a
residence until the early 1930s, and then became a
school. From 1934-1943 the building operated as the
Mary Dodge School. The school was forced to close and
relocated during WWII at which time the building became
the headquarters of the Ouachita Council of the Girl
Scouts from 1943-1966. The girl scouts finally left
when a new building was constructed for their
headquarters. Following that it was the Charles Academy
of Beauty from 1966-1970. It later operated as a
daycare and a paint stripping shop. Before sitting
vacant from the mid-80s until its restoration six years
ago.
Architecture:
The
architectural plans for the Hotze House were purchased
by Peter Hotze for $35 from a Memphis architect named
M.H. Baldwin. The Hotze House is an example of one of
the 19th century’s most popular architectural
styles that is now fading in numbers. This house was
built in the Italianate style which was popular
throughout the United States from 1840-1885. In
Arkansas it was most prevalent between 1850-1890. This
style was popularized through the books of Andrew
Jackson Downing who created imitations of common Italian
farmhouses and published them in his popular house
pattern books in the mid 1800s. As the style grew in
popularity its detailing grew more ornate and complex.
The most high
style examples of this style often included towers or
cupolas, windows with ornate hood moldings, tall narrow
arched windows. More common elements found in this
style include a low pitched roof, sometimes they were
nearly flat. A gratuitous use of decorative or
oversized brackets—to the point where this was often
called the bracketed style, and these buildings often
have an overwhelming square or rectangular shape to
them.
The First Hotze
House employs many details of the Italianate Style.
First, I’d like to point out the rectangular emphasis on
this house. Although the roof isn’t as flat as many
Italianate buildings, the side gable roof does have a
fairly low pitch. But, notice that the porch roof IS
flat and, there is a smaller flat “eave” that extends
the length of the house on either side of the porch that
makes a strong horizontal presence on the façade and
give the illusion of a flat roof if you’re solely
looking at the front of the building. This is
emphasized by pilasters at the corners and accented by
brackets. The Italianate style not only uses the
rectangle and square shapes for the overall building
form, but also the columns are nearly always square
rather than round as you might find in other styles.
The rectangle and square signify security, strength, and
integrity.
The First Hotze
House also utilizes other common features of the
Italianate style including the use of brackets as I
mentioned. This house also has tall narrow windows.
Often these windows were arched at the top, but many
other Italianate buildings feature rectangular windows
as appear on this building. These buildings also
commonly have a front porch with an ornate balustrade,
which is something also present on this house. Finally,
Italianate houses are often symmetrical on the façade.
This house is very evenly symmetrical down to the
placement of the chimney stacks which are evenly spaced
from the center of the building.
Restoration:
The fact that
this building is still standing is miraculous on its
own. The First Hotze House has survived three fires and
a tornado throughout its history. When the restoration
began one of the rear walls of the building was
completely gone, the lime mortar in the brick piers had
deteriorated and compromised the structural integrity of
the piers, termites had attacked the floor structure,
the roof was sagging in many places and beginning to
fail, and the front wall had separated a full six inches
from the roof.
The building
also had lost much of the material in the original
windows and was sheathed in aluminum siding. The
restoration of this building was done in accordance with
National Park Service guidelines allowing Richard to
recoup 20% of his rehabilitation costs as a federal tax
credit through a program called the Federal
Rehabilitation Tax Credit Incentive. The NPS has strict
guidelines that they require of recipients of this tax
credit to insure that buildings are properly restored.
The restoration
of the Hotze House has closely followed those guidelines
by re-using all salvageable material from the original
structure and using appropriate finishes and materials
where new material had to be added.
On the front of
the house the balustrade had to be reconstructed but
most of the original materials were salvaged. The most
reconstruction work took place on the rear of the
building where the porch had to be completely rebuilt
and a wall rebuilt because it was entirely gone. The
windows on this wall also had to be reproduced in
similar style to the original windows found elsewhere on
the building.
Inside the
house has a much larger feel than you get on the
exterior. It has soaring high ceilings and four large
original rooms. The rear wing is thought to have been
added sometime during the time the Hotze’s lived in New
York, during the late 1800s. It is thought that the two
rooms on the right were the living and dining rooms
while the rooms on the left were bedrooms (?). During
the years that this building operated as the Mary Dodge
School each of the rooms was used as a classroom for
children in Kindergarten, 1st, 2nd,
and 3rd grade. The interior was altered at
this time through the addition of closets in each of the
rooms to provide storage for school supplies. She also
closed off the access between the rooms—this change was
reversed during restoration of the house. Additionally,
the end of the central hallway was closed in to add
shelving.
