Overview
Site development and excavation for the English cottage style home at 3852 NE Alameda was begun in 1930 during the early days of the Great Depression by local builder and next door neighbor—Willis Chandler, but paused soon after until the spring of 1938 when better economic times fed a returning real estate market.
Chandler Construction Company built many of the homes along this stretch of NE Alameda during the 1920s, including Chandler’s own family home next door to the west at 3860 NE Alameda. Many Portland homebuilders folded, left town or resorted to other work during the lean years of the early 1930s. In 1931, Chandler sold the property along with several others he owned (probably to raise capital during the depths of the Depression) and it passed through multiple hands until being purchased as a vacant lot by Howard and Del Rosa Carruth. They switched architect and builder in 1937 and began construction.
The home has had only two owners since the Carruths and the Mackert-Southards and has never been occupied by children.
The front-facing double gables, steep-pitched roof, elliptical dormer, classic chimney and exterior surface of brick and beveled wood siding are all elements of English Cottage style, topped with ceramic tile roofing.
Inside, design features include a decorative webbed transom window over the door; prominent stairway with wide sweeping steps at the base and a soaring decorative ceiling above; and ample room for entertaining including a wine cellar, bar and party room, sauna, prominent sun room, and cove-ceilinged living and dining rooms.
The home is listed in the City of Portland’s Historic Resource Inventory and noted for its architecture.
Property Development
3852 NE Alameda exists in Northeast Portland’s Beaumont neighborhood, an area that was first platted for development in 1910. Newspaper advertisements from that time focused on the amenities of the new subdivision. The first homes were built adjacent to the streetcar spur line that traveled up the Wisteria hill and terminated near the corner of NE 41st and Klickitat.
Homes along the Alameda Ridge on the street that was known then simply as “The Alameda” didn’t come along until 1923-1924 when Willis Chandler began to develop those properties. Portland’s economy had cooled in the late 19-teens under the influence of World War 1 and the pandemic, causing homebuilding to slow across the city. As economic conditions began to pick up and population increased, demand for new housing rebounded. During the mid 1920s, the pace and volume of home construction in Portland eclipsed other west coast cities, particularly on Portland’s eastside.
From The Oregonian, May 1, 1910
Early Ownership Changes and Deed Restrictions
The chain of title which tracks ownership changes across the life of the property, even long before the current house was built, makes it clear Lot 8 & 9 of Block 48 changed hands multiple times as investors and speculators jostled to find the best property at the best deal. The title also contains deed restrictions placed on the property by developer Columbia Trust Company that were sadly all too common at the time across Portland neighborhoods:
“That during the period of twenty-five (25) years from the first day of May 1910, no structures other than single detached dwelling houses, costing not less than three thousand five hundred dollars each shall be erected on said premises nor shall the same or any part thereof be in any manner used or occupied by Chinese, Japanese or Negroes except that persons of said races may be employed as servants by residents.”
Racial deed restrictions like these can be found in Alameda, Dolph Park and many other subdivisions platted in the 19-teens and 20s.
Chandler Construction and a False Start
Builder Willis Monroe Chandler had big plans for the lot next door to his own family house, probably a home much like his own, designed by the same architect, Charles L. Linde. But the Great Depression intervened.
Chandler and wife Malissa arrived in Portland in 1915 from Texas; he was born in 1881 in Leesville, Louisiana. During his first years in Portland, Chandler managed a local building supply business called Pacific Fireproof Paint and Waterproofing Co.
In July 1921, he incorporated with partners J.A. Hiller and John Olsen as the Chandler Construction Company to take advantage of the improving housing market, specifically focusing on Beaumont and Laurelhurst. In a period of just a few years, Chandler proceeded to build and sell dozens of homes in Northeast Portland. The following table lists homes he built in the immediate vicinity.
3800 NE Alameda March 1924 Chandler reported that this new but vacant house was robbed of all window shades, electrical fixtures and 40 light bulbs in February 1927
3810 NE Alameda October 1928
3818 NE Alameda January 1926 Cost $18,000
3828 NE Alameda February 1926
3838 NE Alameda September 1926 Cost $19,000, for F.H. Lyons
3844 NE Alameda September 1928
3852 NE Alameda March 1938 Foundation excavated by Chandler in 1930.
3860 NE Alameda July 1930 Chandler family home Cost $22,000 Design by Carl L. Linde
4111 NE Alameda December 1927
4121 NE Alameda February 1928
4131 NE Alameda September 1926 Cost $16,000, for N. Norton
4140 NE Alameda September 1926 Cost $12,000, for Fred Marx
4431 NE Alameda March 1926 Cost $18,500, for Ben Rybke
2804 NE 38th March 1924 Design by Hubert Williams
2824 NE Cesar Chavez August 1923 Design by Universal Plans Service
Advertisements for three of the homes he built along the Alameda Ridge appeared in the August 29, 1926 edition of The Oregonian (on the next page). Note that addresses for these three homes are in the pre-1930 address change format: 1130 The Alameda (3800 NE Alameda); 1134 Alameda (3818 NE Alameda); and 1138 Alameda (3828 NE Alameda).
3852 was completed after Portland’s addressing change, so has only had that single address.
Here is the first permit that Chandler took out for construction of 3852 on June 5, 1930, then addressed as 1148 The Alameda. Note that it covers only excavation and foundation (to cost $400) for a single-family residence, which was to be designed by Carl Linde. Linde was also the architect for Chandler’s home next door at 1144 The Alameda. 18 months after this permit was issued likely due to financial limitations the work was paused, Chandler sold, and the property passed through three investors before being sold to Howard and Del Rosa Carruth in October 1937.
Almost eight years later, on March 14, 1938, Howard Carruth took out this permit, covering construction of a $15,000 home designed by architect Herbert Angell.
Architect Herbert Archie Angell
Herbert Archie Angell was a well-known Portland architect, having studied at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the University of Oregon and the Portland Business College. Born in Junction City, Oregon in 1883, Angell moved to Portland in 1901. As a young man he worked as a carpenter for his father Elmer Angell who was a Portland brickmaker and building contractor. In 1912, after college, Angell went to work as a draftsman for several Portland architecture firms From 1920-1924, he worked for A.E. Doyle, Portland’s best-known architect of the 20th Century. In 1925, Angell began his own architecture practice Among his many residential and commercial projects, Angell is remembered as architect of the Rose City Golf Club Clubhouse, 2200 NE 71st Avenue, built in 1931 and listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Also designed in the English Cottage style, the clubhouse and 3852 bear some family resemblances.
In an interview with The Oregonian in March 1929, Angell described his preference for brick as a building material and for English Cottage as a design style.
During the hardest years of the Depression, Angell worked as an architect for the Works Progress Administration. His connections with the WPA may be related to knowledge passed down from original homeowner Howard Carruth that skilled workers—among them, men who had worked on Timberline Lodge during its construction from 1936-1938—may have been craftsmen who worked on the 3852’s stairs, fireplace surrounds, and stairway ceiling.
Angell and first wife Laura had two children: Robert, born in 1920 and Janet born in 1924. Herbert and Laura divorced in 1939 and he remarried Marie M. Cameron. During the 1940 census, the couple was living at 9025 NE Going. Angell died of a heart attack in Portland at age 58 on May 20, 1941.
Construction
Because there are no construction inspection cards on file at the Bureau of Development Services and no mention in newspapers or other archives from that time, it’s impossible to know for sure the actual builder of the house. The Carruths, ditched Chandler’s earlier plans by Linde and retained architect Herbert Angell for the plans (Chandler Construction did not work with Angell). Existing documentation lists only Carruth as the builder of record, though he was a successful surgeon and real estate investor and would have had a trusted project manager oversee the work.
A common alternative to hiring a contractor at the time was to use “day labor” craftsmen to build homes, usually supervised by an architect; this was perceived as being more exclusive than working with a contractor because the project manager could choose the team of craftsmen. It could be that Angell supervised construction and used WPA day labor craftsmen he knew to do the work. Surely, Chandler would have looked on with interest at the one that got away.
In this detail from a 1930 oblique aerial photo of the area looking toward the northwest, the empty lot that would become the homesite for 3852 NE Alameda is clearly visible at the arrow. The adjacent houses are recognizable today. The surface of the 3852 homesite appears to have been excavated.
Owner Chronology
1937-1976 Dr. Howard A. Carruth, Del Rosa Carruth (1888-1955), Anne Carruth (1885-1977) Howard and Del Rosa Carruth were well established in Portland in 1937 he was 52 and she was 48 when they purchased the Alameda Ridge property from Willis Chandler. Carruth was a leading surgeon who taught and practiced at Oregon Health Sciences University and at Emanuel Hospital where he served as president of the staff. Before their marriage in 1923, Del Rosa who went by “Rose” had worked as a clerk for the Atchison Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad. The couple were avid golfers and members of the Columbia Edgewater Golf Club. Their golf tournament scores were routinely cited in The Oregonian, and Rose even had a tournament trophy named after her.
During their first years in the house, Rose’s mother Lorena M. Denham lived with them, until she died on December 30, 1943 from a fall in the house. According to newspaper reports and her death certificate, Rose died in the home on June 21, 1955 from a heart attack. On June 14, 1959, Howard remarried to Anne Hales Tigart. On their wedding certificate, Howard is listed as widowed and a retired physician; Anne is also listed as widowed, working as an office clerk and living at 1000 SW Vista Avenue.
Howard served in World War 1 as a major in the medical corps of the 3rd Oregon Infantry Regiment during its 1918 deployment to France. In the 1970s, as living memory of World War 1 began to recede and veterans of that era became rare, Carruth appeared in multiple news stories about the Oregon Third Infantry Regiment
Dr. Howard E. Carruth (left) in a news story from The Oregonian on September 20, 1975.
Howard was still living in the house at this time.
Sometime during the early 1970s, Anne Carruth transitioned into a Portland care facility. Howard continued to live on in the house alone. Howard had re-mortgaged the house with US National Bank, which decided to sell in 1976, against Howard’s wishes. Chris Mackert and Pat Southard, bought the house from the bank in April 1976, recalled that during those last years, Howard lived primarily on the first floor. The couple made an arrangement whereby Howard was able to stay on in the house until he was no longer into a Portland nursing home. He died on January 25, 1977 at age 92. Anne died on October 14, 1977.
1976-2024 Dr. Christine Mackert & Patricia Southard
Chris and Pat met Howard Carruth in his final years and heard some of his memories about the house including how as he aged, the stairs had become increasingly challenging. In his younger years, Howard would frequently hold poker games for his friends in the sunroom, which was originally floored in linoleum. When Chris and Pat redid that floor with its current inlaid oak to match the rest of the house, the contractor who came to do the work remembered the house from construction in 1938 because he was the original flooring contractor back in the day.
Chris and Pat noted the Carruths must have had live-in help: a call button in the dining room floor would request help. The downstairs room may have been a residence for a cook or maid.
Howard planted five varieties of grapes in the backyard and would routinely bring surplus fruit to the Portland Rescue Mission.
During their almost 50 years with the house, Chris and Pat replaced the sanitary sewer connection in 1996; upgraded to a heat pump system in 2009; and added a gas fireplace that same year