ARCHITECTURE:
This late British Arts & Crafts-style, multi-gabled house has one very long side-facing gable. There is a double-gabled, Tudor extension to the right of the front porch. The gables are jettied and corbelled, and there is a main floor angled bay below the right gable. Beyond the gables is a small through-the-cornice wall dormer. The two-storey, gabled entrance projects beyond the gables and has a recessed porch below a bank of four diamond-paned leaded lights. A small, gabled, one-storey conservatory on the left end has an attached octagonal bay. Medieval touches include the hand-adzed finishing of major timber elements, a stone hood over the doorway, parged and brick Tudor chimneys on the ridge of the main roof, and trowelled stucco cladding. The roof has been redone in metal. The house, converted to 10 suites in 1950, has a large verandah and many windows on the rear façade. It cost $40,000 and was built to replace Robleda (below). The Pooleys also altered a garage to a dwelling for $3,500 in 1928.
ORIGINAL OCCUPANTS:
1928-34: The house was built for Edward Foster Pooley and Grace Randolph (née Higbee, 1866-1937). Grace was born in Cincinnati, OH, and lived in Philadelphia for many years before coming to Victoria in 1927. She was living at 855 Pemberton Rd, Rockland, when she died in 1937.
OTHER OCCUPANTS:
1935-50: Widow Sarah (née Rose, then Willis) Benning, born in Pennsylvania, she married Capt. Willis of the US Artillery in 1917, but he was killed in action a short time later. In 1928 she married James William Benning (1898- 1931), president of Benning Investment Co of Montreal. Sarah and James moved to BC in 1924, and operated a fruit ranch at Penticton. They came to Victoria in 1928, where James died of pneumonia.
1951-52: May Ethel Cherry managed the 10-suite Robleda Apartments. She had operated a number of converted mansions in Rockland, including 1195 Fort St, 1385 Manor Rd, 834 Pemberton Rd and 1320 Rockland, and had previously lived at 1141 Fort St, Fairfield.
Recent Comments