Charles Curtis House - Neighborhood
The Curtis House at 1101 Topeka Avenue in Topeka was home to Charles and Annie Curtis from 1907 until their deaths in 1936 and 1924 respectively. The Curtis House was listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 1973.
The Curtises were among the familiar names in this prestigious neighborhood. Social gatherings, political networking, news broadcasts, and history making events all converged on this important thoroughfare. Topeka Avenue, originally intended as the city’s Main Street, was platted to be perpendicular with the Kansas River along with other streets in downtown Topeka. It was later officially named Topeka Boulevard. Here many doctors, judges, and influential political leaders lived in the neighborhood.
William and Delora (Kleinhaus) Crosby built their neoclassical house at 1109 Topeka Avenue in 1910. William and his brother Erastus founded the Crosby Brothers Department Store in 1880, a successive retail outlet that often outpaced competitors on Kansas Avenue. Their new home would reflect their business success, as well as community optimism and 20th century trends in modern architecture. They hired Topeka architect Frank C. Squires to design their Italian Renaissance-style residence. The house featured blond rick exterior, ionic columns, stone and terra cotta ornamentation, hipped dormers, and red clay-tile roof. The house served as home to the couple and accommodated gatherings for their many social and fraternal interests. William Crosby died in 1922. Delora Crosby sold the house in 1927, and died in 1930. The Crosby House remained in private ownership until it was purchased by the Kansas Order of the Eastern Star in 1952. It was listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 2011.
Arthur Capper bought lots at 1025, 1027, and 1035 on south Topeka Avenue with the plan to create a large residence to entertain. His house was completed in 1914 at 1035 South Topeka. Capper gained a name as editor and publisher of the Topeka Daily Capital before he was elected as the 20th Governor of Kansas. He served from 1915 to 1919, leaving office after being elected to the U.S. Senate.
Capper served in the U.S. Senate until 1949. While he was away in Washington, D.C., his home was occupied by some governors who followed him in office. Capper moved his WIBW Radio studios from downtown Topeka to his former home on Topeka Avenue in 1934. The station gained a reputation for its live musical performances. Albert started the "Shutt Banjo" band with instruments he made; this was the first band to play over WIBW radio. Others included the Shepherd of the Hills and the Kaw Valley Boys; the Bohemian Band; the Pride of the Prairie Trio; the Harmony Hix; Ezra Hawkins; the lonesome cowboy, Roy Faulkner; and the Radioaires. The Pleasant Valley Gang, a trio of organ, accordion, guitar, and vocal, performed from the 1940s through the 1980s.
Capper continued expanding his publication and broadcast properties, licensing WIBW Television, Channel 13, in 1953, in the former Security Benefit Association school in west Topeka. Capper sold his properties to Stauffer Publications in 1957. WIBW Radio moved west to join the television station. The old WIBW Studios was razed in 1963.
To the north of the Capper House, at 1018 Topeka Avenue, was rival newspaper editor, Frank P. MacLennan, of the Topeka State Journal. MacLennan went on to build a home on the former MacAfee farm 244 acres in west Topeka, in 1928. Cedar Crest would become the designated governor's residence in 1962.
The Charles F. Menninger family lived at 1251 Topeka Avenue, pictured circa 1901. Edwin Menninger later recalled growing up in the neighborhood in the family home at 1251 Topeka Avenue. “It was the route the horse-cars traveled from downtown. It was one of the widest avenues, with amble raised parkways, which made it ideal for the circus parades that traveled it between the Fairgrounds and the downtown business district; and these came three or four times each summer.”
This 1913 Sanborn map, revised in 1950, shows the 1100 block of Topeka Avenue.
