HomeMy WebLinkAboutOliver Mansion SB NRform_Redacted
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
1
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
This form is for use in nominating or requesting determinations for individual properties and districts. See instructions in National Register
Bulletin, How to Complete the National Register of Historic Places Registration Form. If any item does not apply to the property being
documented, enter "N/A" for "not applicable." For functions, architectural classification, materials, and areas of significance, enter only
categories and subcategories from the instructions.
1. Name of Property
Historic name: Oliver, Joseph D., House
Other names/site number: Copshaholm
Name of related multiple property listing:
N/A
(Enter "N/A" if property is not part of a multiple property listing
____________________________________________________________________________
2. Location
Street & number: 808 W. Washington Street; 201 Chapin Street
City or town: South Bend State: IN County: St. Joseph
Not For Publication: Vicinity:
____________________________________________________________________________
3. State/Federal Agency Certification
As the designated authority under the National Historic Preservation Act, as amended,
I hereby certify that this x nomination ___ request for determination of eligibility meets the
documentation standards for registering properties in the National Register of Historic Places
and meets the procedural and professional requirements set forth in 36 CFR Part 60.
In my opinion, the property x meets ___ does not meet the National Register Criteria. I
recommend that this property be considered significant at the following
level(s) of significance:
x national ___statewide local
Applicable National Register Criteria:
x A x B x C ___D
Signature of certifying official/Title: Date
Indiana DNR-Division of Historic Preservation and Archaeology
State or Federal agency/bureau or Tribal Government
In my opinion, the property meets does not meet the National Register criteria.
Signature of commenting official: Date
Title : State or Federal agency/bureau
or Tribal Government
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Sections 1-6 page 2
______________________________________________________________________________
4. National Park Service Certification
I hereby certify that this property is:
entered in the National Register
determined eligible for the National Register
determined not eligible for the National Register
removed from the National Register
other (explain:) _____________________
______________________________________________________________________
Signature of the Keeper Date of Action
____________________________________________________________________________
5. Classification
Ownership of Property
(Check as many boxes as apply.)
Private:
Public – Local
Public – State
Public – Federal
x
x
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Section 7 page 3
Category of Property
(Check only one box.)
Building(s)
District
Site
Structure
Object
Number of Resources within Property
(Do not include previously listed resources in the count)
Contributing Noncontributing
2 1 buildings
1 0 sites
4 1 structures
0 0 objects
7 2 Total
Number of contributing resources previously listed in the National Register 1
____________________________________________________________________________
6. Function or Use
Historic Functions
(Enter categories from instructions.)
DOMESTIC: single dwelling
DOMESTIC: secondary structure
Current Functions
(Enter categories from instructions.)
RECREATION AND CULTURE: museum
x
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Section 7 page 4
_____________________________________________________________________________
7. Description
Architectural Classification
(Enter categories from instructions.)
LATE VICTORIAN: Romanesque
Materials: (enter categories from instructions.)
foundation: STONE
walls: STONE
TERRA COTTA
roof: TERRA COTTA
other: BRICK
ASPHALT
Narrative Description
(Describe the historic and current physical appearance and condition of the property. Describe
contributing and noncontributing resources if applicable. Begin with a summary paragraph that
briefly describes the general characteristics of the property, such as its location, type, style,
method of construction, setting, size, and significant features. Indicate whether the property has
historic integrity.)
______________________________________________________________________________
Summary Paragraph
The Joseph D. Oliver House, also known as Copshaholm, was constructed between 1895-1896
by leading agricultural implement industrialist, J. D. Oliver, best known for the Oliver Chilled
Plow Works Company in South Bend, Indiana. The 38-room, three-story house, as well as its
carriage house and perimeter property wall, are constructed in the Richardsonian Romanesque
style with walls composed of large fieldstone granite boulders, cut and neatly fitted together with
exceptional skill. The property was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1973;
this nomination seeks to elevate the property’s significance from state to national status and
includes additional information and boundary expansion.
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Section 7 page 5
_____________________________________________________________________________
Narrative Description
The Joseph D. Oliver House is situated on a large partial city block on South Bend’s near west
side. The West Washington Street National Register District, in which the Oliver House is
included, contains many large residential estates from the late 1800s of the city’s leading
citizens, including a similarly scaled and styled house that belonged to Clement Studebaker of
the Studebaker Corporation. The Oliver site occupies the better portion of the city block bounded
by Washington Street on the north, Chapin Street on the east, Laurel Street on the west, and
Thomas Street on the south. The house fronts Washington Street and the stone perimeter wall
with gateways line both Washington and Chapin Streets with the house nearer that corner
intersection (photos 03, 08). A formal sunken garden (photos 18, 21) is west of the house while
the remaining area around the house is lawn with originally paved lanes and courts for carriages
and automobiles.
The original National Register nomination submitted for this property contained only the
property on which the house, carriage house, and gardens were located. Under current
ownership, and due to additions made to the rear (south) of the carriage house, the nominated
property extends south to Thomas Street. While the scale of the addition on the carriage house is
large and for all intents and purposes, a separate building, it is adequately removed from primary
views due to a breezeway connection and does not substantially impact the significance of the
building. See photos 07, 09-11, and 14-16 for context. A large asphalt parking lot is south of the
History Museum’s main building (1994) and Studebaker Museum (photos 19-20) with entries
onto Thomas Street. The Studebaker Museum (2005) is connected to the History Museum’s main
building but carries a separate address of 201 Chapin Street and is under separate ownership by
the City of South Bend. Because National Register boundaries cannot go through a building, and
the History Museum main building and Studebaker Museum are connected, they are not counted
as separate resources from the Oliver Carriage House.
Joseph D. Oliver House, 1896. Richardsonian Romanesque Revival, Contributing
Lamb & Rich, architects (New York)
Exterior, photos 01-06, 08-10, and 12-13
The large home expands from a cube form with a number of bays and a large porch that wraps
around the front of the house (photo 01). The house is three stories on a raised, finished
basement with an attic over the front half of the house. This gives the impression of the house
being four stories tall with an attic in the front, side-gabled portion, particularly when viewed
from the east (photo 02). The general massing includes a three story (northeast) corner turret, a
projecting portico centered on the front façade (photo 04), and a one-story porch that wraps the
turret to a porte cochere on the west side of the house (photo 05). The back wall features two one
story projecting bays on the west half and a two-and-a-half story projecting bay with enclosed
porch on the east half (photo 13).
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Section 7 page 6
The home’s walls are composed of cut, rough-faced or split granite fieldstone in various shades
of gray and red. The stone is cut into square and rectangular blocks with larger blocks in the
raised basement walls, followed by smaller blocks in the first story, with gradually smaller
blocks composing the second story walls (this is best seen in photo 02). The blocks are fit tightly
together with narrow mortar joints. A pitched, smooth-cut limestone belt course is at the top of
the basement walls which allows the upper stories to appear to recess from a thicker base. The
home’s windowsills are smooth-cut, flat limestone while the lintels are tall, rusticated granite
matching the walls. The porch walls more closely resemble the perimeter wall of the site with
larger blocks and grapevine mortar joints.
Most of the home’s wood windows are double-hung sashes in a variety of sash patterns. These
are painted dark green along with most of the exposed, finished wood features on the exterior
such as porch beams, cornices, and roof balustrades. The roof and gables are covered with deep
red colored terra cotta tiles including dormer walls and roofs and the walls of most projecting
bays. The tile application includes ridge tiles and pinnacles at the front of gables. The roof is
flared at the eaves and features half-round gutters and round downspouts. The soffits and porch
ceiling are covered with beaded boards.
Front Facade
The front (north) façade is divided into three sections, all fronted with the one-story porch. The
east section is the three-story turret with a pair of 1/1 windows facing north flanked by 1/1
windows facing northwest and northeast in the curved walls of the turret (photos 03-04). The
turret’s second story features three double-hung windows with top sashes divided into three ogee
arches. The second story and second story windows are topped by a tall belt course of cut granite
which is topped by a limestone cornice. A tall frieze of patterned granite is above the cornice
featuring rows of four-petaled flowers in red granite and poche of gray granite. The frieze is
topped by a sill course of cut granite. This forms the sill for the third story’s band of casement
windows. The band of windows is composed of seven pairs of casements, each divided into four
panes. Short wood Corinthian columns divide the pairs and support the conical turret roof. A tall
stone chimney rises from the west, inside corner of the turret.
The middle section of the front façade features a buttressed front portico wall with a broad
segmental archway onto the porch (photo 04). The portico wall is topped by carved limestone
crenelations. Recessed from the front wall of the portico is a two-story projecting bay with entry
on the east half of the first story. The entry is composed of a wide segmental arch with a pair of
wide, one-panel wood doors and stained art glass transom depicting Art Nuevo stylized fauna
and shield. A group of three windows, the middle slightly wider than the other two, is west of the
entry. The second story of the projecting bay has a pair of wide double-hung windows flanked
with three limestone Corinthian columns centered in the wall. The windows have three ogee
arches in the top sashes. This window and column assemblage is flanked by a small 1/1 window
on the west and inset limestone panel on the east. Both the window and panel feature arches with
carved limestone clamshell panels in the arch. The granite voussoirs that form the arch are
stepped rather than cut to form the top of the arch. The patterned frieze and wall cap from the
turret continues across the top of the projecting bay. This forms a balcony-like wall at the top of
the projecting bay with a carved ball finial on the front northwest corner of the wall. A dormer,
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Section 7 page 7
covered with roof tiles, is centered at the back of the bay and features a pair of 3/2 windows in its
front wall. The dormer features a rounded roof.
The west section of the front façade has a wide 1/1 window centered on the first story (right side
of photo 04). A three-sided projecting bay is centered in the second story. It has three small
casement windows with transoms divided into small diamond-shaped panes by lead caning. The
bay has tiles on its wall under the windows and boards that form the narrow side walls and frieze
at the top of the bay. The bay is sheltered by the overhanging eaves of the side-gabled roof. A
dormer, matching the dormer over the center section, rises from the roof and is centered with the
projecting bay on the second story.
The front porch extends around the east side of the house, around the turret, and to the west side
of the house ending at the porte cochere (photo 05). The porch walls are cut granite, capped with
granite, and features several cut stone scuppers to drain the porch floor. The porch has two short,
but wide segmental arched openings filled with iron work in the west end of the north façade and
north end of the west façade. Three similar arched openings are in the porch wall as it wraps
around the turret. Rows of limestone Corinthian columns rest on the porch walls and support a
wood beam with dentils. The beam carries a low-pitched hipped roof covered with tiles. The
porch floor is composed of small, randomly laid mosaics with a mosaic tile border. The porch
has a raked ceiling covered with beaded boards. The front wall of the portico, described
previously, has five steps that lead down to a front sidewalk. A metal handrail with ornate
ironwork is centered on these front steps. The porte cochere and east porch terminus will be
described in the west and east facades, respectively.
East Facade
The east façade is divided into three primary sections. The north section is the turret, already
described, and the eastern terminus of the front porch. This east porch projects from the rounded
section of the porch wrapping the turret and features four Corinthian columns on its front wall to
support its low-pitched hipped roof. An opening with steps leading to an alpine garden is
centered in the porch’s front wall. The alpine garden (the Olivers used it for tropical plants) has a
semicircular plan with stone walls topped by pointed stones matching the perimeter wall of the
property (left side of photo 01). The garden has an opening on its north side, flanked by a stone
pier on its east side. The garden floor is covered with mosaics similar to the porch floor.
The middle section of the east façade features a three-sided, two-story bay with cutaway corners
on its south half (right side of photo 02). The basement of the bay has a window in each wall,
each covered by ironwork. The northeast facing window is much smaller than the other two. The
first story of the bay has three wide 3/1 windows, one in each wall, with the upper sashes
composed of small art glass panes. The second story of the bay features three diamond-shaped
red granite stones in each wall. A course of sawtooth red granite stones is just below the
limestone sill course for the second story windows. The bay’s second story has three double-
hung windows, one in each wall, with a top sash composed of three ogee arches. This projecting
bay is sheltered by the upper story gable overhang. The north half of the middle section features
two basement windows, the north window shorter than the south window. A wide 1/1 window is
in the first story. The second story has a row of three small casement windows topped by a
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Section 7 page 8
segmental arched transom composed of art glass on the south and a double-hung windows with
top sash composed of three ogee arches on the north. A large, double-hipped gabled roof extends
across the front of the house and features a tall side-gable covered with tiles over this middle
section. The side gable projects forward and is supported by three large wood brackets set on
stone corbels. The gable wall is divided into three sections by narrow flared eaves that extend
north/south across the wall. The bottom section features two pairs of 3/2 windows recessed into
the wall. A row of four small square attic windows is at the top of the middle section.
The south section of the east façade also has a one-story extension on its south end (left side of
photo 02). The extension features a full-round arched window in the basement and a row of three
small windows in the first story. The extension has a curvilinear-shaped parapet capped with cut
stone. The remaining south section has two bays of windows in its south half. The basement
windows are fronted with ironwork. The first story windows are 6/2 and the second story
windows, which share a limestone sill, are double-hung with three ogee arches in the top sash.
The north half of this section features two basement windows fronted with ironwork and one 6/2
first story window. The second story features two segmental arched openings with a row of three
small casement windows topped by a segmental arched window composed of art glass. These
two openings share a limestone sill. A round panel of cut stonework is in the middle of this
section’s first story. It features a large daisy wheel with eight petals of gray granite
circumscribed by a band of gray granite. Red granite forms the poche and center of the daisy.
Three dormers, covered with roof tiles, are in the roof over the south section. Each dormer has a
3/2 window in its front wall. A tall stone chimney is centered on the ridge behind the middle
dormer.
West Facade
The west façade is divided into two sections with the tall, side gable and porte cochere in the
north section and a one-story bay that projects to the south in the south section. The one-story
bay has cutaway corners with the southwest-facing wall visible on the west façade (right side of
photo 06). This one-story section has two basement windows fronted with ironwork. The first
story has a large 1/1 window in its south half and a segmental arched window composed of two
casements and arched transom, all featuring art glass, in its north half. The one-story section is
topped by a short frieze of sawtooth cut stone in alternating red and light gray granite. A short
balustrade of turned balusters and piers with recessed panels tops the one-story section’s walls.
The north section of the west façade is dominated on the first story by the porte cochere that
extends from the south end of the porch wrapping the west façade from the front façade (right
side of photo 05/left side of photo 06). Stone steps also lead down from the south end of the
porch to the drive. The porte cochere features two large square columns of cut granite on its
projecting west wall. These carry a low-pitched hipped roof over the drive. A metal cat is
centered on the ridge over the porte cochere. Five limestone steps lead up from the drive onto the
porch. This provides access to a wide wood door with full window and transom composed of art
glass. Two narrow windows are south of the door in the first story. Two 1/1 windows are north
of the door in the first story. The second story features a double-hung window with a top sash
composed of three ogee arches in its north end. A three-sided projecting bay is in the south half
of the second story. It features four double-hung windows with three ogee arches in the top sash.
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Section 7 page 9
These are located in the north and south walls of the bay and two flank a wide window with four
ogee arches in the front wall of the bay. The wide window is over a wood panel. The bottom of
the bay’s walls is covered with tiles. The top of the bay is sheltered by the projecting side gable
of the roof. This gable is covered with tiles and is supported by two large wood brackets set on
stone corbels. The gable wall is divided into three sections by narrow flared eaves that extend
north/south across the wall. The bottom section features three 10/2 windows. A row of four small
square attic windows is at the top of the middle section. A tall cut stone chimney rises from the
north and south sides of the roof on the west façade.
South Facade
The south (back) façade has three projecting sections, or bays, from the taller two-and-a-half
story portion of the house which rises from behind the bays. The west and middle bays are one-
story while the east bay features both a one- and two-story section (photo 13). The west bay
features cutaway corners with windows composed of art glass in the southwest and southeast
facing walls and a large 1/1 window in the front wall. A basement window fronted with ironwork
is also in the front wall of the bay. The bay’s walls are topped by a short frieze of sawtooth cut
stone in alternating red and light gray granite. A short balustrade of turned balusters and piers
with recessed panels tops the one-story sections and partially conceals a hipped roof covered
with metal. The wall rising at the back of the bay features a tall cut stone chimney on its west
side (previously mentioned in the description of the west façade) and a small 1/1 window in its
east side. This section of wall is recessed from the section rising behind the middle bay.
The middle bay has a semicircular wall with a basement window fronted with ironwork. The first
story features rows of narrow windows with transoms composed of art glass, some leaded and
some stained. This forms the music room inside the house. A door with art glass window is on
the west side of the bay and has a set of stone steps that lead down to an asphalt drive. The bay
features a wood cornice and tall frieze covered with tiles. The balustrade from the west bay
continues across the top of the middle bay. The wall rising at the back of the bay features a
semicircular projecting bay with a row of five 1/1 windows with the top sash smaller and
composed of art glass. This bay has a semicircular domed roof and forms the sitting room off the
landing of the grand staircase on the second story. The top story features a wide window flanked
by narrower windows off centered to the east. This is in the landing at the top of the grand
staircase. A cut stone chimney rises from the inside corner between the middle and east sections
of the back façade.
The east section projects forward as it cascades down from the top story to a two-and-a-half story
section, down to a one-story projection (left side of photo 08). The one-story section has a
basement entry in its west wall and an enclosed porch in its southwest corner with wood stairs
and porch door. Both the basement entry and porch are enclosed with wood windows and wood
porch doors with full windows. A square column of cut stone is on the southwest corner of the
porch. A 6/2 window is centered in the first story wall east of the porch. This one-story section
has a shed roof covered with tiles and shaped parapets on its east and west walls. The two-and-a-
half story section that rises from behind the one-story section features a large, projecting three-
sided bay covered with tiles that rests on the roof of the one-story section. The bay’s front wall
has a small middle window flanked by double-hung windows composed of three ogee arches in
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Section 7 page 10
the top sash over two panes in the bottom sash. The bay’s side walls feature a window divided
into three ogee arches. A tall cornice board is at the top of the bay’s walls and the roof is edged
with a balustrade matching those of the west and middle projecting bays. This forms a balcony-
like structure for a dormer covered with tiles centered in the upper story. The dormer has a 3/2
window. A matching dormer is in the west-facing slope of the hipped roof over this section. Two
basement windows fronted with ironwork are on the west wall of this section. The first story has
a 6/2 window on the north side and small window divided into two panes on the south side. The
second story features two double-hung windows with two ogee arches in the top sash. As the
west wall rises from over the middle bay, a full-round arched window is centered in the top
story. It is composed of a double-hung window with three ogee arches in the top sash and two
panes in the bottom sash. It is topped by a full-round arched transom. The back façade’s top
story features a tall cornice board and balustrade matching the one on the west and middle
projecting bays. This also encloses gutters on the back wall.
Interior
The opulence of the Oliver house comes into full view on the interior of the home. Exquisite
woodwork among other finishes in spaces of grand scale are borne out throughout the home. The
general composition of the interior includes large, formal rooms in the main part of the home on
each story, with areas dedicated to service functions, including servant staff, in the southeast
corner projecting section of the home as well as the basement level. An attic, used for storage,
stretches over the front part of the house above the third story and features wood floors, raked
ceilings, and some built-in casework (photo 57). A description of each story from bottom to top
level (basement, first, second, and third stories) follows and includes descriptions of materials
and finishes in the rooms on each story.
Basement
The basement level of the Oliver house demonstrates the necessity for services related to a large
home and the prominence of the family. The main staircase that leads to the basement is from the
kitchen area on the first story. There are also steps that lead down to the basement from the
exterior on the back, southwest corner of the projecting bay under the enclosed porch. This latter
set of steps leads to a storage area with a doorway to a long hallway to the north, which connects
to a laundry room (photo 38) and shipping room and the staircase to the kitchen. An elevator is
in the north end of the hallway and a door in its northwest corner leads to a large drying room in
the center of the basement. A drapery room is off the east side of the drying room; a storeroom is
off the north side of the drapery room (northeast storeroom). The north storeroom is off the north
side of the drying room and the northwest storeroom is off the west side of the drying room. A
small workshop and wine cellar are within the northwest storeroom. Another room is off the
southwest corner of the drying room and leads to a canning room off its south side and a room
enclosing blowers for the mechanical system off its west side.
Finishes in the basement are obviously less refined than those located in spaces meant for use by
the family and guests. The floors are covered with an early composite tile, c. 1940, and many of
the walls are covered with a fiberboard material also from this era. Masonry walls, which include
the exterior walls, are covered with plaster. Most of the ceilings throughout the basement remain
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Section 7 page 11
unfinished and exposed to the floor structure above, typically concrete. The hallway, laundry
room, and shipping room exhibit the highest level of finishes. The shipping room also features
wood wainscot and built-in casework along its east wall. The laundry room features original or
very early porcelain sinks along its south wall. The hallway features unpainted, four-panel wood
doors and trim to rooms and storage closets off the hallway. The staircase leading to the kitchen
is mostly open with a simple wood railing, steps, and square newel post. The underside of the
staircase is finished with beaded boards.
First Story
The first story features five large rooms off a main hall where the grand staircase is located. The
service area of the home, with kitchen and supporting rooms, is in the southeast corner of the
first story. The large front porch wraps the front and west side of the home and includes two
entrances into the first story. The main, front entry includes a vestibule and enters the main hall
on the north/front and a side hall includes an entrance from the porte cochere on the west side. A
small bathroom and staircase is located in the side hall. Finishes and many of the features in the
first story are typical of most of the upper stories. These include wood floors, typically protected
by large modern carpets, wood wainscot and trim, wood doors, and plaster walls and ceilings.
The following descriptions of rooms will highlight important features and provide the location
relational to the main hall which will be described first.
The main hall is a wide space that extends nearly front-to-back on the first story. The north half
of the space features the main entry’s vestibule in its northeast corner and a small sitting area in
its northwest corner (photo 29). A pair of fluted, Ionic columns flank a wide opening between the
north and south half of the main hall. The south half features a large, open grand staircase
leading up from its southwest corner and a fireplace in its east wall (photo 28). The fireplace
surround features caramel-colored marble and spiral wood columns with Ionic capitals (seen on
the right side of photo 29). These support a tall entablature with carved frieze. The staircase has a
tall, carved wood newel post with urn finial. The balustrade is composed of carved wood panels
on the first story and turned spindles on the upper floors. The staircase leads up to a mid-level
mezzanine in the south end of the main hall. It has a projecting, three-sided balcony with
cutaway corners supported by wood corbels that projects out into the main hall (top of photo 28,
middle of photo 41). The main hall is finished with a tall wainscot composed of rows of tall
panels topped by short panels, matching most of the door panel configuration in the house. The
main hall’s ceilings are coffered with wood panels and beams.
The mezzanine features the balcony overlooking the main hall, previously described, on its north
side and a semicircular sitting room through a segmental arched opening on its south side (photo
39). The sitting room features a domed ceiling composed of art glass supported by a carved
wood frieze and wood columns in the sitting room wall. The columns rest on a wall composed of
wood panels. The domed ceiling’s glass is opalescent and backlit.
A room called the Morning Room is off the Main Hall in the northwest corner (photo 32). It has
a pocket door into the Main Hall and a pair of French doors into the side hall. The room
functioned as a sitting parlor for the Oliver women and thus has softer, painted finishes. A
fireplace is centered in the west wall and features a painted, carved surround and white marble.
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Section 7 page 12
The tall baseboards and door surrounds, as well as wood panels under the windows, are also
painted. The ceiling is coffered in geometric patterns with plaster medallions at light fixtures and
is painted.
Joseph D. Oliver’s den is in the southwest corner of the house through a passageway with two
steps into the southwest corner of the main hall (photo 33). The den occupies the west projecting
section of the back façade and is shaped into a three-sided bay with cutaway corners in its south
wall. The den has a fireplace centered in its north wall with a closet in the northeast corner and a
small bathroom in the northwest corner. The fireplace surround is composed of carved oak with
tile. The den’s ceiling is raked and supported by hammer-beam trusses around the perimeter. The
north end of the ceiling features a balcony-like wall with three casement windows divided into
small diamond-shaped panes. This is accessed from the mezzanine level. The balcony is
supported by a pair of wood columns. A pair of doors leads to the music room south of the den.
The den has quarter-sawn oak trim and tall wainscoting. The wall above the wainscot into which
the trusses project appears like a tall plaster frieze with geometric patterns.
The music room (photo 34) has a semicircular plan and is off the south end of the main hall with
a pair of doors centered under the mezzanine balcony. The music room has iron metalwork doors
and sidelights into the main hall and doors with lead-glass windows into the den. A door is also
in the southwest corner of the music room to the exterior. The room features plaster walls with a
high chair rail above which is a heavy bas-relief frieze of figures playing musical instruments.
The frieze is terminated by pilasters ornamented with plasterwork. These flank the row of
windows in the semicircular outside wall that forms the middle projecting bay on the back
façade. The music room has an ornamented plaster cove molding and plaster ceiling.
The dining room is off the east side of the main hall (photo 31). The room has a wainscot of
wood panels and painted tapestry above. The ceiling is plastered and coffered with wood beams
with a perimeter of wood cove moldings and corbels. The dining room has a fireplace centered in
its west wall with a pocket door into the main hall north of the fireplace. The fireplace has a red
tile surround topped by a carved wood mantle flanked by fluted Ionic columns. The columns
support a tall wood entablature, and a mirror is inset above the mantel. A recessed area for the
buffet is centered in the room’s south wall with a door leading into a butler’s pantry on its east
end. This composition features a large surround composed of fluted Ionic pilasters and wood
entablature. The back wall of the recessed area features wood wainscot topped by a mirror
divided into lancets by wood mullions (photo 31). The east wall of the dining room is part of the
projecting three-sided bay with cutaway corners on the east façade. A pair of pocket doors is
centered in the dining room’s north wall and lead into the library.
The library (photo 30) is located in the northeast corner of the house with a pair of pocket doors
that lead into the dining room in its south wall and into the main hall in the south end of its west
wall. The large room has a semicircular north half that is part of the turret on the northeast corner
of the house. The room has built-in wood bookcases between the windows in the north wall and
in the east wall. Wood panels are below the windows. The walls are plastered above the windows
and bookcases. The ceiling has an impressive wood cornice and coffering with carved beams
composing geometric patterns of plaster panels. An elaborately carved wood fireplace is centered
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Section 7 page 13
in the west wall and features green marble and a wood surround flanked by carved Greek god-
like figures that support a frieze of carved wood panels (left side of photo 30).
The service area is through a passageway in the southeast corner of the main hall. The
passageway has an elevator in its north wall and servant’s staircase leading to the second story in
its southwest corner (photo 36). A doorway to the kitchen is in its southeast corner. The kitchen
acts as a hub for a number of functions in the southeast corner of the first story. A servants’
dining room is off its southeast corner, a large icebox and refrigerator are in its southwest corner,
and built-in casework is centered in its west wall next to the basement staircase (photo 37). An
entry to an enclosed porch is near the ice box in the southwest corner. Many of these spaces are
updated and painted, c. 1935. A very refined, original space is the butler’s pantry which occupies
a small room between the kitchen and dining room (photo 35). It features original wood
casework of upper and lower cabinets. The upper cabinets are supported by slender Doric
columns and have doors with glass panes divided into lancets. A steel safe is nestled into the
northwest corner of the pantry and features a wood door on the outside of its steel door (seen in
photo 35).
Second Story
The second story has a similar arrangement of spaces as the first story. A walkway with
balustrade overlooks the main hall in the center of the second story (photos 40-41) with family
bedrooms off the west, north, and east sides as well as the northwest corner. A study is located in
the northeast corner, in the turret (photo 42), and a nursery is located off a long hallway in the
wing that extends over the service area in the southeast corner of the house (photo 48). The
walkway balustrade that overlooks the main hall from the north features three segmental arched
openings supported by carved square columns of wood with Ionic capitals (photo 40). The
middle opening is much wider and spans the opening while the other two span the walkway. The
walls of this space, along with the remaining rooms of the second story are plaster. The ceiling of
this space is coffered with wood beams that create geometric patterns in the plaster ceiling. The
remaining ceilings in the second story are plastered with a curve to meet a trim board on the
walls below. With the exception of this upper main hall, nearly all the remaining woodwork in
the second story is painted. The doorways feature tall surrounds with entablature hoods and the
doors are mostly one-panel.
The north (or green) bedroom (photo 45) features an entry off the walkway in the east end of its
south wall and one into a hallway centered in its east wall. A corner fireplace is located in the
northeast corner and a bathroom (shared with the northwest bedroom) and closet are off its west
wall. The wood fireplace surround features carved applique and a tall backboard over the mantle
that has an oval mirror flanked by smaller rectangular mirrors with clamshell carving above.
These reflect the panels on the outside wall of this room on the north façade. The northwest
corner bedroom (also called the pink bedroom, photo 46) has an entry from a small hall off the
northwest corner of the main walkway at the top of the main hall. A fireplace is in the south half
of the room’s west wall and closet and bathroom (shared with the north bedroom) is in the east
wall. The fireplace surround is wood with carved features and tile. The west bedroom (also
called Well’s bedroom, photo 47) has an entrance in its east wall off the small hall from the
walkway. A closet and shared bathroom with the walkway are also in the east wall. A small
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Section 7 page 14
fireplace is located in the southeast corner of the south wall. It features a simple carved wood
surround and black marble. A wood panel is below the center window in the projecting bay in
the west wall. The room also features a chair rail and wood cornice near the top of the walls.
The east bedroom has an entrance in its northwest corner off a hallway from the walkway’s
northeast corner. The room’s west wall forms a slight three-sided bay centered on a carved
marble fireplace in the center of the wall (photo 43). This mirrors the projecting three-sided bay
with cutaway corners in its east wall. The fireplace features a tall mirror flanked by wood panels
and surmounted by wood carvings above the marble mantle. A doorway in the southwest corner
of the room leads down a hall to a dressing room and nursery in the south end of the second
story. A bathroom, shared with the study, and closet are in the north wall (photo 44). Wood
panels are below the windows in this room and a closet door in the southwest corner is fronted
with a large mirror. The study has a doorway into the shared bathroom with the east bedroom in
the east end of its south wall and an entry into the hallway that leads from the main walkway in
the west end of its south wall. A fireplace is centered in the study’s west wall and features a
carved surround with scroll brackets and tile. The room’s north wall is the semicircular second
story of the turret on the northeast corner of the house. Its band of windows have wood panels
below them.
The hallway that leads off the southeast corner of the main walkway includes the servants’ stairs
on its west side and trunk room and bathroom in its southwest corner. The trunk room’s
woodwork, which features built-in casework remains unpainted unlike most of the woodwork on
the second story. Off the east side of the hallway is the short hall from the east bedroom that
connects to a dressing room on the east side of the hall and nursery in the southeast corner. The
dressing room (photo 49) features built-in casework along both its north and south walls. The
east wall features a built-in bench and wood panels below its segmental arched windows. The
room has a tall wainscot to just below the plaster cove. The nursery features built-in casework
and a fireplace in its north wall, east of the entry to the short hallway to the east bedroom (photo
48). It also has an entry from the service hall in its west wall. The fireplace features a simple
wood surround and gray marble. The casework has upper cabinets with doors composed of glass
divided into lancets. They are flanked by carve, fluted Ionic pilasters. The south wall appears like
a three-sided bay with windows that includes a closet in its west side. This is composed of a
larger three-sided projecting bay with cutaway corners on the back façade.
Third Story (half-story)
The third story features a few more public spaces again as well as servants’ bedrooms and a
bedroom suite for Joseph Oliver. The grand staircase terminates at a landing on the south end of
the central part of the third story (photo 50). A ballroom occupies the remaining central part of
the third story and features a semicircular south wall which is reflected in the landing off the
stairs (right side of photo 50). A fireplace is located in the south end of the ballroom’s east wall
and an entrance to a billiard room is in the north end of the east wall. An alcove with segmental
arch is centered in the room’s north wall (the location of a dormer). The walls and ceiling, which
is raked, are plastered in the ballroom. Some unusual features include large wood beams and
brackets that stretch across the ceiling as well as an alcove area north of the fireplace that
features a fluted Ionic column supporting two full round arches (photo 56). The fireplace
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Section 7 page 15
surround is wood with tile and features a pair of fluted Ionic columns that support the mantle.
The room has a wood entablature around its perimeter at a height just above the doorways. The
woodwork is painted, like the rest of the third story.
Joseph Oliver’s suite includes a study in the northwest corner and bedroom on the west side of
the second story. The study and bedroom both have entries from a hallway that curves around the
ballroom’s south wall from the landing. A bathroom with a door curved to match the hallway is
in the southwest corner between the hall and bedroom. A fireplace with carved wood and tile
surround are in the bedroom’s southeast corner (photo 51) while built-in wood casework is in the
northwest corner. The study features a fireplace with a simple wood surround and stone centered
in its west wall. A doorway to a pipe room and closet is north of the fireplace. The study also
features an alcove in its north wall (the location of a dormer, photo 52). Like most of the rooms
in the third story, the ceiling is plaster and is raked.
The billiard room is off the northeast corner of the ballroom and occupies a large portion of the
turret’s third story (photo 53). The room has wood chair rails and a raked ceiling. A porch is
entered through a pair of doors with full windows in its north wall. The porch is enclosed and is
the top of the turret with rows of windows divided by thick Ionic columns of wood. The porch
floor and ceiling are wood. A short hallway leads from a side entrance into the billiards room
from an anteroom off the landing’s east side. A trunk room and elevator are located off the
southeast corner of the landing and a narrow staircase to the attic is east of the hallway to the
billiards room.
The cook’s bedroom is east of the attic staircase (photo 54). Its entry is off the anteroom off the
landing. Its plaster walls are covered with wallpaper and the ceiling is also plastered. Opposite
the cook’s bedroom entry is a doorway that leads to a short hallway to the remaining servants’
space. Two servants’ bedrooms are located off the east side of this hallway that connects to a
landing at the top of the servants’ stairs (photo 55). A sewing room is off the south end of the
servants’ stairs landing and a bathroom is off its southwest corner. In this area most of the
ceilings are raked with windows in dormer walls. Most of the woodwork in this area remains
unpainted including the simple balustrade composed of turned balusters.
Common among most stories of the house are finishes in the home’s bathrooms which were
updated during the 1930s to include mosaic tile floors and square ceramic tile wainscot (see
photo 44). Walls and ceilings are plastered and some, but not all fixtures, are porcelain and
original to the 1930s. The updates included Art Deco style lights and other fixtures. Most of the
light fixtures in the house are original or from the early interior remodel of the 1930s. The
furniture throughout was left by the Oliver family to remain with the house.
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Section 7 page 16
Oliver Carriage House, 1896-1994. Richardsonian Romanesque Revival, Contributing
Lamb & Rich, architects (New York)
The primary focus of this description will be on the original carriage house building. The first
addition was made by the History Museum connected by a two-story breezeway on the back
(west wall) of the carriage house about 1985 (photos 15-16, 24-25). That addition extends from
the central gable section of the original building’s back wall and features modern vinyl shingle
siding and wood windows. The 1994 main building of the History Museum connects to the south
end of the 1985 addition and is much larger in scale, extending south and west on the site. It is
mostly brick with large metal windows. The additions feature grand foyers and multiple rooms
for displays and meetings. The Studebaker Museum was added to the east end of the History
Museum in 2005. See photos 19-20 for the History Museum & Studebaker Museum buildings.
The original carriage house is two-stories of cut stone, matching the main house, with a steeply
pitched hipped roof covered with asphalt shingles. The front (north) façade is nearly symmetrical
with two-story round turrets that flank a wide central bay recessed into the façade (photo 07).
The turrets feature two 6/2 wood windows in the first story and two shorter 3/2 wood windows in
the second story of the east turret and three 3/2 shorter windows in the west turret. The turrets
have conical roofs with flared eaves and metal finial. The central bay features a wide, segmental
arched opening infilled with modern wood and glass doors, side-lites, and transom. A pair of 5/2
full-round arched windows flank the wide opening. A pair of massive timber brackets on each
side of the wide opening support a second story balcony That is covered with wood shingles.
Four wood posts with braces extend up from the balcony wall to support a roof that is a flared
extension from the main roof over the carriage house. A wood and glass door leads from the west
turret onto the balcony. A similar door is in the east end of the balcony’s back wall. Three 6/2
wood windows are west of this door. The roof’s front hip rises to form a gable, covered with
asphalt shingles, in which is a row of three, square wood windows divided into panes by Roman
crosses. A one-story extension off the east side of the façade features a wood entry door and
porch with a full-round arched opening in its east wall.
The west façade (right side of photo 10) features a one-and-a-half story projection with two
small wood windows divided into six panes in its north wall and two 6/2 wood windows in its
south wall (left side of photo 16). Its front (west) wall features a large wood door on rollers on its
north half. A wood entry door is centered in the west wall above which is a transom composed of
three narrow 2/2 wood windows. A pair of matching windows is in the top of the wall in its south
half. The west façade’s tall, hipped roof rises to form the hayloft of the former carriage house
(with stables below). The roof features a hipped dormer with hay hatch door. A tall square
cupola with vented walls rises from the ridge of this roof and is surmounted by a copper
weathervane.
The east façade (photos 14-15) features a steeply stepped gabled parapet extending from the
main hipped roof of the building. The façade features two small square windows in its north end.
A large, full-round arched window is centered in the façade. It features a top sash divided into
lancets over two panes in the large bottom sash. The window is flanked by 2/2 wood windows.
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Section 7 page 17
The gable features a row of three narrow wood windows with transoms. The breezeway covers
about a third of the back wall with the exception of the south wall of the projecting section on the
west façade, which has already been described, and a portion of wall without windows on the
east half (left side of photo 15).
The interior of the original carriage house is mostly composed of three large spaces on each
story. The first story has a wide, central hall (photo 22) off of which is a former carriage
room/meeting room on the east and a large meeting room (former stables, photo 23) on the west.
Small rooms enter the first story of the turrets in the northwest and northeast corners of the
central room. Staircases to the basement and second story are in the east turret (photo 27).
Entries into the first and second stories are off the breezeway in the original south wall (photos
24-25). The first story has a mix of historic wood and brick finishes while the second story’s
central hall has been renovated with modern finishes (photo 26). The second story has a large
central room/hall for offices, meetings, and files. A storage room is in the former hayloft on the
west side of the second story. An office that formerly stored the Oliver family’s sleigh is on the
east side of the second story. The west turret’s second story functions as a small office while the
east turret has the staircase to the first story (photo 27). The balcony on the front of the building
is accessed from both the central room and the office in the west turret (photo 21).
Pumphouse, 2022. Non-contributing; replication of original. Left side of photo 16
The one-story, four-sided brick building is painted green and features a cutaway entry corner on
its northeast corner where a pair of four-panel wood doors is located. The building has small
segmental arched wood windows with stone sills and a simple brick cornice with rows of dentils.
The small building has a relatively flat roof covered with metal.
Stone wall & gateways, 1896. Contributing (structure).
The site features a wall composed of cut granite boulders with grapevine mortar joints that
extends along Chapin and Washington Streets. The wall features rounded piers with rusticated
capstones that divide the wall into roughly ten-foot sections. The wall between the piers is
capped with rusticated stone. The Washington Street wall is split by a wide gateway for a paved
drive leading to the port cochere on the west side of the house. The gateway is composed of four
tall piers capped with pointed stones to resemble crenelations. A walkway is also accommodated
on the east side of the gateway and features a concrete sidewalk that extends south along the east
side of the paved drive. A second walkway splits the wall for a concrete sidewalk that extends to
the front of the house nearer the intersection of Washington and Chapin Streets. It is flanked by
large piers with stone crenelations (photo 03). A second gateway for a paved drive is at the south
end of the original Oliver property onto Chapin Street (right side of photo 08). This gateway also
features four tall piers with crenelations. These are connected by radial walls, arcing into the
property. The drives from both gateways connect southwest of the house in front of the carriage
house.
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Section 7 page 18
Sunken gardens, 1908. Contributing (site). Photos 18, 21
Alice E. Neale, landscape architect (New York)
The Oliver gardens are sunken in the west half of the original site, west of the house. The
rectangular-shaped garden is sunken with a perimeter earthen berm with sets of steps that lead
out of the garden. The main access to the garden is west of the porte cochere under a long
pergola with a brick-paved walkway. The walkway enters the garden’s east side and bisects it
roughly in half terminating at a brick fountain at the far west end. The garden has several brick-
paved paths that create formal geometry within the garden. The north end of the garden features
a semi-circular bay in which a well was placed near the center.
Brick pergola, 1908. Contributing (structure). Photo 17
The west wall of the porte cochere has an opening for a walkway centered on a long pergola that
leads to the sunken garden west of the house. The pergola walkway is paved with brick and is
sheltered by cedar beams (these replicate the original that were recently replaced). The pergola
features eleven pairs of square brick columns with simple bases and capitals. The capitals are
capped by square concrete blocks on which the cedar beams rest. The brick that composes the
columns is “clinker” or irregularly shaped brick with unstruck mortar joints.
Brick fountain, 1908. Contributing (structure). Background of photos 17, 21
At the opposite side of the garden from the pergola is a brick fountain with a raised brick floor
and four, square columns of brick that match the pergola’s columns. The front wall of the
fountain has three wide steps. The outer (north and south) walls are flared outward from the back
wall where the fountain is located. The flare walls each feature a recessed panel and carved stone
bench. The back wall features a recessed panel with an ogee arched top where a carved stone
face from which water projects is located. The water empties into a carved clamshell-like stone
bowl supported by a stone base carved with dolphins. Cedar beams shelter the fountain floor
from the top of the brick columns.
Wellhead, 1927. Contributing (structure). Photo 18
The wellhead is composed of two pieces: a carved/pierced stone base and a tall ornamental iron
canopy and pulley. The stone base has the appearance of the top of a stone column and is carved
through (pierced) with depictions of griffins and lion heads. The base is rounded but features a
square top. The iron canopy features two twisted legs rising from each side of the base, then
forms an ogee arch over the well with finials and an iron pulley wheel that is suspended from the
underside of the canopy.
Wood gazebo, c. 2015. Non-contributing (structure). Right side/background of photo 14
A wood gazebo replicating the original is south of the sunken gardens at the west end of a formal
green that is off the west side of the first addition to the carriage house.
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Section 8 page 19
_________________________________________________________________
8. Statement of Significance
Applicable National Register Criteria
(Mark "x" in one or more boxes for the criteria qualifying the property for National Register
listing.)
A. Property is associated with events that have made a significant contribution to the
broad patterns of our history.
B. Property is associated with the lives of persons significant in our past.
C. Property embodies the distinctive characteristics of a type, period, or method of
construction or represents the work of a master, or possesses high artistic values,
or represents a significant and distinguishable entity whose components lack
individual distinction.
D. Property has yielded, or is likely to yield, information important in prehistory or
history.
Criteria Considerations
(Mark “x” in all the boxes that apply.)
A. Owned by a religious institution or used for religious purposes
B. Removed from its original location
C. A birthplace or grave
D. A cemetery
E. A reconstructed building, object, or structure
F. A commemorative property
G. Less than 50 years old or achieving significance within the past 50 years
X
X
X
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Section 8 page 20
Areas of Significance
(Enter categories from instructions.)
ARCHITECTURE
INDUSTRY
Period of Significance
1896-1933
___________________
Significant Dates
______________
Significant Person (last name, first name)
(Complete only if Criterion B is marked above.)
Oliver, Joseph D.
___________________
___________________
Cultural Affiliation
___________________
___________________
___________________
Architect/Builder (last name, first name)
Lamb & Rich
Neale, Alice E.
Huber, Hugo
Matthew Brothers
Johnson, Walter
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Sections 9-end page 21
Period of Significance (justification)
The period of significance begins with completion of construction of the house in 1896 and
concludes in 1933 at the death of Joseph D. Oliver. This time period incorporates both the
significance of the home’s architecture but also the time during which Oliver lived at the home,
underscoring criterion B and criterion C under industry.
Criteria Considerations (explanation, if necessary)
N/A
Statement of Significance Summary Paragraph (Provide a summary paragraph that includes
level of significance, applicable criteria, justification for the period of significance, and any
applicable criteria considerations.)
The Joseph D. Oliver House, already listed in the National Register of Historic Places, qualifies
under criterion A due to its significance as a monumental building that represents the wealth
produced during the golden age of industry in the United States as it relates to the importance
and growth of agriculture. The home’s opulence is best representative of the Oliver contribution
to the industrialization of agriculture through development of plows that transformed the United
States ushering in the golden age of agriculture. All that remain of Oliver’s national and
international manufacturing prowess are a boiler plant and smokestack (c. 1920) from a plant
that once stretched over vast acres of South Bend’s southwest side. The house therefore best
represents the significance of the Olivers’ industry in the United States through its scale and
refinements.
For similar reasons, the property qualifies under criterion B, naming Joseph D. Oliver as a
significant person due to his leadership in the industry. The house best exhibits Oliver’s stature
in manufacturing and his contribution to South Bend’s golden age of industry, aligning with the
Golden Age of Agriculture in the United States.
The Oliver House is also an important example of mansion houses built during the industrial era,
both for its scale and refinements. This allows the property to qualify using criterion C under the
area of architecture. The home’s unusual cut granite fieldstone walls, some in patterned
stonework, on this grand scale of Richardsonian Romanesque execution is significant.
Particularly combined with its other stone features such as the perimeter site wall and carriage
house, the Oliver house gains significance under architecture on the exterior. The house design
and interior composition of spaces by noted New York architects Lamb & Rich, as well as its
interior design and carved millwork also raise the level of significance.
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Sections 9-end page 22
______________________________________________________________________________
Narrative Statement of Significance (Provide at least one paragraph for each area of
significance.)
JOSEPH D. “J. D.” OLIVER & INDUSTRY
The property qualifies under industry due to the contributions of Joseph D. Oliver to
development of agricultural implements during the Golden Age of Agriculture in the United
States. While under separate criteria, both A and B, these are intertwined in the narrative
statement of significance to demonstrate the importance of the Joseph D. Oliver House.
This intertwining is noted in the opening paragraph of significance from the original National
Register of Historic Places nomination submitted in 1973:
The Oliver family mansion, constructed in 1895-1896 by Joseph D. Oliver, is an architectural
statement of the combined achievements of two types of American ingenuity: the inventive skill
of James Oliver and the financial sagacity of is son, Joseph D. Oliver. Today the Oliver mansion
is not only a monument to life as it was enjoyed by the nuevo rich and their heirs during the early
years of the twentieth century, but also a symbol that documents three generations of an
American family whose history is clearly interwoven with the urban, technological, agricultural,
manufacturing, financial, and immigrant history of the United States as well as the social and
cultural development of an important area of the Middle West.1
It is unfortunate that for all the Oliver family’s contributions to the city of South Bend and the
broader national landscape, very little evidence of the family remains today besides the Joseph
D. Oliver House. The once sprawling manufacturing site on the near southwest side of the city
has been reduced to just two structures, a large classically inspired boiler plant and connecting
smokestack (c. 1920). These are located on Oliver Plow Court, a public drive accessing
redevelopment of the manufacturing site. The brick building serves as a private masonry supply
company. The home James Oliver constructed as a wedding gift to his daughter, Josephine
(Ford), in 1886 is east of the J. D. Oliver House and is operated as the Oliver Inn today.
The James Oliver House was demolished in 1911 to make way for a city public school. The
Oliver family constructed “Oliver Row”, a string of rowhouses that was once a premier
residential complex where J. D. Oliver first made his home with his new bride. This was
significantly altered by removal of the front portion in 1924. The Oliver family built the Oliver
Opera House in South Bend in 1885; it was demolished in 1978. In 1899, the Olivers constructed
a first-class hotel in downtown South Bend; it was demolished in 1967. In 1900, James Oliver
constructed a new city hall, leased back to the city at a nominal amount with option to purchase;
it was demolished in 1970 after the city-county building was constructed. Indeed, all that remains
that truly demonstrates the scale of the nationally-and internationally known Oliver Chilled Plow
Works as an American industrial giant that transformed American agriculture, is the opulence
present in the Joseph D. Oliver House.
1 Joseph D. Oliver House National Register of Historic Places form, 1973. Section 8, pg. 1.
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Sections 9-end page 23
Agricultural Expansion in the United States
Agriculture was making slow but steady growth in the United States in the first half of the 19th
century. Westward expansion from the East Coast pushed through inland areas where small
farms and plantations dotted the countryside in western Pennsylvania, Virginia, North Carolina
and jumped across the Appalachian Mountains into Kentucky, Ohio, Illinois, and Indiana where
land in the “old west” was opened for agricultural production beginning at the turn of the 19th
century. Settlement grew, leading across the Middle West, up and expanding out from the
Mississippi River into Minnesota, Iowa, and Missouri. As the population grew across the
Midwest, land was cultivated and put into production and states were added to the Union.
However, slavery was creating its own set of problems in westward expansion and soon, the
issue led to the Civil War when agricultural production and expansion became secondary to the
issue that divided the country in half. Young sons and husbands enlisted, leaving fewer workers
to remain on the farm. The 1860s became the pivotal decade between slow progress, brought
nearly to a halt, and rapid progress in agriculture after the war ended.
President Lincoln saw the need for expansion into the West, which resulted in his signing the
Homestead Act of 1862. The act provided 160 acres to the heads of households who could live
on and improve the land. After five years, the land would become theirs, free and clear. An
added benefit for Union soldiers was a reduction in the residency requirements based on time
served in the army. While not as successful as had hoped, due in large part to the cost of making
improvements and the equipment to do so, farmland had begun to be opened. Of the four million
homestead claims, only 1.6 million deeds were obtained. Montana, followed by North Dakota,
Colorado, and Nebraska had the most successful claims.2
Complimenting the Homestead Act were other developments in the pursuit of agriculture.
Development of technology and dissemination of information regarding agricultural education
and best farming practices grew rapidly between 1860 and 1900. During the 1850s, Indiana, like
other states, established the State Board of Agriculture, and the first state fair was held. County
agricultural fairs also began to be established throughout the country. In 1862, the Morrill Act
was passed by Congress which provided for the establishment of agricultural colleges in each
state. In Indiana, Purdue University was founded in 1874 in response to the act and would later
be served by Joseph D. Oliver as president of the board of trustees. Agricultural experiment
stations were developed from these colleges to carry out research in connection with agricultural
practices.
Agricultural publications became common during this time. In 1874, the Indiana State Board of
Agriculture began to publish the Indiana Farmer, a publication which touted the latest trends in
farming practices. The Grange was a fraternal organization founded in 1867 in Fredonia, New
York to promote the social, cultural, educational, and economic advancement of its farmer-
members. Other Granges followed across the country. Combined, these organizations
contributed to the advancement of farming practices across the United States.
2 The Homestead Act: https://www.history.com/topics/american-civil-war/homestead-act. Accessed July 22, 2024
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Sections 9-end page 24
A few statistics between 1866 and 1899 reflect not only the number of new acres in agricultural
production in the United States, but also show how farming practices were being better perfected
to result in higher yields per acre. Between 1900 and 1920, known as the “Golden Age” of
agriculture, the value of farm property grew rapidly due to progress in farming technology.
Horse-drawn equipment was replaced with power-driven machinery and larger amounts of land
could be more easily and efficiently cultivated. While the number of new acres put into farm
production grew only modestly at this time, yields and productivity were vastly improved. The
figures that follow are given in the 1,000s of acres.
For example, in 1866, just over 30,000 acres in the United States were planted to corn and
yielded about 24.3 bushels an acre. By 1899, more than three times the number of acres, 94,591,
were put into corn production and yielded 28 bushels per acre. The number of acres in corn
production decreased slightly from 1899 to about 90,000 acres in 1920 but were yielding 30
bushels to an acre. Grain crops such as rye and wheat saw substantial growth in the number of
acres cultivated. Rye was grown on just over 1,500 acres in 1866 to almost 5,000 acres in 1920.
Wheat grew from 15,408 acres with 11 bushels per acre in 1866 to 52,342 acres producing 12.5
bushels per acre in 1899. Wheat crops were falling in popularity in some regions of the country,
yielding to other newer crops, such as soybeans. The number of acres planted to wheat in 1920
was just under 68,000 with a yield of 13.5 bushels an acre. In the South, cotton grew from less
than 8,000 acres to over 24,000 acres in production between 1866 and 1899, then grew to over
32,000 acres by 1920. The number of acres in tobacco production grew from 394,000 producing
803 pounds per acre to almost 2 million acres by 1920, essentially producing the same number of
pounds. In the West, hay production followed a similar growth pattern. In 1866, 18,250 acres
were under production and by 1899, almost 43,400 acres were growing hay. By 1920, hay was
being produced on 73,000 acres.3
The development of new farming technology, specifically in the realm of mechanized
implements, played a major role in the efficient development of the Midwest, Middle Border,
and Plains states. Until the widespread use of gasoline engines that pulled multiple-bottom plows
by the mid-20th century, it was the simple horse-drawn plow that evolved from a walk-behind
unit to a surrey style riding plow that probably had the greatest impact on American agriculture.
Early American plows were typically wood with forged iron shares. While it would have seemed
an outdated technology to farmers in the second half of the 19th century, it was still a more
efficient method of increasing planting/production from trenches dug by hand with a hoe. John
Deere introduced the first mass-produced steel plow in 1837. Its slick steel surface, as opposed to
iron, and curved contours allowed soil to be broken and furrows laid over more easily. This
increased the number of acres that farmers were able to cultivate and opened larger areas of land,
particularly in the Midwest, poised for cultivation in the first half of the 19th century. Still, the
plow had issues regarding repair and wear. It was James Oliver that perfected the simple plow
and changed the American landscape with the Oliver Chilled Plow in 1868.
3 USDA Crop Production Historical Track Records 2019:
https://www.nass.usda.gov/Publications/Todays_Reports/reports/croptr19.pdf. Accessed July 22, 2024
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Sections 9-end page 25
Early life of Joseph D. Oliver
Joseph Doty Oliver was born August 20, 1850, to James and Susan Catherine (Doty) Oliver
while the family lived in Mishawaka, St. Joseph County, Indiana. Joseph was the only son born
to the couple, who had a daughter first by the name of Josephine. James Oliver, the founder of
Oliver Chilled Plow Works, was the son of Scottish immigrants, George and Elizabeth Oliver
who arrived in the United States in 1834 when James was just 11 years old. The immigrant
family came through New York to St. Joseph County, Indiana where they engaged in farming.
George Oliver died in 1837 and Elizabeth died in 1867, both while living in the Mishawaka area.
James married Susan Doty in 1844 and were living in the Mishawaka area when Joseph Doty (J.
D.) Oliver was born in 1850.4
Joseph worked at his father’s plow works company in South Bend from the age of 14 in 1865
threading nuts. He attended two years of college, at Notre Dame and DePauw University, then
came back to work in the company. His administrative duties were identified as bookkeeper in
the 1870 and 1880 censuses while living in his parents’ household at the age of 19 and 30,
respectively. He married Anna Gertrude Wells in Johnstown, New York, on December 10, 1884,
and came back to reside in South Bend in one of the townhouses constructed by the Oliver
family, named Oliver Row on Main Street.
Beginnings of the Oliver Chilled Plow Works Company, 1855-1868
By the time Joseph Oliver had married, he had already become an integral part of Oliver Chilled
Plow Works Company. His father, James Oliver, had engaged in several early 19th century
industrial manufacturing occupations while living in Mishawaka. These included foundry work,
manufacturer of agricultural implements, and cooperage. While visiting South Bend in 1855,
James Oliver met another foundryman, Harvey Little, and each purchased a quarter share of a
foundry owned by Lamb for $88.96. James Oliver was just 32 years old and South Bend’s
population was less than 2,000 people.5
Six weeks after the purchase of the foundry, it was devastated by floodwaters of the St. Joseph
River. James Oliver referred to this in later life as his first great discouragement. The plant went
back into operation in November of 1855. Oliver and Little then purchased Lamb’s half interest
and renamed it South Bend Iron Company. That name appeared on the title page of their first
book of accounts. On February 6, 1857, high water again damaged the plant, but it soon was
back in production. They bought scrap iron for one and a quarter cent a pound and converted it to
almost anything that could be made of cast iron at a charge of five cents a pound. They made
iron window weights, caps and sills for windows, kettles, spiders (frying pans with legs and long
handles), pulleys, stove castings and grates. They also produced metal strips that fit on sled
runners known as bob shoes for the fledgling Studebaker Brothers Company.6
4 Joseph D. Oliver House National Register of Historic Places form, 1973. Section 8, pgs. 1-2
5 Joseph D. Oliver House National Register of Historic Places form, 1973. Section 8, pg. 1
6 The History Museum: Oliver History: https://www.historymuseumsb.org/research-history/oliver-history/
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Sections 9-end page 26
James Oliver, the molder, designer, salesman and bookkeeper for the company, also continued
experimenting with ways to produce a better plow. All plows of that era were walking plows
pulled by two work animals behind which the farmer walked and guided it through the soil with
two handles. Cast iron and steel plows both wore out rapidly. Dirt stuck to the moldboard and
made it difficult for the animals to pull. This forced the plow from the ground with a jerk,
endangering the plowman. The dirt that built up on the moldboard had to be scraped with a
paddle every few minutes.7
On June 30, 1857, James Oliver obtained his first patent from the U.S. government, entitled
“Improvement in Chilling Plow Shares.” It covered a new way to process a plow point, or share,
to an extremely hard surface. This was his first improvement in the plow with many more to
follow. In 1858, in order to get nearer the plant, the Oliver family moved from Mishawaka to an
old brown frame house purchased for $600, on unpaved Main Street near downtown South Bend.
In 1868 the house was moved to the back of the lot and a larger brick home was built.8
Oliver and Little were so successful in development and manufacture of the new plow that they
were able to advertise a reward of $500 to anyone who could, “chill or harden plowshares with
equal success without infringing on their patent.” The firm was renamed “Oliver, Little & Co.”
in 1860 when Thelus Bissell, a machinist, was taken into the partnership. Each now owned a
third interest in the firm. On Christmas Eve, 1860, disaster struck again. Fire destroyed the plant
on the West Race with an estimated loss of $4,000 with no insurance. James Oliver later branded
this event his second great discouragement.9
By March 1861, Oliver, Little & Co., had succeeded in erecting a building on the west race of
the St. Joseph River where operations resumed. That year they produced, in addition to plows,
six fluted columns weighing 4,902 pounds for Saint Mary’s College, two iron columns for
Schuyler Colfax, brackets and vestibule cornice for the city jail and sewer crates also for the city.
Window weights, more than four tons of columns, cornices and stairs were produced for a
contractor. The plows sold for $6.50 each. Business was improving and more buildings were
acquired on both sides of the west race of the river.10
In 1863, Harvey Little retired from the firm. Thelus Martin Bissell acquired half interest in the
company, now renamed Oliver and Bissell, and James Oliver acquired the rest. That summer
about twenty men were on the payroll, and demand for the plows was such that the price was
increased to $7.50. Due to continued demand for their plows, Oliver and Bissell realized they
needed more capital. George Milburn, a wealthy wagon manufacturer in Mishawaka, purchased
a third interest in the company with Oliver and Bissell retaining one third each. The company
was, once again, renamed to Oliver, Bissell & Co. The work force was increased to twenty-five
and wages ranged from $1 to $3.50 per day.11
7 The History Museum: Oliver History: https://www.historymuseumsb.org/research-history/oliver-history/
8 Ibid
9 Ibid
10 Ibid
11 Ibid
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Sections 9-end page 27
Approximately 1,000 plows were produced and sold in 1864. Of these, one hundred were the
patented steel share plows that sold for $17.50 each. They also made hundreds of double shovel
plows, with two side-by-side plow shares, and some twenty-five road scrapers for which they
received $8 each. Castings were sold for ten cents a pound. The Civil War was in progress and
prices continued to rise as demand for production increased. By mid-1865 the staff again had
been increased to plant capacity and all on the payroll were working overtime. It was in that year
that J. D. Oliver began working in the company as a 14-year-old boy.12
The 1857 patent for hardening plow shares began the company’s upward trend that only
accelerated when a breakthrough in 1867 perfected a process of hardening plow shares through
chilling metal mold boards by passing warm water over them. The method was patented in 1868
and resulted in one of the most recognized names in American agricultural implements, the
Oliver Chilled Plow. South Bend Iron Works was incorporated on July 22, 1868, to produce the
plow by James Oliver, Clement Studebaker, Thelus Bissell, George Milburn, and John
Brownfield. Ultimately, all of the company’s stock was controlled by James, J. D., and others in
the Oliver family.13 When the company introduced the concept of interchangeable parts through
the slip-nose share, allowing only worn-out parts to be replaced, demand for Olivers’ products
grew substantially. The chilled plow itself was crucial to the amazing speed with which the tough
sod of the Great Plains and Midwest states was converted to arable land by settlers taking
advantage of the 1862 Homestead Act and the aftermath of the Civil War.14
Following the company’s early history of manufacturing, expansion of production and sales was
phenomenal. Many improvements by the Olivers to the plow followed, making the Oliver Plow
the most popular plow in the world.
Late 19th Century Expansion of the Company, 1870s-1890s
Through the mechanical ingenuity of James Oliver and with his son, J. D., as a partner with
financial and administrative astuteness, the company underwent massive expansion during the
1870s through 1890s. J. D. Oliver had rejoined the company after two years in college by 1870
working as a bookkeeper and administrator. In less than fifty years, Olivers took out forty-five
patents for industrial designs.15 The Oliver Chilled Plow’s quality drove demand, but that was
predicated on making it easily recognized and then available in the market. J. D. Oliver gave the
company a national and international profile through establishment of over a dozen branch
offices in the United States and sales agents established in every agricultural county in every
state in the country. This was expanded to other countries as well, most notably in Canada and
Argentina where agriculture was expanding in sync with United States’ agriculture in the Great
Plains.
By 1875, the Olivers purchased a 32-acre portion of the Perkins farm on the southwest edge of
South Bend for $30,000. Construction of a new South Bend Iron Works plant on that site started
12 The History Museum: Oliver History: https://www.historymuseumsb.org/research-history/oliver-history/
13 Howard, Timothy E. History of St. Joseph County (IN) Vol. 1. Lewis Publishing Co. Chicago: 1907. Pg. 400
14 Joseph D. Oliver House National Register of Historic Places form, 1973
15 Joseph D. Oliver House National Register of Historic Places form, 1973. Section 8, pg. 1.
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Sections 9-end page 28
almost immediately. Full production continued at the “Lower Works,” as the old factory (no
longer extant) on the west race of the St. Joseph River was known, while warehouses were built,
railroad tracks laid, and water and sewer lines extended to the new “Upper Works” plant. The
new complex had five buildings with a total area of 200,000 square feet and took advantage of
available railroad lines accessing the industrial heart of South Bend. Plans called for employment
of four hundred men who would cast fifty tons of metal into three hundred plows daily. A new
600-horsepower Harris Steam Engine powered the machinery. On January 17, 1876, the engine
was started, and the new plant went into operation.16
Labor shortages in the 1870s pushed the Olivers to recruit immigrants from Eastern Europe, who
would become an important part of South Bend’s cultural and ethnic identity. Joseph D. Oliver
had a systematic and deliberate recruiting program for workers from Belgium and Polish Prussia
specifically to alleviate labor shortages at the company. On one occasion in 1875, James Oliver
met twelve Polish families in New York and provided them transportation to South Bend where
he constructed homes for the new arrivals.17
Plow sales in 1878 reached 62,779. A total of thirty-to-forty railroad cars loaded with 5,000 to
7,000 plows left the new upper works plant at a time, for shipment from coast to coast across the
country. In November 1878, John Brownfield, who had been president for almost nine years
after the resignation of George Milburn, tendered his resignation. In January 1879, James Oliver
was elected president; prior to that, James had held the title of superintendent. Of note, the
company also made seventy iron columns for the main building at Notre Dame University, after
a disastrous fire consumed the old one in 1879. These columns hold up the iconic Golden Dome
structure on the university’s administration building.18
The demand created through agents and branch houses, being established across the country to
handle distribution, needed a strong and steady supply of plows. J. D. Oliver oversaw the
company’s physical growth on the near southwest side of South Bend to ultimately cover over
sixty-two acres of production and storage facilities. By the late 19th century, the company
employed over two thousand men and produced as many as 200,000 plows annually.19 The size
of the Oliver company simply overwhelmed its opponents, including the South Bend Chilled
Plow Company, which had been organized by Bissell and allegedly used Oliver patents in an
attempt to capitalize on the reputation of the Oliver firm, still known as South Bend Iron Works.
The year 1880 was one of great expansion. A record was set in production and sales of plows,
new buildings were erected, riding plows were being produced on a large scale, the manufacture
of malleable castings was started, and more rail tracks were laid to the Oliver property.20
A description of the company’s facilities, as well as recollections by James Oliver on founding
the company are recorded in the 1880 St. Joseph County (Indiana) History. The facilities
straddled the Lake Shore & Michigan Southern Railroad and the Northwestern & Grand Trunk
16 The History Museum: Oliver History: https://www.historymuseumsb.org/research-history/oliver-history/
17 Joseph D. Oliver House National Register of Historic Places form, 1973. Section 8, pg. 2
18 The History Museum: Oliver History: https://www.historymuseumsb.org/research-history/oliver-history/
19 Joseph D. Oliver House National Register of Historic Places form, 1973. Section 8, pg. 2
20 The History Museum: Oliver History: https://www.historymuseumsb.org/research-history/oliver-history/
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Sections 9-end page 29
Railroad, “making splendid shipping facilities.”21 At the time of the writing, daily production
was estimated to be 500 plows completed (fully assembled plows) and 4,000 points. There was a
total of about 600 men on the payroll. The company produced a catalog in 1880 highlighting the
Oliver Chilled Plow’s Casady Sulky Plow product, asserting that Oliver plows were being used
on half-a-million farms…and its name has become a household word among farmers of 20
states.”22 The catalog included a list of showrooms in Indianapolis, Mansfield (OH), Harrisburg
(PA), Rochester (NY), Baltimore (MD), Dallas (TX), St. Paul (MN), and St. Louis and Kansas
City (MO).
In 1889, the company produced an alphabet book, a popular advertising-teaching tool at the time,
that included letters reinforcing desirability of the product such as “A is for America, and like the
Oliver Plow Works, the greatest on Earth” and “C is the Chilled Plow for which Oliver’s name
shall go down through the ages encircled in fame.”
An early instance of the Oliver company’s interest in European markets is evidenced through one
letter of correspondence between J. D. Oliver and A. V. Perrin in April 1884. Perrin was a
director for Rumsey & Cie, a Belgian manufacturer of hydraulic pumps. The company had a
presence in Seneca Falls, New York, and Perrin corresponded with Oliver about a contract to act
as a sales agent for Oliver plows in Europe.23 This demonstrates J. D. Oliver’s guidance and
interest in developing the company into an international supplier of plows. During the mid-
1880s, the Oliver company was working on patents on their plow improvements in the United
Kingdom, and James Oliver personally travelled to Great Britain, France, and Germany. By the
late 1890s, J. D. Oliver was corresponding with R. Gareth, then a field agent in Texas, about the
possibility of plow markets being opened in territory gained after the Spanish American War,
Puerto Rico specifically. Clearly, J. D. Oliver sought ways to expand the company’s reach.24
Numerous other correspondence between J. D. Oliver and field agents in the United States
demonstrates his direct involvement in creating the network through which the Oliver plow
gained mass appeal and use. In March 1885, a sales agent by the name of A. Listenberger
discussed the possibility of freight rebates with J. D. Oliver as a way of competing with other
plow manufacturers. He also updated Oliver on testing and marketing the plows in California.25
The company’s Dallas, Texas branch, opened by the late 1880s, seemed of special interest to the
Olivers where the company owned a large building and leased out commercial storerooms. The
company had a large presence in Kansas City, Missouri by 1897, then considered one of the
largest implement manufacturing centers in the country. The city boasted over seventy firms with
capital of $10 million.26 With the city’s position at the edge of the great prairie and plains,
shipment was made with ease, and Oliver was in the center of it.
21 Charles C. Chapman & Co. History of St. Joseph County (IN), pg. 879. Chicago: 1880.
22 Oliver Plow Works Catalog, September 1, 1880. Produced by Oliver Chilled Plow Works
23 History Museum (South Bend) collection of Oliver company correspondence. Folder OD2/2/15
24 History Museum (South Bend) collection of Oliver company correspondence. Folder OD16/1/3
25 History Museum (South Bend) collection of Oliver company correspondence. Folder OD3/2/11
26 “The World’s Greatest Implement Center” Kansas City Times. 3 Jan 1897. Pg. 28, cols. 6-7
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Sections 9-end page 30
Advertisements taken out in newspapers across the country by Olivers during the 1890s regularly
carried images of their iconic plow. One such advertisement in 1897 in the Ann Arbor Courier
carried an image of the plow headlined with “Oliver Gave to the World the Chilled Plow and it
has saved more money to the farmers of America than any other implement ever produced.
Oliver Chilled Plows are the best on earth.” The advertisement portrayed the Nos. 98 and 99
wood and steel beam plows fitted with non-breakable standards and the “Celebrated No. 40.”
The ad encouraged readers to look out for imitations and only buy from regular Oliver agents.
J. D. Oliver contracted with noted illustrator Elbert Hubbard for images of the company’s
products. Hubbard was a guest of J. D. at their home in 1912, after which he wrote an essay
about the three generations of Oliver plow manufacturers.
A book printed in 1894 by R. L. Ardrey entitled American Agricultural Implements makes a
number of references to the Oliver Chilled Plow company and notes South Bend as a “pioneer
manufacturing center.” In the first half of the book, Ardrey recalls the history of James Oliver
and founding the company, along with its important patents. In the second half, he dedicates
several pages to the Oliver company in its present state (1894) with three illustrations of their
plows and notes J. D. Oliver’s position with the company.27 The line of Oliver plows was often
featured at important fairs and exhibits, such as Nashville, Tennessee’s Centennial Fair in 1897
which placed heavy emphasis on industrial mechanization, and leading among the exhibits was
Oliver Plow Works. A long description of their exhibit, which included a 12-foot-tall pyramid of
plows, with Oliver’s at the top, was featured in the Tennessean, which stated the company spent
$25,000 on the exhibit and it was superior to their Word’s Fair exhibit in Chicago.28
In 1896, Oliver Chilled Plow Works celebrated Flag Day in an unusual method (Flag Day was
not officially designated June 14 until 1916). A train of thirty decorated freight cars drawn by a
decorated engine pulled out of the factory grounds and left over the Lake Shore Railroad for
New York. Each of the freight cars were labeled “Loaded with Oliver Chilled Plows” and were
decorated with national flags secured to the sides. This was a marketing concept to highlight the
preeminence of Oliver’s plow on the national scene. The train only traveled in daylight for
spectators to see the flag-draped line of freight cars filled with plows. It was the fourth whole
train sent out by Oliver Chilled Plow Works in 1896 and it was estimated that two more full
trains would be sent before January 1, 1897. The train departing in October was headed to New
York’s ports for shipment to foreign countries.29 Indeed, the company’s slogan of being “plow
makers to the world” was reality.
So much so was the international fame of the Oliver company, along with Studebaker, that a
delegation of South and Central American leaders came to South Bend in 1897 to inspect the
plants and learn about the companies and their products, and how they may boost industry in
their own counties.30
27 Ardrey, R. L. pgs. 200-203
28 “Superiority of the Exhibits is Marked” The Tennessean. 21 April 1897. Pg. 5, col. 7
29 “Incident of Flag Day” The South Bend Saturday Tribune. 31 Oct 1896. Pg. 1, col. 4
30 “Visitors are Here” The South Bend Daily Tribune. 8 July 1897. Pg. 1. Cols. 1-2
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Sections 9-end page 31
By the late 1890s, the Oliver company was experiencing pressure to merge with other
manufacturers of plows, or in similar agricultural-related industry. This business trend spanned
all kinds of industries in the United States, however, it seemed of only passing interest to J. D.
Oliver. One such letter dated November 4, 1897, between J. D. Oliver and W. M. Brinkerhoff,
mentions a potential merger with Bucher & Gibbs, another plow manufacturer. A second letter
dated March 9, 1899, between J. Oliver and William Vincent described the potential purchase of
the David Bradley Company, Parlin & Orendorff, and the Syracuse Plow Company by a
consortium of Eastern capitalists. In it, Vincent inquires if Oliver would be interested in selling
his company through the deal.31 A newspaper article in March 1899 stated that local plow firms
would not be in a trust or “combine” being created.32 The 20th century, however, would
eventually set the stage for mergers involving Oliver.
Early 20th Century Expansion of the Company, 1900-1929
J. D. Oliver became co-owner of Oliver Chilled Plow Works in 1900, but his contributions as the
chief financial officer and business administrator had already propelled the company to national
recognition. On October 12, 1901, the company reorganized under the name Oliver Chilled Plow
Works with working capital of $500,000. The 1907 St. Joseph County (IN) History describes the
Oliver Chilled Plow Works as the most extensive plow works in the world “out of which daily
carloads of the famous chilled plow go to every quarter of the globe. The value of the great plant
hardly admits of estimate, running as it does into the millions of dollars.”33 A photograph of the
J. D. Oliver House is included in the 1907 history on page 401. The company’s profile and
history are told alongside those of South Bend’s Studebaker, Birdsell Manufacturing, and Singer
Sewing Machine companies, all of which became nationally recognized, household names of the
late 1800s and early 1900s.
The beginning of the new century was marked with two gold medals awarded to Oliver Chilled
Plow Works at the Paris Exposition in 1900. Word of the awards came by the trans-Atlantic
cable to the company who won the awards in agriculture and viticulture with development of
their plows. “No other plow concern was so favored” an article states. The company had also
made a special plow for the French market.34 Announcement of the awards were carried in large
newspapers from coast to coast, including the Seattle Post-Intelligencer 35 and the New York
Times.36 The plows were being used in England, Scotland, Denmark, Germany, Turkey, Mexico,
South Africa, and as far away as the Philippines during the 1900s. A whopping sixty railcars
loaded with Oliver plows left for South America in 1905. Danish social reformer Jacob Riis
lauded the Oliver Plow Works company for benefitting the common man in 1909.
The Oliver company continued to see pressure for mergers in the early 1900s as was evidenced
in more correspondence from fellow manufacturers and those representing them. A letter in April
31 History Museum (South Bend) collection of Oliver company correspondence. Folder OD16/2/7
32 “Not in the Trust” The South Bend Daily Tribune. 18 March 1899. Pg. 1, col. 1
33 Howard, pg. 401
34 “Oliver Plows at Paris” The South Bend Tribune. 20 Aug 1900. Page 4, col. 4
35 “Paris Exposition Awards” Seattle Post-Intelligencer. 18 Aug 1900. Pg. 3, col. 1
36 “Paris Exposition Awards” New York Times. 18 Aug 1900. Pg. 9 col. 3
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Sections 9-end page 32
1902 from J. Harley Bradley of Bradley Manufacturing in Bradley, Illinois, to J. D. Oliver asks
Oliver to attend a meeting of the Northwestern Plow Manufacturers Association in Chicago. In
the letter, Bradley states that “for your information, will say the question of consolidation,
reorganization, or things of that kind, are debarred from the meetings of our Association, or have
been up to this time.”37 This would seem to indicate Oliver’s reluctance to attend, or at least be
part of discussions about potential mergers. Later that year, Oliver writes to Richard Delafield
that while other firms were considering mergers, Oliver had “not given the matter serious
thought.”38 By November 1902, a letter from Azel Hatch to J. D. Oliver informed Oliver that
John Deere was instigating a merger between several large plow manufacturers. Hatch advised
Oliver to be part of that merger.39 One of the last discussions of a merger, prior to World War I,
at least as evidenced in correspondence with J. D. Oliver, occurred in January 1905 when W. M.
Brinkerhoff, a businessman from Auburn, New York, advised Oliver of an impending merger in
the small tools industry. He warned Oliver that participating in such a venture would push back
against International Harvester, seen as Oliver’s most formidable competitor.40
Through the early 1900s, J. D. Oliver seemed focused on cultivating business relationships
overseas, which may be why the idea of mergers within the United States did not particularly
appeal to him. By 1903, J. D. Oliver was setting the stage to expand significantly into the
Canadian market, specifically through Ontario. He also inquired of his sales agent in San
Francisco, E. K. Lindsey, about improving the company’s position in South America,
specifically Argentina and Uruguay. Lindsey accepted the position of sales agent to those
countries and by June 1903, he and J. D. Oliver composed plans on Lindsey’s responsibilities.41
J. D. Oliver advocated for the reduction or elimination of tariffs placed on South America,
specifically in Argentina, in 1907. He wrote to Indiana Congressman Abraham Brick (of South
Bend) stating that he had grave concerns about the ability of American companies to compete in
South America given tariffs.42 Brick had previously written to J. D. Oliver about pending
congressional legislation that should make American products more competitive in European
markets.43 In a 1908 letter written to Walter Weed, an Oliver sales representative in Russia, J. D.
Oliver inquired about the business climate in the country, and how the Oliver plow was accepted
there. In his response, Weed wrote that there was difficulty in selling American products to
Russian farmers because they viewed implements like the Oliver plow as more of a luxury than a
necessity.44
The Oliver company regularly displayed their plows at large national fairs, including the Pan-
American Exposition in Buffalo in 1901 and the Louisiana Purchase Exposition in 1904. J. D.
Oliver continued to ensure a presence in the United States with expansive buildings or sale
37 History Museum (South Bend) collection of Oliver company correspondence. Folder OD22/1/2
38 History Museum (South Bend) collection of Oliver company correspondence. Folder OD22/2/3
39 History Museum (South Bend) collection of Oliver company correspondence. Folder OD22/2/6
40 History Museum (South Bend) collection of Oliver company correspondence. Folder OD25/1/2
41 History Museum (South Bend) collection of Oliver company correspondence. Folder OD23/1/10
42 History Museum (South Bend) collection of Oliver company correspondence. Folder OD27/1/2
43 History Museum (South Bend) collection of Oliver company correspondence. Folder OD27/1/2
44 History Museum (South Bend) collection of Oliver company correspondence. Folder OD28/1/10
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Sections 9-end page 33
rooms in large American cities. In 1908, Oliver hashed out plans for expansion in the Pacific
Northwest with construction of a large building in Portland, Oregon. The company’s cashier,
Frank Nippold, scouted locations for the new building in late 1907, providing J. D. Oliver a
hand-drawn map for him to select the most desirable location.45 Olivers also constructed large
storerooms in St. Louis in 1908, Harrisburg (PA) in 1911, and in San Francisco in 1920.
At the time of his father’s death in 1908, J. D. Oliver was named executor; he was 58 years of
age. He had been a director of the company since he was twenty years old, so the transition from
father to son was easily accomplished. Joseph was a financial genius, and it is doubtful James
would have done so well without his son’s financial guidance. While it has been noted that
James was frugal, J. D. Oliver felt money was earned by reinvestment. It had also been noted
that because of J. D. Oliver’s modesty, it was not generally known that James almost always left
details of financial management to his son. At a meeting after the death of his father, J. D. Oliver
was elected president, treasurer and general manager. James Oliver II (J. D.’s son) was named
vice president, and Joseph Ford (J. D.’s brother-in-law who was married to Josephine) was
named secretary. The three became the sole directors of the company. J. D. Oliver held almost
the entire issue of Oliver company stock and became responsible for the plant and more than
2,000 employees.46
J. D. Oliver was featured in an article published in the Indianapolis Star in 1910 in which he
stated that Indiana’s outlook was superb and that manufacturers should stay in the state because
the future was bright. The article speaks of Oliver’s plans to expand company facilities in South
Bend and states the company is recognized as one of America’s greatest business establishments
with products sold in every civilized country on the globe.47 Visitors to the South Bend plant in
1911 included a delegation from India and Russian Prince Mikhail Mikhailovich Cantacuzène,
and J. D. Oliver gifted a plow to Queen Victoria of Great Britian during the same time.
In 1909, J. D. Oliver had launched an expansion to double the size of the plant’s footprint and
developed plans to build a factory in Canada. Oliver continued to resist consolidation and
mergers occurring in American manufacturing during the late 19th and early 20th century. Instead,
he chose a model of cooperation and partnership with competing firms in avenues of marketing
and distribution. By 1911, J. D. Oliver had forged a close connection between the company and
International Harvester Company of Chicago when they jointly opened a factory in Hamilton,
Ontario. A large, multi-page spread with the Oliver company profile, views of the South Bend
plant, and proposed Hamilton plant appear in the Hamilton Spectator in 1910.48 Once the plant
was operational, another full-page article ran in the newspaper in 1911.49
J. D. Oliver’s interest in international markets, particularly regarding tariffs, provided him with
appointments to tariff boards and as a conference delegate in 1909. His name was floated as a
potential Secretary of State in 1910. He certainly had the attention of American presidents during
45 History Museum (South Bend) collection of Oliver company correspondence. Folder OD27/2/10 & OD28/1/10
46 The History Museum: Oliver History: https://www.historymuseumsb.org/research-history/oliver-history/
47 “Oliver Declares Indiana is Best” The South Bend Tribune. 11 Aug 1910. Pg. 4, col. 1
48 The Hamilton (Ontario) Spectator. 17 May 1910. Pgs. 1 & 5
49 The Hamilton (Ontario) Spectator. 16 Sept 1911. Pg. 10
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Sections 9-end page 34
the early 1900s. He was appointed to the Indiana Conservation Commission in 1908, a program
initiated by President Theodore Roosevelt. He had meetings with President Taft concerning
tariffs in 1911, then later with President Coolidge in 1922. The Oliver plow had become so
integrated in American culture that nationally-known authors George Ade and Charles Major,
were guests of Oliver in 1910,50 and nationally-known religious evangelist, Billy Sunday, made
references to the Oliver plow in 1916.
It was also during this period of the early 20th century that J. D. Oliver intensified company
marketing efforts in opening arable lands in South America, specifically the plains of Argentina
and adjacent countries. This effort was led by Rudolph Altgent and J. D. Oliver’s son, James, Jr.,
now the third generation of Olivers working for the company. James Oliver, Jr. would also play a
vital role in the company’s Canadian markets. R. A. Bogardus, with International Harvester,
wrote to J. D. Oliver in 1911 about his son being well-accepted in Canada and that J. D. would
“never need to lose sleep over the selling end of the Canadian plant.”51
In 1911, plant operations started at the new plant the Olivers built in Hamilton, Ontario. J. D.
Oliver correctly perceived vast amounts of Canada’s northwest wilderness would be opened to
agriculture, particularly for wheat crops, and the plant was positioned to provide plows to
opening the land. On May 1, 1911, the first carload of plows was shipped from Hamilton,
Ontario, and by summer’s end, 30,000 plows had been shipped. Among buildings constructed in
Hamilton that year were two large docks to provide for two lake carriers to be used for shipping
Oliver products. J. D. Oliver had contracted with International Harvester Company to handle
distribution and sales from the Canadian plant. This satisfactory arrangement for both companies
continued until 1919 when the Olivers sold the Hamilton plant to International
Harvester.52 Oliver’s satisfaction with this arrangement is noted in a letter from him to a
longtime-friend and implement dealer in Glasgow, Scotland named William Wallace when
Oliver writes that the investments were prompted by “wonderful development in the western
portion of Canada.”53
Farming in the United States was steadily becoming mechanized. A new era had been opened in
1905 when a gasoline engine was mounted on a traction truck to pull several plows. Gasoline
farm tractors pulling gang plows, a large plank that has several plow blades fastened to it,
developed rapidly. On September 30, 1911, a world record was set when an Oliver 50-bottom
(50 blades) gang plow, pulled by three LaPorte, Indiana-built Rumley Oil-Pull tractors, turned
fifty, 14-inch furrows at one time. This was a width of almost sixty feet. That same year, three
International Harvester tractors pulling a 55-bottom Oliver gang plow set another record by
plowing an acre in less than four minutes. In contrast from previous decades of farming, a farmer
walked eight and one-fourth miles behind a team of horses with a single plow to turn an acre of
land.54
50 “Purdue Trustees Visit South Bend” The South Bend Tribune. 29 Oct 1910. Pg. 18, col. 6
51 History Museum (South Bend) collection of Oliver company correspondence. Folder OD30/2/2
52 The History Museum: Oliver History: https://www.historymuseumsb.org/research-history/oliver-history/
53 History Museum (South Bend) collection of Oliver company correspondence. Folder OD30/1/15
54 The History Museum: Oliver History: https://www.historymuseumsb.org/research-history/oliver-history/
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Sections 9-end page 35
However, most small farms had not gravitated toward the use of gas-powered tractors or
machinery yet. Work animals still provided the primary source for power on small farms. One of
the company’s plows, the Oliver No. 23-B Reversible Sulky Plow, was considered one of the
company’s most ingenious inventions of the 20th century. Production began on the plow in about
1917 and continued until 1934. The horse-drawn plow was reversible in that mechanisms
allowed plow shares to turn the soil in either direction, allowing highly efficient plowing patterns
for more quickly cultivating fields. One citation states that “many authorities consider this
machine to represent the pinnacle of design for plows of this type.”55
World War I provided its own set of difficulties for the Oliver company. J. D. Oliver gauged
conditions in Europe leading up to America’s entry into the war. Prices for materials rose, labor
shortages would follow, and decisions on how to conduct business with foreign countries would
weigh heavily on Oliver’s mind before the war ended. The war was preventing stockpiles of the
company’s products from going to market. The plant in Ontario had all but closed by 1914, and
the South Bend plant was running at 60% capabilities.56 Letters from sales agents in St. Louis
and Kansas seemed to echo what was being experienced across the country, particularly the
Midwest. Dire and suffering were adjectives used to describe the markets in the United States.57
In 1915, J. D. Oliver informed sales agents that Oliver would no longer act as a distributor for
other farm implement manufacturers, aside from a few, until Olivers could produce the products
themselves. Oliver also indicated that wagons and trucks that were in direct competition with
their South Bend neighbors (Studebaker) will also be discontinued.58 By 1917, J. D. Oliver wrote
to his son that business was booming again despite other companies’ struggles, such as
Studebaker who was laying off 700 employees.59 After one Oliver company agent recommended
creating a new division of sales territories in the United States in 1916, J. D. Oliver was
concerned that there would not be enough sales activity to justify the additional branches in
Columbus, Ohio and Atlanta, Georgia.60
Oliver had forged an excellent working relationship with a German company named Hasenclever
in Argentina by 1915. Given the separation, Oliver felt that the relationship could continue as
Argentina was a prime market for plows opening up their vast lands. That would change before
the war was over when Hasenclavers were placed on a list which prevented J. P. Morgan & Co.
(the Oliver bank) from transferring funds due to it being of German origin.61 The Oliver
company was testing various products in Argentina, including plows and cultivators, with
promising results. The Oliver company’s strength in Argentina was the one bright economic
condition during this period, though poverty and crop failures by 1916 began to take their toll.
J. D. Oliver wrote to the company’s plow inventor in Argentina, Altgent, that the company may
55 Small Farmers Journal: Douglas Kerr: https://smallfarmersjournal.com/the-oliver-no-23-b-reversible-sulky-plow/
accessed July 22, 2024
56 History Museum (South Bend) collection of Oliver company correspondence. Folder OD33/1/10
57 History Museum (South Bend) collection of Oliver company correspondence. Folder OD34/1/15
58 History Museum (South Bend) collection of Oliver company correspondence. Folder OD35/1/15
59 History Museum (South Bend) collection of Oliver company correspondence. Folder OD36/2/10
60 History Museum (South Bend) collection of Oliver company correspondence. Folder OD35/1/15
61 History Museum (South Bend) collection of Oliver company correspondence. Folder OD35/2/7
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Sections 9-end page 36
not be able to keep up with the demand being created in the country for the plow.62 Altgent
responded from Chili, showing the company’s reach throughout the continent, and expressed that
John Deere was trying to break into the South American market.63 J. D. Oliver wrote to his son,
James, in Argentina about concern that the war’s need for horses would likely create further
development and demand for tractors.64 He was correct in his thoughts on the future. During this
time, the company had also been shipping products to South Africa, which also seemed to be at
least only marginally affected by the war.
After World War I, demand for tractor-pulled farm implements increased rapidly. The war had,
in fact, generated much of the technology for truck-tractor development. It was estimated that
250,000 tractors would be built in 1919. Oliver Chilled Plow Works expected to put 750,000
plows behind the 100,000 tractors International Harvester and Henry Ford & Son would build.65
Even before the war ended, Oliver had been corresponding with the Ford company on
collaboration.66 Ford had been experimenting pulling non-Oliver plows by 1916, which no doubt
prompted this quick collaboration. An Oliver Plow advertisement in 1918: Henry Ford, Too
Chooses Oliver Plows included a drawing of a 2-bottom plow pulled behind a Fordson Tractor
with an inset testimonial by Henry Ford & Son stating that they appreciated the cooperation the
Oliver Chilled Plow Works Company provided in designing the proper plow for the Fordson
Tractor: “We know that with the Oliver No. 7 plow the Fordson will work to the very best
advantage.” The price of the plow was $140.00 plus shipping and freight charges. Henry Ford’s
brother visited the company in South Bend in 1922.
To this end, the Olivers launched an extensive expansion program, and in the next four years
conducted their biggest building and real estate activity, exclusive of the Hamilton, Ontario plant
construction, in the company’s history. More than $3 million went to acquire branch house
properties across the county and in foreign markets, $160,000 was used for new buildings at the
South Bend plant, and $1 million was used to erect 160 greatly needed workmen houses. An
innovation at the time was the company’s voluntary introduction of a pension plan, providing for
a pension and automatic retirement for an employee who had reached the age of 70 and had been
with the company twenty years. No pension was to be more than $100 per month or less than
$12.67
Dignitaries and common workmen alike visited the plant during this time. A Russian Count
visited the South Bend facility in 1919 and a delegation of Canadians visited in 1920. A group of
Texas farm boys were hosted by J. D. Oliver at the plant in 1920, with the idea that
understanding the operation would further their understanding of the usefulness of the Oliver
product. Olivers also took plow demonstrations to their markets, such as plowing demonstrations
the company organized in Macon, Georgia and Wichita, Kansas, in 1919.
62 History Museum (South Bend) collection of Oliver company correspondence. Folder OD35/1/1
63 History Museum (South Bend) collection of Oliver company correspondence. Folder OD35/1/1
64 History Museum (South Bend) collection of Oliver company correspondence. Folder OD33/2/10
65 The History Museum: Oliver History: https://www.historymuseumsb.org/research-history/oliver-history/
66 History Museum (South Bend) collection of Oliver company correspondence. Folder OD34/1/5 & OD36/1/10
67 The History Museum: Oliver History: https://www.historymuseumsb.org/research-history/oliver-history/
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Sections 9-end page 37
In a realignment of company responsibility to ease some of his burdens after World War I, J. D.
Oliver relinquished some of his duties, including that of plant manager. An operating committee
for general management was set to be directly responsible to J. D. Oliver, who retained the
company presidency. This committee included James Oliver II, Vice-President; Joseph D. Oliver
Jr., Treasurer; H. Gail Davis, Assistant Treasurer; and C. Frederick Cunningham, Secretary, a
post that had been left vacant by the death of J. D.’s brother-in-law George Ford in 1917.
Gertrude Oliver Cunningham and Susan Catherine Oliver, daughters of J. D. Oliver, were elected
to the board of directors.68
A book entitled The Oliver Chilled Plow: a Treatise on Plows and Plowing by C. A. Bacon was
produced by the Oliver company in 1920 as a way to promote not only the plow, but its proper
use and care, such as sharpening the shares, but also plant horticulture and planting. The book
provided instructions on when to plow, how to plow to kill both pests and weeds, plowing
various soil types, and how to break sod. The 200-page book has a vast number of illustrations
and photographs, comparisons for plowing behind tractors and horses, and chilled and steel plow
shares. The book, which sold for $1.00 a copy, makes it clear the Oliver Chilled Plow Works
was creating a helpful guide as part of its marketing to the growing agriculture industry across
the country. The Oliver company understood the market was locally driven, by farmers, which
prompted their contribution to the Indiana State Fair through the erection of the Oliver Building
in 1924, highlighting Indiana’s important position in the agriculture industry.
When the 1920s arrived, business indicators looked good, but recession followed the war. In
some ways, the Oliver company’s production success itself was some of its undoing. World War
I and the recession that followed interrupted normal production. Farm prices began to drop
which led to farmers being unable to pay debts. This resulted in a lack of agricultural implements
being purchased. When markets recovered, the agricultural advancements of the Golden Age
created overproduction during the 1920s, which further weakened demand for agricultural
implements and products. The Oliver Company held the largest stock of manufactured goods and
the largest stock of raw materials in its history, all purchased at high wartime prices. Because of
its strong financial condition, Oliver Chilled Plow Works weathered the crisis, but J. D. Oliver
reduced many of his outside duties and returned to his Oliver Chilled Plow Works office on
February 11, 1924, where he remained active until the business was sold.69
In 1923, increased competition from other full-line farm implement companies forced Oliver
Chilled Plow Works to choose between an enormous expansion with a program to include more
implements, such as tractors, or join other manufacturers of different types of farm tools and
establish its own full-line company.70 The company experimented with tractors in the early
1920s, creating the Oliver Chilled Plow Tractor, though only about twenty of the experimental
machines were produced. J. D. Oliver elected to join other manufacturers as a way to survive. At
a special meeting of stockholders on February 1, 1929, he was authorized to organize a new
company known as Oliver Farm Equipment Company. This new company took over Oliver
68 Ibid
69 Ibid
70 Ibid
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Sections 9-end page 38
Chilled Plow Works and Hart-Parr Company of Charles City, Iowa, a company which
manufactured tractors. Oliver also purchased Nichols & Shepard Company of Battle Creek,
Michigan, which made threshing machines, corn pickers and combines. Soon after this merger,
American Seeding Machine Company of Springfield, Ohio and the McKenzie Potato Machinery
Company of LaCrosse, Wisconsin, were acquired. The Oliver Chilled Plow Works, as such,
ceased to exist on March 30, 1929. The executive office posts of the new Oliver Farm Equipment
Company were divided among three of the merging companies, with J. D. Oliver as Chairman of
the Board, a post he held until he resigned on December 13, 1932.71
The Oliver Farm Equipment Company maintained its manufacturing plants but located its
administrative headquarters in Chicago. It began producing tractors, among other equipment,
joining technology of both the Oliver Chilled Plow Tractor and that of the Hart-Parr Company.
In 1944, the company became the Oliver Corporation and purchased another manufacturer
named Cletrac of Cleveland, Ohio, that produced land crawlers. In 1960, White Motor
Corporation purchased the Oliver Corporation. By 1969, White Motor Corporation combined
both its Oliver and Minneapolis-Moline subsidiary manufacturing lines to become White Farm
Equipment Company. The Oliver named lived on in the company’s iconic green Oliver tractor
until 1976 when the last Oliver tractor rolled off the assembly line.72 The name that had become
synonymous with agricultural production in the United States, and much of the world, had
spanned over one hundred years rising through the Golden Age of Agriculture.
Other Contributions by J. D. Oliver
J. D. Oliver’s contributions to the United States went beyond his role with expanding the Oliver
Chilled Plow Works to a nationally and internationally recognized company. Oliver’s financial
brilliance catapulted him to being an influential member of the interlocking directorates of
national banking houses for Chase National Bank of New York and First National Bank of
Chicago for which he was elected director in 1916. As chief financial officer of the family
corporation, J. D. Oliver invested in railroad stock including the New York Central Railroad,
Pennsylvania Railroad, and helped establish the Indiana Northern Railroad beltline which aided
in shipment of the company’s products. J. D. Oliver was also elected a director of the Pittsburg,
Cincinnati, Chicago & St. Louis Railroad in 1916.73 By 1917, J. D. Oliver was endorsed as the
Federal Trade Commissioner, then in 1919, treasurer of a body overseeing canal trade.
After the United States entered World War I in 1917, J. D. Oliver was called to Washington to
confer with the nation’s food administrator, Herbert Hoover. Oliver was concerned about an
impending food crisis in the country due to wheat crop failures. He stated in a letter “the food
supply, in my judgement, demands immediate attention and action, and this can best be done
through government supervision…I would be only too glad to do all in my power without profit
to further this all-important matter. Should this war continue for eighteen months, and we fail to
do our duty at this time, I feel we will see a bread famine such as has not occurred in the world’s
71 The History Museum: Oliver History: https://www.historymuseumsb.org/research-history/oliver-history/
72 Oliver Heritage: Oliver History: https://oliverheritage.com/oliver-history. Accessed July 22, 2024
73 Joseph D. Oliver House National Register of Historic Places form, 1973. Section 8, pg. 2
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Sections 9-end page 39
history.”74 Oliver felt that tractors pulling plows should run twenty-four hours per day, using
headlights, to avoid food shortfalls. Oliver’s national influence is evidenced by his meeting with
Hoover, but also through a meeting he had with Vice President Thomas Marshall over the food
issue.75
Food concerns during the war were parallel with financing the war. Through Treasury Secretary,
William McAdoo, President Wilson appointed Oliver the state director for Indiana of the War
Savings Certificate program in 1917.76 Oliver and Frank Hering, an Oliver vice-director,
crisscrossed Indiana setting up fund-raising and bond-selling committees in every community.
J. D. Oliver organized 22,000 schoolteachers to sell thrift stamps for bond purchases through
schoolchildren to their parents.77 In addition, to ease the food shortage for employees in South
Bend, J. D. Oliver established a community garden. Fifty acres near the plant were divided into
50 by 100-foot patches with the families of 301 workers participating in the project. J. D. Oliver
awarded $50 in gold for the best crop return.78
In October 1923, J. D. Oliver fell victim to a four-month illness, described as tired break-down,
from which he never fully recovered. He resigned many of the outside directorships he held and
gave up the presidency of the Purdue University Board of Trustees, on which he had served for
18 years.79 Oliver advocated for additional appropriations to Purdue through state legislators, as
is evidenced in a 1909 letter to Jesse Eschbach (state representative). Oliver felt that Purdue
University was vital to the future prosperity of the state in its training of technical experts.80 The
University’s Engineering and Agriculture departments were no doubt of special interest to
Oliver, as demonstrated in a visit arranged for Purdue seniors to the Oliver plant in 1908. J. D.
Oliver promoted Purdue University when he staged a large plow at the campus’s farm in 1911
and broke the world’s plowing record for turning an acre of ground in 4.25 minutes.
J. D. Oliver died on August 6, 1933, at Copshaholm. Anna (Wells) Oliver died in 1938 and the
home passed to their children. The home and its contents, original Oliver family pieces, were
donated to the forerunner of today’s History Museum of South Bend in the 1970s. Since that
time, the organization has opened the home to the public and created exhibit halls to relay the
importance of Oliver Chilled Plow Works not only to the city of South Bend, but to the nation.
74 History Museum (South Bend) collection of Oliver company correspondence. Folder OD36/2/8
75 History Museum (South Bend) collection of Oliver company correspondence. Folder OD36/2/9
76 History Museum (South Bend) collection of Oliver company correspondence. Folder OD38/1/10
77 History Museum (South Bend) collection of Oliver company correspondence. Folder OD38/2/10
78 The History Museum: Oliver History: https://www.historymuseumsb.org/research-history/oliver-history/
79 The History Museum: Oliver History: https://www.historymuseumsb.org/research-history/oliver-history/
80 History Museum (South Bend) collection of Oliver company correspondence. Folder OD29/1/4
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Sections 9-end page 40
ARCHITECTURE
The Joseph D. Oliver House represents the gilded age of American architecture funded through
robust industrialization and capitalism. Taking its place among other residential estates for
industrial magnates, the grand Richardsonian Romanesque style house exhibits austerity softened
by its rambling, cascading form (photos 01-06). The architects selected to design the home were
Hugh Lamb (c. 1850-1903) and Charles Alonzo Rich (c. 1850-1943), whose firm catered to
wealthy East Coast families through designs created in their New York office. Lamb & Rich
gained a reputation for designing large country estate homes in the Shingle and Romanesque
style from Maine to New Jersey including Sagamore Hill, Theodore Roosevelt’s country manor
completed in 1885. The 38-room Oliver mansion was as large as any private residence the firm
had completed when it was built between 1895-1896. The firm’s other work, such as urban row
houses, commercial, and civic work was comparatively large in scale, but with fewer interior
refinements. Their other work was also more typically constructed in brick with stone trim, or in
easily quarried and cut stone. The Oliver house was unlike the firm’s other work in this regard as
well due to the use of fieldstone granite boulders for its walls.
In 1894, Joseph H. Hibberd transferred the site on which the home would be built to Joseph D.
Oliver. The corner property included 250 feet of frontage on Washington Street’s south side,
which had become one of the most exclusive residential streets in South Bend. It included about
300 feet of frontage on Chapin Street’s west side. The cost of the property was $12,000. At that
time, drawings for the house had not been completed, but it was anticipated that the sale would
result in the erection of a handsome residence on the property.81 Once drawings were completed
by Lamb & Rich, the contract for carpentry work was awarded to McCombs & Hepler for the
new residence.82 It is difficult to know who were the stone masons on the house, however, a few
names were prominent for other similarly-constructed buildings in the city. Stone cutter Harmon
Clark worked for masonry superintendent R. L. Braunsdorf on the Studebaker house and S. W.
Starke is also mentioned as a well-known stone mason in the city.83 Outside cutters were also
employed by J. D. Oliver because he could not get enough local cutters.84 Likely, J. D. Oliver
managed many of the affairs in the construction of his home, acting as a general contractor
would today.
Romanesque Style in Cut Fieldstone
The Romanesque style was a popular style selected for massive civic buildings constructed
during the 1880s-1890s. In Indiana, the style was used to construct churches and courthouses,
often using Indiana limestone from quarries in the southwest part of the state. The style was
made popular by New York architect Henry H. Richardson (1838-1886), particularly on public
buildings located along the east coast. By the late 1860s and early 1870s, Richardson had
become recognized for the style, and it should be no surprise that the firm of Lamb & Rich, even
81 “To Build New Homes” The South Bend Daily Tribune. 31 Jan 1894. Pg. 4, Col. 3
82 “Meetings and Announcements” The South Bend Daily Tribune. 30 April 1895. Pg. 8, Col. 2
83 “Favor Home Stone” The South Bend Daily Tribune. 18 July 1895. Pg. 5, Col. 1-2
84 “Talk About Stone” The South Bend Daily Tribune. 21 Aug 1895. Pg. 5. Col. 3
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Sections 9-end page 41
into the 1890s, would be working in their fellow New Yorker’s design style. Buildings in this
style often have large, rusticated stone blocks or belt courses for wall construction. Wide arched
windows, towers or turrets, and dormers in steeply pitched roofs were also frequently used.
Given their grand scale, few houses were constructed in the style and generally, buildings in the
style employed at least some use of rusticated stone. Crafting a Romanesque Revival style
building of fieldstone was a challenge for only the most skilled stone masons. Dressing granite
fieldstone culled from glacial till required a substantially higher skill.
The Oliver house conveys a sense of permanence and mass through its stone walls, visually
layered with a tapered base of larger blocks, capped with limestone, and decreasingly smaller
blocks as each story ascends. This is particularly noticeable on the east façade where the grand
scale of the home, with each story, is displayed through this composition of stone (photo 02).
This massive, almost monolithic appearance is typical of the Romanesque style to provide a
sense of gravity and weight to the structure. The home’s numerous projecting bays, often with
cutaway corners, as well as its large three-story corner turret, also convey the style (photo 01).
The entry to the home, through a wide segmental arched front portico wall, is capped with carved
stone crenelation (photo 04). Behind it rises a two-story projecting bay ornamented by a frieze of
patterned stone and windows flanked by carved stone columns. The house also features several
dormers clad in roof tiles (photos 02, 04) that appear to have rounded, front corners. All these
features demonstrate an excellent application of the style in a large residence.
The architects employed some aspects of another style they were well-known for on the East
Coast, the Shingle style. This is best demonstrated in the design of the towering double-hipped,
side-gabled roof clad in tiles (photo 02, 06). Tiles cover the side gable walls which are divided
by eave lines into three sections. The side gable walls project over the east and west facades and
are supported by heavy timber brackets. This feature, along with the home’s large wraparound
porch seems more typical of the Shingle style that softens the overall massing of the
Romanesque form. Typical Shingle style elements of wood shingle-covered walls are absent in
lieu of stone and tile.
By the time the Oliver house had been constructed, two other notable cut fieldstone homes had
been built in proximity to it on South Bend’s West Washington Street. The street became well-
known for large homes constructed by the city’s leading families. Of considerable note is
“Tippecanoe Place” a few blocks east of the Oliver house. The house, constructed in 1888-1889
by Studebaker Corporation president, Clement Studebaker, is of similar scale to the Oliver
house. Maybe most strikingly similar is its Richardsonian Romanesque style designed by Henry
Ives Cobb, well-known Chicago architect, interpreted through the use of cut granite fieldstone.
The house was built by Christopher Fassnacht.
Two other large cut granite fieldstone buildings were constructed in advance of Copshaholm.
The William L. Kizer House, located north of the Oliver house, was built about 1888 by a
prominent manufacturing family of South Bend in the Romanesque style. The home’s height and
corner location add to its prominence giving it the nickname “the Castle” despite being of
smaller scale than the Oliver and Studebaker houses. The other cut fieldstone building is South
Bend’s First Presbyterian Church built several blocks east of the Oliver house on Washington
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Sections 9-end page 42
Street. Also constructed in the Richardsonian Romanesque style, with a full third of the cost
underwritten by the Oliver family, and a third by the Studebaker family, the church was built in
1888-1889 by Christopher Fassnacht using plans by architect J. P. Bailey.
J. D. Oliver had nicknamed their home “Copshaholm” in honor of the family’s Scottish ancestral
home. It is the fourth and last building of any significant scale constructed using cut granite
fieldstone in South Bend. All four buildings exhibit exceptional skill in masonry construction but
with slightly different approaches to stone coursing. Both the Studebaker house and First
Presbyterian Church feature random-coursing of hand-split rubble fieldstone. This gives their
massive walls a less formal, more natural appearance. Both buildings feature carved stone trim
and columns, highlighting window arches, belt courses, and porches. The Studebaker house
features red-colored roof tiles, and the church roof is covered with slates.
In contrast, both the Kizer house and Oliver house have walls composed of granite fieldstone cut
into blocks. The Kizer house simplifies the coursing into simple, stacked rows of rusticated block
trimmed with projecting beltcourses and large rusticated stone lintels. No carved limestone or
other type of stone is part of the house and only the large entry features a stone arch. The house
roof was once covered with red-colored tiles but is now covered with red-colored asphalt
shingles. The Oliver house combines random coursing with its cut stone blocks and creates a
visually appealing assemblage of larger stone in the raised base, followed by smaller stone,
followed by the smallest stone blocks in the top story. Also, unlike the other buildings, the Oliver
house features cut fieldstone patterns in friezes and in a large daisy wheel on its east façade.
Unusual stonework continues into the perimeter wall of the Oliver house, with grapevine mortar
joints and crenellation-like jagged stones atop its piers. All this more detailed work is the product
of exceptional stone masons working with very hard material versus more typical and more
easily carved and cut limestone or sandstone. It should be noted that the south façade of the
carriage house, something not meant to be readily seen by the public, is composed of cut stone
more closely resembling the type of cut stone found in the Studebaker house.
Two other substantial buildings composed of this cut fieldstone once existed in South Bend. The
city’s First Baptist Church was a large Romanesque structure built of the stone c. 1890 and
another residence on West Washington Street was substantially remodeled by James Oliver
during the 1880s at which time it was covered with cut fieldstone. Both buildings have been
razed. Another residence owned by Mrs. Maude Coquillard in 1894 had foundations, a large
turret like Oliver’s, and a perimeter wall composed of uncut fieldstone at the corner of Jefferson
and Notre Dame Avenue; it was also razed.
It was in this backdrop of these large buildings being constructed of “St. Joseph County Granite”
that people began to advocate for the new, proposed courthouse be constructed of “home
stone.”85 Several articles relating to this advocacy provide some of the only insight into the
construction of the J. D. Oliver House which indicate that the stone used on his home was culled
from the farm fields surrounding South Bend. In one article, J. D. Oliver is quoted as saying he
was in favor of using local fieldstone for the courthouse because it was not only the cheapest but
85 “Favor Home Stone” The South Bend Daily Tribune. 18 July 1895. Pg. 5. Cols. 1-3
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Sections 9-end page 43
the best material that could be procured and that age and use had no apparent effect on it, so it
was beyond comparison.86 Both Henry Ives and Lamb & Rich, architects for the Studebaker and
J. D. Oliver homes, respectively, submitted proposals for the new courthouse.87 Ultimately,
St. Joseph County Commissioners went with another architect who selected Amherst stone from
Ohio for the new building. Had the courthouse been constructed of cut fieldstone granite, it
would have been truly unique in Indiana.
The upper Midwest is somewhat unique in its supply of granite fieldstone boulders. The material
is part of the great glacial till, which deposited granite boulders in large quantities across land.
This land would ultimately be cleared and tilled for agricultural production and these stones were
cleared and often placed in large piles on the edges of fields. This creates an interesting
dichotomy for a house built of these same stones by a family who manufactured an implement
for converting so much land into agriculture production.
Most of these cut fieldstone buildings of the upper Midwest are located in Michigan and northern
Indiana into Ohio, or states bordering the Great Lakes with few found outside of this range. The
use of such precision cut block from granite fieldstones is even more rare since most fieldstone
construction is composed of uncut boulders. An interesting note concerning masons who
employed this stone-building skill rests with William Lake Foker of Argos, Indiana, who learned
the stone mason’s trade in the 1880s-1890s working with French stone masons who were
brought to South Bend to construct these buildings. Foker’s skill, style, and use of designs in his
work most closely resembles that found in the Oliver house. His work can be found throughout a
narrow portion of north-central Indiana, mostly in porches and chimneys of early 20th century
Craftsman style homes.
Interior Refinements
While the exterior of the Oliver house reflects a remarkable execution of stone masonry skill, the
interior of the home provides a clear picture of the wealth produced from the Oliver company.
Hugo Huber (1869-1934), a German immigrant in New York City was hired to complete interior
decoration. Huber was the founder of H. F. Huber & Company, one of New York’s first interior
decorating companies who worked closely with architectural firms to provide their clients with a
complete package with high-end interiors, particularly in residential design. One of his largest
works was Stan Hywet Manor for the Seiberling family of Akron, Ohio. Matthew Brothers
Manufacturing Company, a custom furniture and woodwork provider of Milwaukee, provided
interior woodwork and casework. In 1938, Walter Johnson, an architect from Philadelphia, was
contracted to redecorate the home, which included lightening the darker colored oak woodwork
in the main hall (photos 28-29).
The house features room after room of well-appointed materials including carved woodwork,
tile, and plasterwork. The division of the house between more public rooms on the first story and
some on the third story, and the service areas in the southeast corner and family suites, largely on
86 “Court House Talk Testimony for Home Granite” The South Bend Daily Tribune. 19 July 1895. Pg. 5, Cols. 1-2
87 “Some Noted Architects” The South Bend Daily Tribune. 8 June 1896. Pg. 5, Col. 4
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Sections 9-end page 44
the second story, is a clever design requiring the use of two staircases. The home’s many
projecting bays and turret provide interest to the shape of rooms, sometimes reflected in the
opposite wall using poche. This use of poche in the home’s many interior masonry walls
provides places for closets and fireplaces throughout the home. This aspect is also an element of
the Romanesque style.
The main hall exhibits the most elaborate features of the Oliver house. It is into this space that
one enters the home, either from the front entry vestibule (right side of photo 29) or through a
side hall off the porte cochere. The main hall is divided into two parts by fluted, Ionic columns.
The north half, near the vestibule, has coffered wood ceilings and wood beam work (photo 29)
while the south half features the grand staircase which is open to the second story in the center of
the space (photo 28). The staircase balustrade is composed of lattice-like wood panels, a
projecting balcony at a mezzanine landing, and carved wood newel posts topped by urn-like
finials. This half also features a wood fireplace with twisted columns and tall, paneled wood
wainscot.
The exquisite refinements flow into every room off the main hall with carved fireplace mantles
and tiled surrounds, built-in casework like in the library (photo 30), dining room (photo 31), and
butler’s pantry (photo 35), and geometrical plasterwork relief in the morning room ceiling (photo
32) or the frieze found in the music room (photo 34). Other exceptional rooms include J. D.
Oliver’s den (photo 33) with hammerbeam trusses and raked ceiling in the southwest corner of
the first story and the half-domed ceiling composed of opalescent glass in the sitting room on the
mezzanine (photo 39). The second story of the main hall’s grand staircase features a walkway
around the open stairs with a wood-beamed and plaster ceiling with a division of the open
staircase from the walkway’s north side by carved wood columns supporting three arched
openings (photos 40-41). The top story features a ballroom with curved front wall off the
staircase landing, arcade with full round arches supported by a fluted Ionic column, and a tall,
raked ceiling (photo 56). The multitude of exceptional features, as well as the incorporation of
servant rooms (photos 54-55), demonstrates that the house has significance as an example of
industrial baron residences.
The Carriage House
The Oliver’s carriage house was also designed by Lamb & Rich in the Romanesque style,
employing many of the same features found in the house. It should be noted for the same
exceptional exterior qualities found in the main house. The carriage house is also composed of
cut, rusticated fieldstone blocks in the same general pattern of larger blocks at the bottom rising
with smaller blocks into the second story (photo 07). This allows the principal feature of the
carriage house, dual two-story turrets that flank the front entry, to have a slight taper upward.
The turrets are topped with conical roofs and flank a balcony on the front façade’s second story.
The carriage house has a similar, front-gabled wall covered with asphalt shingles as opposed to
tiles, with flanking hipped roofs with flared eaves. The building’s stepped parapet and arches on
the east side are notable (photo 14), as is the unusual ventilator-cupola on the west side (photo
16). The breezeway addition that connects the larger History Museum to the carriage house is not
visible from its front façade nor the main house.
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Sections 9-end page 45
The South Bend Tribune carried an account of a visitor to the city in 1896, after the completion
of the J. D. Oliver House. Thomas W. Keene (Thomas Eagleson, 1840-1898), a Shakesperean
actor, had been visiting the city and on his way to the railway station passed the Oliver home. He
was “so struck with the appearance” of the house that he stopped the carriage in which he was
riding so he could walk around the house. He said that “in design, character of material and
workmanship the house was the most beautiful he had ever seen.”88
Developmental History/Additional historic context information
88 “Admired the Building” The South Bend Daily Tribune. 7 Dec 1896. Pg. 5, Col. 5
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Sections 9-end page 46
______________________________________________________________________________
9. Major Bibliographical References
Bibliography (Cite the books, articles, and other sources used in preparing this form.)
PRIMARY SOURCES
“Admired the Building” The South Bend Daily Tribune. 7 Dec 1896. Pg. 5, Col. 5
Ardrey, R. L. American Agricultural Implements. Chicago (published by author), 1894
Bacon, C. A. Oliver Chilled Plow: a Treatise on Plows and Plowing. Oliver Chilled Plow Works
(publisher) South Bend, 1920.
Charles C. Chapman & Co. History of St. Joseph County (IN), pg. 879. Chicago: 1880.
“Court House Talk Testimony for Home Granite” The South Bend Daily Tribune. 19 July 1895.
Pg. 5, Cols. 1-2
Drawings/plans provided by University of Notre Dame School of Architecture
“Favor Home Stone” The South Bend Daily Tribune. 18 July 1895. Pg. 5, Col. 1-2
The Hamilton (Ontario) Spectator. 17 May 1910. Pgs. 1 & 5
The Hamilton (Ontario) Spectator. 16 Sept 1911. Pg. 10
The History Museum (South Bend) collection of Oliver company correspondence
The History Museum: Oliver History: https://www.historymuseumsb.org/research-history/oliver-
history/. Accessed July 13, 2024
The Homestead Act: https://www.history.com/topics/american-civil-war/homestead-act.
Accessed July 22, 2024
Howard, Timothy E. History of St. Joseph County (IN) Vol. 1. Lewis Publishing Co. Chicago:
1907. Pg. 400
“Incident of Flag Day” The South Bend Saturday Tribune. 31 Oct 1896. Pg. 1, col. 4
“Meetings and Announcements” The South Bend Daily Tribune. 30 April 1895. Pg. 8, Col. 2
National Register of Historic Places form, Joseph D. Oliver House, 1973. Prepared by Southold
Restorations, Inc.: Mrs. Richard Forbes, Mrs. Donald Sporleder, T. J. Schlereth
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Sections 9-end page 47
“Not in the Trust” The South Bend Daily Tribune. 18 March 1899. Pg. 1, col. 1
“Oliver Declares Indiana is Best” The South Bend Tribune. 11 Aug 1910. Pg. 4, col. 1
Oliver Heritage: Oliver History: https://oliverheritage.com/oliver-history. Accessed July 22,
2024
“Oliver Plows at Paris” The South Bend Tribune. 20 Aug 1900. Page 4, col. 4
Oliver Plow Works Catalog, September 1, 1880. Produced by Oliver Chilled Plow Works
“Paris Exposition Awards” New York Times. 18 Aug 1900. Pg. 9 col. 3
“Paris Exposition Awards” Seattle Post-Intelligencer. 18 Aug 1900. Pg. 3, col. 1
“Purdue Trustees Visit South Bend” The South Bend Tribune. 29 Oct 1910. Pg. 18, col. 6
Small Farmers Journal: Douglas Kerr: https://smallfarmersjournal.com/the-oliver-no-23-b-
reversible-sulky-plow/ accessed July 22, 2024
“Some Noted Architects” The South Bend Daily Tribune. 8 June 1896. Pg. 5. Col. 4
“Superiority of the Exhibits is Marked” The Tennessean. 21 April 1897. Pg. 5, col. 7
“Talk About Stone” The South Bend Daily Tribune. 21 Aug 1895. Pg. 5. Col. 3
“The World’s Greatest Implement Center” Kansas City Times. 3 Jan 1897. Pg. 28, cols. 6-7
“To Build New Homes” The South Bend Daily Tribune. 31 Jan 1894. Pg. 4 Col. 3
USDA Crop Production Historical Track Records 2019:
https://www.nass.usda.gov/Publications/Todays_Reports/reports/croptr19.pdf. Accessed July 22,
2024
“Visitors are Here” The South Bend Daily Tribune. 8 July 1897. Pg. 1. Cols. 1-2
SECONDARY SOURCES FROM 1973 NATIONAL REGISTER NOMINATION
Anderson & Cooley. South Bend and the Men Who Made It (1901)
“James Oliver,” Dictionary of American Biography
Ardrey, R. L. American Agricultural Implements (1894).
Burlingame, Roger. March of the Iron Men (1938).
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Sections 9-end page 48
Delaney, J. J. “The Beginnings of Industrial South Bend” M. A. Dissertation, Notre Dame (1951)
Esslinger, D. R. “The Urbanization of South Bend’s Immigrants, 1850-1880” Ph. D.
Dissertation, Notre Dame (1972)
Kaempffert, Waldemar. A Popular History of American Invention (1924)
Meike, D. L., “James Oliver and the Oliver Chilled Plow Works” (Ph. D. Dissertation, Indiana
University, 1958.
Oliver, John W. History of American Technology (1956)
Shannon, Fred. The Farmer’s Last Frontier 1865-1900 (1945)
___________________________________________________________________________
Previous documentation on file (NPS):
____ preliminary determination of individual listing (36 CFR 67) has been requested
X previously listed in the National Register
____ previously determined eligible by the National Register
____ designated a National Historic Landmark
____ recorded by Historic American Buildings Survey #____________
____ recorded by Historic American Engineering Record # __________
____ recorded by Historic American Landscape Survey # ___________
Primary location of additional data:
____ State Historic Preservation Office
____ Other State agency
____ Federal agency
____ Local government
____ University
____ Other
Name of repository: _____________________________________
Historic Resources Survey Number (if assigned): 201-598-26103
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Sections 9-end page 49
______________________________________________________________________________
10. Geographical Data
Acreage of Property Approx. 6.8 acres
Use the UTM system
UTM References
Datum (indicated on USGS map):
NAD 1927 or NAD 1983
1. Zone: Easting: Northing:
2. Zone: Easting: Northing:
3. Zone: Easting: Northing:
4. Zone: Easting : Northing:
Verbal Boundary Description (Describe the boundaries of the property.)
Beginning at the southwest corner of the intersection of West Washington Street and Chapin
Street, on the west edge of the curb on Chapin Street, face south and follow a line with the
curb 240 feet to the north property line of 121 Chapin Street, then turn west and follow the
north property line of 121 Chapin Street 124 feet to its west property line. Turn south and
follow the west property line of 121 Chapin Street 56 feet to the north property line of 125
Chapin Street, then turn west and follow the north property line 30 feet to the west property
lines of 125, 127, and 131 Chapin Street. Turn south and follow the aforementioned west
property lines approximately 124 feet to the south property line of 131 Chapin Street, then
turn east and follow the south property line of 131 Chapin Street approximately 156 feet to
the edge of the west curb on Chapin Street.
Turn south and follow the west curb of Chapin Street approximately 230 feet to the north
curb of Thomas Street, then turn west and follow the north curb of Thomas Street
approximately 425 feet to the east property lines of 911 and 915 Thomas Street. Turn north
and follow the east property lines approximately 192 feet until the line of 915 Thomas Street
jogs slightly southwest 10 feet, then continue north approximately 212 feet, following the
east property lines of 122, 128, 132, and 134 Laurel Street to a line extended east
approximately 14 feet from the south property line of 120 Laurel Street. Turn west and
follow the line to the east property line of 120 Laurel Street, then turn north and follow the
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Sections 9-end page 50
east property lines of 120 and 112 Laurel Street and 916 West Washington Street
approximately 248 feet to the south curb of West Washington Street. Turn east and follow
the south curb of West Washington Street approximately 448 feet to the west curb of Chapin
Street, or the place of beginning.
Boundary Justification (Explain why the boundaries were selected.)
The original National Register nomination submitted for this property contained only the
property on which the Oliver house, carriage house, and gardens were located. Under current
ownership, and due to additions made to the rear (south) of the carriage house, the nominated
property extends south to Thomas Street. While the scale of the addition on the carriage
house is large and for all intents and purposes, a separate building, it is adequately removed
from primary views and does not substantially impact the significance or contributing status
of the building. See photos 07, 09-11, and 14-16 for context. The Studebaker Museum (2005)
is connected to the History Museum’s main building (1994) but carries a separate address of
201 Chapin Street and is under separate ownership by the City of South Bend. Because
National Register boundaries cannot go through a building, and the History Museum’s main
building and Studebaker Museum are joined and connected to the carriage house’s
breezeway and addition (c. 1985), they are not counted as separate resources from the Oliver
Carriage House, but essentially constitute non-contributing, modern additions.
_____________________________________________________________________________
11. Form Prepared By
name/title: Kurt West Garner
organization: The History Museum
date: August 1, 2024
___________________________________________________________________________
Additional Documentation
Submit the following items with the completed form:
• Maps: A USGS map or equivalent (7.5 or 15 minute series) indicating the property's
location.
• Sketch map for historic districts and properties having large acreage or numerous
resources. Key all photographs to this map.
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Sections 9-end page 51
• Additional items: (Check with the SHPO, TPO, or FPO for any additional items.)
•
Photographs
Submit clear and descriptive photographs. The size of each image must be 3000x2000 at 300
ppi (pixels per inch) or larger. Key all photographs to the sketch map. Each photograph must
be numbered and that number must correspond to the photograph number on the photo log.
For simplicity, the name of the photographer, photo date, etc. may be listed once on the
photograph log and doesn’t need to be labeled on every photograph.
Photo Log
Name of Property: Oliver, Joseph D., House
City or Vicinity: South Bend
County: St. Joseph State: Indiana
Photographer: Kurt West Garner
Date Photographed: June 25, 2024
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking southwest at the front of the Oliver House
1 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking west at the Oliver House
2 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking southwest at the Oliver House from the gateway at the sidewalk
3 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking southeast at the front entry of the Oliver House
4 of 57.
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Sections 9-end page 52
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking southeast at the front and west facades of the Oliver House
5 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking northeast at the west façade of the Oliver House
6 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking south at the front façade of the Oliver Carriage House
7 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking east toward the Chapin Street gateway pass the back of the Oliver House
8 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking west between the Oliver House and Carriage House from Chapin Street
9 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking northeast from the east side of the Carriage House to the Oliver House
10 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking south toward the Carriage House from the porte cochere
11 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking east on the front porch of the Oliver House toward the entry
12 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking northeast toward the Oliver House from the Carriage House balcony
13 of 57.
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Sections 9-end page 53
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking southwest at the Carriage House
14 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking northwest at the breezeway connection to the Carriage House
15 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking northeast at the breezeway and c. 1985 addition to the Carriage House
16 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking west through trellis to fountain from the porte cochere
17 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking north at well in sunken garden
18 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking southeast at c. 1994 History Museum main building
19 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking northeast at History Museum main building (left) and Studebaker
Museum (2005, on right)
20 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking northwest toward sunken garden from Carriage House balcony
21 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking southeast in the first story central hall of Carriage House
22 of 57.
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Sections 9-end page 54
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking southeast in the first story east hall of the Carriage House
23 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking northwest at breezeway connection to Carriage House, first story
24 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking northwest at breezeway connection to Carriage House, second story
25 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking north in second story of Carriage House
26 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking southeast/down from second story at main staircase in Carriage House
27 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking southwest in first story main hall in Oliver House
28 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking north in first story main hall in Oliver House
29 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking north in first story library in Oliver House
30 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking south in first story dining room in Oliver House
31 of 57.
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Sections 9-end page 55
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking west in first story morning room in Oliver House
32 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking south in first story den in Oliver House
33 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking south in first story music room in Oliver House
34 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking northwest in first story butler’s pantry in Oliver House
35 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking south in first story at servants’ staircase in Oliver House
36 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking northwest in first story kitchen in Oliver House
37 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking east in basement laundry room in Oliver House
38 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking south at sitting room off landing between first/second stories
39 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking northwest in second story landing in Oliver House
40 of 57.
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Sections 9-end page 56
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking south in second story landing in Oliver House
41 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking northwest in second story study in Oliver House
42 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking southwest in second story (east) bedroom in Oliver House
43 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking southwest in second story (east) bedroom bathroom in Oliver House
44 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking northeast in second story green (north) bedroom in Oliver House
45 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking northwest in second story pink (northwest) bedroom in Oliver House
46 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking west in second story at Well’s (west) bedroom in Oliver House
47 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking north in second story nursery in Oliver House
48 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking southeast in second story dressing room in Oliver House
49 of 57.
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Sections 9-end page 57
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking down/northwest in third story landing in Oliver House
50 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking south in third story at Joseph’s (west) bedroom in Oliver House
51 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking north in third story at Joseph’s study in Oliver House
52 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking east in third story billiard room in Oliver House
53 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking northeast in third story cook’s room in Oliver House
54 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking northeast in third story servant’s room in Oliver House
55 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking northeast in third story ballroom
56 of 57.
Description of Photograph(s) and number, include description of view indicating direction of
camera: Looking east in attic over northeast corner of third story
57 of 57.
Paperwork Reduction Act Statement: This information is being collected for applications to the National Register of Historic
Places to nominate properties for listing or determine eligibility for listing, to list properties, and to amend existing listings. Response
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form
NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018
Oliver, Joseph D., House St. Joseph County, IN
Name of Property County and State
Sections 9-end page 58
to this request is required to obtain a benefit in accordance with the National Historic Preservation Act, as amended (16 U.S.C.460
et seq.).
Estimated Burden Statement: Public reporting burden for this form is estimated to average 100 hours per response including
time for reviewing instructions, gathering and maintaining data, and completing and reviewing the form. Direct comments regarding
this burden estimate or any aspect of this form to the Office of Planning and Performance Management. U.S. Dept. of the Interior,
1849 C. Street, NW, Washington, DC.