Turner House

Description:	Drawing of the Turner House which stood at Center and Ohio streets and once housed the Young Mens Christian Association by Juliet A. Peddle, Terre Haute Artist and Architect. The Turner House, which stood at Center and Ohio streets and once housed the Young Mens Christian Association. Drawing by Juliet A. Peddle, Terre Haute Artist and Architect.The Turner house was located at Sixth and One-half and Ohio streets and was occupied by the Y. M. C. A. before it was taken down several years ago.This is a difficult house to name. It has had several owners who kept it long enough to have their names attached to it, but no one family lived here over a long period of time. It is said to have been built by Ezra Smith, the proprietor of a distillery and flourmill. Mr. Smith purchased the property about 1845 and the map of 1854 shows a house marked Smith at this location then. I have not been able to place the date of construction closer than this period between 1845 and 1854 except that if it was originally built as it appears in later years (illustrated above) it was probably built only a short time before 1854 as the style is not as characteristic of the forties as the fifties and sixties. Mr. Smiths occupancy seems to have been marked by only one event that has come down to us, and that was a very grand party which he gave which was a fiasco, and his disappearance following the party.In 1861, Mr. Elisha M. Huntington, a prominent lawyer in Terre Haute, bought the property from the widow, Hannah Smith, and lived there about a year. He sold to James H. Turner in 1862.Mr. Turner was the first to live here any length of time about whom much information is available so I have called it the Turner house.Mr. Turner came to Terre Haute from Fleming County, Kentucky, where he was born in 1818. When he first came in 1836 he worked for Jacob Early several years, later going into the grocery business for himself. He married Miranda McDonald. They had a large family of children, a number of whose descendants are still identified with Terre Haute. Miss Rose Farrington, whose mother was Mary Turner, tells me her mother was married while they lived at this house and the reception was held here. Mrs. Turner died while the family lived here and some years later Mr. Turner married Jeannie Collett. He sold the house in 1869 to Owen Fuller. Mr. Fuller is given in the directories as a mail contractor and stage contractor. He lived in the house until his death about 1877. His son, Owen Jr., inherited the property and held it until 1881 at which time it was purchased by J. S. Beach.The house must have been rented during this period for it was about this time that the Genis family from Belgium lived here. Louis Genis had been sent over here by a Belgium bank to look after certain railroad interests they held here. He came about 1875 and stayed close to ten years. During the latter part of their stay in Terre Haute they lived in this house. Those who remember their sojourn here tell of their being a charming and hospitable family whose foreign ways were the delight of the townspeople who were not in the habit of having distinguished foreigners in their midst.In 1891 Mr. Beach sold the house to the Terre Haute club for a clubhouse. This was an exclusive private club of the sort that is more often found in larger cities. The house was appropriately furnished and served excellent meals. I am told it was a real treat to receive an invitation to go there.The above picture was made from a photograph taken in 1931 not long before the house was taken down. It was in bad repair at this time and I am sure that some of the details of the original house are missing. In studying the photograph to make the drawing, it seems to me that the stone work on the front-the window treatment and the entrance porch-are definitely later in character than the details shown on the side windows and are rather French in style. This leads me to wonder whether the Genis family may not have been responsible for the changes. It is unusual for either tenants or landlords to go into extensive remodeling of this kind, but it is by no means impossible.The Y. M. C. A. bought the house in 1902 and it served as a clubhouse and residence until it was outgrown. A new building at Sixth and Walnut streets houses the Y now and the old house was finally torn down, the last survivor of the group of handsome houses which stood on Ohio street between Sixth and Seventh streets.
Origin:	01/01/2005
Contributor(s):	Peddle, Juliet, 1899-1979
Source:	http://indianamemory.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/ref/collection/rose/id/849
Collection:	Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology Logan Library
Rights:	http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/UND/1.0/
Copyright:	Copyright Undetermined
Subjects:	Architectural drawings Architecture Houses Young Mens Christian associations Turner, James H., b. 1818 Architecture Domestic Life Social Life

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