Walter Franklin Mills House

Walter Franklin Mills House was built by Mr. Mathias Meyers, the same person who built the Jeanmard House next door. This house was designed in accordance with the progressive style of the times, the American Foursquare, which is part of the American Arts and Crafts Movement. While many homes built in Lafayette in the late nineteenth century were designed in the Victorian style, which made use of ornamentation to achieve a picturesque look, a more “honest” architecture that included cleaner lines emerged as the more progressive style in Lafayette by the early twentieth century.
This property is located in Hopkins Addition, developed in 1903 as an extension of Lafayette’s first upscale residential subdivision, Mills Addition. Among the numerous early owners of this property, Walter Franklin Mills is the one who would have been most remembered as being associated with this house. He was a former railroad worker who lived in the house for many years. He operated a mechanical repair shop in the rear of the property. Thanks to the care over the last several decades by current owners, Ken and Andrea Veron, and previous owner, Peter Scalisi, the house remains in beautiful condition.