Just the way it was

Original elements remain in this 1914 Prairie-influenced house: handsome wood and leaded windows, the brick fire-place, wainscot and trim, and even kitchen cabinets. Deftly added upgrades in period mode enhance the exemplary restoration.

- PATRICIA POORE

Sarah Brew discovered the house when she attended an estate sale there. “It was a time capsule, I fell in love with it,” she says. She is only its second owner, though the chain of residency is more complicated.

The house was built by Hal Paris, a son of the family who owned the Paris Candy Company in Minneapolis. He, his wife, Mary, and his young son, Lee, moved in in 1914. In 1928, young Ida arrived from Mora, Minnesota, to serve as their latest live-in maid. Mary died of “apoplexy” (likely a stroke) in 1936. Ida stayed on... but when Lee left to serve in World War II, the neighbors began to talk. So Hal and Ida got married. Hal died around 1956. “I bought the house in 1997 from Ida, who was 95 years old,” says Sarah.