Historic Nomination Report of the Roy and Alice Lichty House 4386 North Talmadge Drive Kensington Community ~ San Diego, California Ronald V. May, RPA Kiley Wallace Legacy 106, Inc. P.O. Box 15967 San Diego, CA 92175 (858) 459-0326 (760) 704-7373 www.legacy106.com October 2019 HISTORIC HOUSE RESEARCH Ronald V. May, RPA, President and Principal Investigator Kiley Wallace, Vice President and Architectural Historian P.O. Box 15967 • San Diego, CA 92175 Phone (858) 459-0326 • (760) 704-7373 http://www.legacy106.com x Attachment G – documentation developed October 2020 regarding staff involvement and concerns State of California – The Resources Agency Primary # DEPARTMENT OF PARKS AND RECREATION HRI # PRIMARY RECORD Trinomial NRHP Status Code 3S Other Listings Review Code Reviewer Date Page 3 of 36 *Resource Name or #: The Roy and Alice Lichty House P1. Other Identifier: 4386 North Talmadge Drive, San Diego, CA 92116 *P2. Location: Not for Publication Unrestricted *a. County: San Diego and (P2b and P2c or P2d. Attach a Location Map as necessary.) *b. USGS 7.5' Quad: La Mesa Date: 2015 T ; R ; ¼ of ¼ of Sec ; M.D. B.M. c. Address: 4386 North Talmadge Drive City: San Diego Zip: 92116 d. UTM: Zone: 11 ; mE/ mN (G.P.S.) e. Other Locational Data: (e.g., parcel #, directions to resource, elevation, etc.) Elevation: 380 feet Legal Description: Lot 51 of Talmadge Park, in the City of San Diego, County of San Diego, State of California, according to Map thereof No. 1869, filed in the Office of the County Recorder of San Diego County, December 3, 1926. It is Tax Assessor’s Parcel (APN) # 465-332-09-00. *P3a. Description: (Describe resource and its major elements. Include design, materials, condition, alterations, size, setting, and boundaries.) This house is an excellent example of the Spanish Eclectic style built in 1927, which served as the Talmadge Park model home from 1927 to 1931. It is located in the historic Kensington neighborhood of San Diego. The home is positioned on a steeply down sloping lot with sloping and terraced entryway walk that sits below the sidewalk grade and the Northeast elevation is completed outside the public view. The public view of the house is down a steep slope from the sidewalk and utilizes a prominent tile-topped tower entryway, and house displays a low pitched red tile roof. The public view is the west (front) elevation, which is set lower than the sidewalk entry and faces uphill towards North Talmadge Drive. The visible front exhibits the tile-topped tower entry, tile-topped chimney, metal grill over windows and French door that is about six feel lower in elevation that the sidewalk entry (See Continuation Sheet.) *P3b. Resource Attributes: (List attributes and codes) (HP2) Single family property *P4. Resources Present: Building Structure Object Site District Element of District P5b. Description of Photo: (View, date, accession #) View of southwest (front) elevation. Photo by Dan Soderberg, May 2019. *P6. Date Constructed/Age and Sources: Historic Prehistoric Both Notice of Completion, January 7, 1927. Tax Assessor’s Residential Building Record, 1927. Index to Property (Lot Book), 1927. No original water or sewer records were found, as is common for early Kensington houses. San Diego Evening Tribune article / photos, January 1927. San Diego Evening Tribune article / photos, Feb. 1927. San Diego Union article / photos, January 1928. *P7. Owner and Address: Michael S. Talbott and Alina R. Talbott 4386 North Talmadge Drive San Diego, CA 92116 *P8. Recorded by: (Name, affiliation, and address) Ronald V. May, RPA and Kiley Wallace, Legacy 106, Inc., P.O. Box 15967, San Diego, CA 92175 *P9. Date Recorded: October 2019 (revised October 2020 by Ronald V. May, RPA) *P10. Survey Type: (Describe) Intensive *P11. Report Citation: (Cite survey report and other sources, or enter "none.") Historical Nomination of the Roy and Alice Lichty House, San Diego, California, for the City of San Diego Historical Resources Board, by Ronald V. May, RPA and Kiley Wallace, Legacy 106, Inc., October 2019. Legacy 106, Inc. is indebted to Alexandra Wallace for extensive research, and other assistance with the preparation of this report. *Attachments: NONE Location Map Sketch Map Continuation Sheet Building, Structure, and Object Record Archaeological Record District Record Linear Feature Record Milling Station Record Rock Art Record Artifact Record Photograph Record Other (List): DPR 523A *Required Information State of California The Resources Agency Primary # DEPARTMENT OF PARKS AND RECREATION HRI# CONTINUATION SHEET Trinomial Page 4 of 36 *Resource Name or #: The Roy and Alice Lichty House *Recorded by: Ronald V. May, RPA and Kiley Wallace *Date: October 2019 Continuation Update *P3a. Description: (Describe resource and its major elements. Include design, materials, condition, alterations, size, setting, and boundaries) (Continued): (See Attachment D, Photographs) The subject property at 4386 North Talmadge Drive is a Spanish Eclectic style home with an asymmetrical façade and a compound irregular floor plan. The front façade features two main dominant entryway features. The first feature is the large rounded tower entryway with upper dovecote and arched entryway door. The second is the large elaborated end chimney front the house near the front entryway. This mixture of roof types and varying roof heights along with the home's complex irregular form present an image of a small compact village, breaking up the massing of this single family residence. The house has irregularly laid, two-layers of fired clay Mission half barrel tile roof with cement mortar in the style of old Spanish architecture. The side gabled front façade features an attached double garage. The home design included the integrated garage with a wide overhanging Mission half barrel tile shed roof that once extended over lathe-turned vertical spindles that are now sealed with stucco. The house has a low pitched fired tile roof with minimal eave overhang and decorative end rafter tails on the eave ends below the eave roofline. The home features sandy stucco wall surfacing on all elevations. The main house front wall is slightly stepped back from the protruding front garage wing. The house exhibits the architecturally defining features of the Spanish Eclectic or "California Style" home, as local architect Richard Requa referred to it. These include the asymmetrical façade, low pitched red tile roof, eaves with shallow overhangs, stucco surfacing, and arches on principle doorways. The home also exhibits some interesting features of the style including its use of a large entry tower. The original design set the house about six feet lower than the sidewalk, which was connected by steep a sloped saltillo tile walkway .This steep slope design ensures privacy. The front door is brown and the windows are light green painted wood unless otherwise noted. The public view of the house has retained excellent architectural integrity. The Northeast rear and Southeast are outside the public view and exhibit some changes that will be described in a later section of this report. This Spanish Eclectic, also known as the Spanish Colonial Revival style first appeared with the creation of the California pavilion and other buildings for the 1915-1916 Panama California exposition in San Diego, which master architect Bertram Goodhue introduced. However, other than a few Mission Revival influenced Craftsman houses, the Spanish style did not dominate San Diego communities until after Goodhue designed and the federal government completed the Marine Corps Recruit Depot in 1922 and Naval Training Center in 1923. The style assumed greatest popularity in Kensington and Talmadge after 1925 and retained the primary design until the Great Depression impacted the real estate market in 1931. West (Front and Public View) Elevation – As noted, the house was designed to be sunken at least six feet beneath the sidewalk and N. Talmadge Drive street elevation. This provided privacy. Visible from the street are two different separate chimney tops, a circular dovecote over the large tower circular entryway, all rising above the house and garage. From left to right these three vertical extensions are each described separately. First on the left, a wonderfully detailed stucco chimney tops the left side of the garage with an arched and stepped cap and side opening arching flues. The chimney also cantilevers out slightly with a multi-step series of corbels supporting the chimney from the wall. This detailed and stucco surfaced chimney creates a convincing illusion, as this left chimney is in fact a faux or false chimney, helping to balance the front façade and integrating the garage into the overall design of the house. The interior of the chimney is positioned to the rear the garage interior and rises above the red clay tile covered shed roof fronting the garage. The roof displays deliberately irregular clay tile with mission clay roof tiles overlapping the side ends. This left shed style roof fronting the garage has fired Mission half barrel tiles in a rustic hand laid pattern with short rafter tails below the eave end matching the rest of the home. The garage tile shed roof extends out on the left creating an L shaped front with an inset courtyard terraced entryway area connecting to the circular entrance tower area. The front façade is dominated by the circular entry pavilion at the center, this circular tower is topped by a conical roof and small decorative circular false dovecote. This tiny circular dovecote utilizes round clay tile openings around all sides and displays a miniature conical roof above. State of California The Resources Agency Primary # DEPARTMENT OF PARKS AND RECREATION HRI# CONTINUATION SHEET Trinomial Page 5 of 36 *Resource Name or #: The Roy and Alice Lichty House *Recorded by: Ronald V. May, RPA and Kiley Wallace *Date: October 2019 Continuation Update *P3a. Description(continued): History of the Dovecotes in Architecture.