By Linda Lovas Hoeschler-Blyberg, February 2025

We Purchase 1630 Edgcumbe Road, June 1, 1973

Intro: We Move to St Paul in 1968

On December 17, 1968, Jack, I and 2 ½ month-old Kristen Bowe Hoeschler moved from Chicago to St. Paul (1). In early November Jack had started working at Doherty, Rumble and Butler, Minnesota’s oldest law firm, based in the Capital city. While Linda nursed the babe in La Crosse, WI, Jack, his father, Jake, and Uncle Bob Hoeschler made a foray to St Paul and placed a tentative offer on a two-bedroom-rambler at 1793 Yorkshire Avenue in the Highland Park section of the City. I, Linda, who had only visited the Twin Cities in the summer, was only marginally involved in this “fait accompli”. Jack and I made a day trip to St Paul where we viewed the few suitable offerings in our price range with a Jambor realtor; I felt a home on Summit Avenue was more to my taste! Under pressure and needing to move soon, I agreed when Jack promised it would only be for a couple of years before we moved to a “better” home.

1793 Yorkshire turned out to be a terrific starter home: well-built by a contractor for his daughter, nestled among older folks who embraced and watched out for us kids, plus lots of reliable sitters, particularly Janet and Deanne Becker. We expanded the partially finished basement by adding a sleeping area and tidy bathroom to better provide for our ongoing guests—a theme of our lives! The most consistent guest was Manny Elson, our Chicago landlord who became our kids’ adopted grandfather; he visited at least four-times a year and joined us on many foreign and domestic trips.

In 1972 Jack was invited by senior partner, Andrew Scott, to open a Minneapolis office of DR & B in the stunning new IDS building (designed by Philip Johnson). After Fritz’ birth in May 1971 we had begun looking for a bigger home in St. Paul, but with Jack’s move we shifted our focus to Minneapolis. Due to the energy crisis and high interest rates, large homes, such as those on Lake of the Isles, were less desirable: most were listed for about $65,000—high in our range but doable. In the summer of 1972, we made a $37,500 bid for a gracious house on Logan Avenue, overlooking Kenwood Park and Lake of the Isles. We were excited and asked Jack’s father to come look at it. Jake drove up and declared to us, the realtor and owners that it was “nothing more than a pigeon coop” when he found extensive dry rot in the roof’s overhanging eaves!

Each weekend we pulled out the real estate section of the Sunday paper and, while still in bed (often with the kidlets snuggled in) we circled possible house listings. We drove by various homes, toured some, but nothing matched our purse or eye.

Through a friend we learned of the sale of Dick Hammel’s own 1961 home at 1307 Chelmsford in the St Anthony neighborhood—a most desirable area of St Paul for us liberals, near the farm campus of the University of Minnesota(Dick was a founder of the locally-based national architectural firm of Hammel, Green and Abrahamson.) I believe we wanted to pay $55,000 but Dick wanted 5 or 10k more. Jack’s father again leaped into the fray, visited Dick in his hospital room where he was recovering from back surgery, and threatened to “jump on his back” if Dick didn’t meet OUR price! Dick was horrified and asked Jack to keep Jake away from him!

But the real discouragement of making a deal with Dick was that his ex-wife, Libby, (and the co-builder of the lovely home) lived next door—set back so that she could easily view all the rear glass-sliding-door-walled rooms of 1307. Evidently, the prior occupants of Libby’s current cottage felt sympathy for her after her divorce, and gave her their house. That was not the issue for us. One time I went to her home about 10 in the morning to borrow the key to 1307, and she offered me scotch on the rocks. As a naïve 28-year-old, and not wanting to hurt her feelings, I took the glass reluctantly. She then said: “Can’t you hardly wait to have your first drink of the day!”

I was shaken but made alert that this was NOT the situation for us to fall into: it was still her house and she would probably want to make herself too much a part of our lives. I told Jack there would be no deal here!

1630 Edgcumbe ID’d and Snagged

Late in the summer of 1972, Jack’s partner, Andy Scott, told us about the house next door to him, 1630 Edgcumbe, currently owned by Donald and Linda Butler (no relation to the Pierce Butler Jr. family whose estate had been partially subdivided to provide lots for this and several other homes. Donald Butler was retiring as head of the Religion Department at Macalaster College, and he and his spouse were moving back to Princeton, NJ where he had once taught.

We toured the compact open-plan 4-bedroom home designed by Ralph Rapson, a famous Minnesota architect. The home’s modest size (about 2000 square feet) appealed to us in a time of energy crisis and high heating costs. Moreover, although in the city, it was at the end of a private drive and its south border was a ravine with a picnic park on the other side. It felt like a country treehouse, with its floor-to-ceiling south facing windows, and glass openings on the east and west.

In early November we made an offer on the house to the Butlers, who would not negotiate a penny less than the asking price of $65,000, hard as Jack tried. They hoped to move out soon, but insisted they be able to stay until the end of May 1973 should they need the time. And they did.

Although the Butlers were polite, they would get quite nervous when we asked them anything about the house…or things they might leave when they moved (like plants). Don Butler would sit in a leather sling chair and begin to scratch the raw underside. I would contort my fact to get Jack to cease what he considered pleasant questions. We soon learned that Don and Linda had had nervous breakdowns after the suicide of their son, Peter, a Columbia student. We tried harder to be sensitive and thoughtful lest we cause them more distress.

We eventually recognized that Butlers would stay in the house until May 31. Eager but realistic, we put our Yorkshire home on the market mid-March, no broker needed since Jack was a real estate lawyer. We wrote and printed brochures citing the house’s details, then put an ad in the paper. We sold the home the second weekend for our full asking price (low to mid-30’s as I recall) to a wonderful family, Frank and Nell Hamburges, and their two daughters at home.

On May 31st we met with John Healy, Butlers’ lawyer at the Oppenheimer firm, closed on our new home, ready to take possession the next day. Learning that the Butlers had moved out on the 31st, Jack and I drove the mile and a half to our new abode. On the front walk was a clay flowerpot full of ice, a small bottle of champagne, and two straws—courtesy of Andy and Kathleen Scott. We walked through the empty house, sipping champagne and marveling at our good fortune. This would be our home for 52 years (49 years for Jack who died at Edgcumbe in 2022). But on May 31, 1973 we had no idea how much work the house needed and how many wonderful times we’d have in it!

1.        We had finished up an instructive but harrowing year+ in Chicago as Vista Volunteers. Linda and baby lived at Jack’s parents’ La Crosse, WI home from November-mid-December until our young family found a place to live.

2.        Jack and Linda had picked out two areas of St Paul to live in, based on looking at a Twin Cities map while still in Chicago: Highland Park and Macalaster-Groveland. Both sections were mid-way between St Paul and Minneapolis, close to the airport, and close to the colleges/U of MN where Linda hoped to teach after getting a PhD.