2915 Kershaw Street

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The Basics

Many houses in Melrose Heights—bungalows, cottages, and four squares—reflect an eclectic style, the result of a designer's combination of building styles. Built in 1928 by local real estate developer C.A. Edwards, 2915 Kershaw Street melds elements of Old-World construction aesthetics with an early 20th-century building form.

What the Records Tell Us

Recounting a property’s past can take many forms, from oral histories passed down from generation to generation to newspaper stories and advertisements to municipal records and occupant listings in city directories. Then, there is the building itself, in which physical evidence reveals change over time, due to everything from changes in aesthetic taste, to embracing new technologies, or responding to the growth of families or changes in financial fortune.

Prior to Heather Preston buying this residence on September 5, 2020, other owners who called this address home were:

Blanche Richey (2004)
Kirkman Finlay III (1994) - state senator & son of Columbia mayor, “Kirk” Finlay, Jr.
Leslie Arlen Cotter Jr (1987)
Jenifer Brazil (1978)
Doris Simpson (1965)
Raymond Kennedy (1970)
Lena Kline (1965)
Philip Kline (1939)

Local newspapers provide a handful of interesting facts:

Lena Kline was the victim of a wave of theft in the area between March and September 1947, during which time she reported the loss of a ladies’ platinum wristwatch with diamonds ($450 value) and women’s clothing ($135.90).
The general manager with WOIC Radio, Douglas W. Craig, died while residing here at 38 years of age in 1980.
An addition was permitted to it by St. John Whitfield Builders for $35,102 as of June 21, 1990.

Architecturally Speaking

This 1.5-story residence embodies the tenets of the bungalow movement, which enjoyed a national following from the 1910s through 1930s. Like many neighborhood houses, this charming residence features an exterior clad in red wire-cut, or striated, brick—most likely sourced from the Guignard brick works in Cayce. The house’s partial-width hipped roof covers its deep front porch, which is enhanced by two square brick columns, a brick balustrade, arched stucco detailing, and a truncated pier—ideal for a flowerpot or seasonal decorations. Evoking a Tudor feel, the façade’s gable embellishments include vertical half-timbering, stucco, and heavy braces. This Old-World appearance is repeated on the other elevations resulting in a visual gravitas that sets this house apart from neighboring buildings.

Architectural details that this home shares with others in the historic district include windows that are comprised of a multiple-paned upper sash (in this case, four vertical lights) situated above a sash featuring a large, single pane. (Thus, such a window be called a “four-over-one.”) A tripartite-grouped window—comprised of a four-over-one window flanked by three-over-one light windows—visually ties the interior to the porch, whose other primary design element is an entry doorway consisting of an original three-light/one-panel door with eight-paned sidelights. Other details to note are the beadboard decking that adds further visual interest soffits, which are emphasized through the decorative braces and dentil molding, on the east, or front, elevation.

Historic Visual Reference

Insurance man and real estate developer, C.A. Edwards, who had 2915 Kershaw built, also oversaw the construction of other houses in Melrose Heights, including 3015 Kershaw Street, a $4,000, six-room, brick veneer residence that was later replaced with a ranch-style house in 1963.

Classified advertisement, The State, February 3, 1929.