At its regular quarterly meeting, Dec. 1, the Kansas Historic Sites Board of Review recommended the addition of three Wichita listings to the National Register of Historic Places. If accepted, the properties will be included on the National Register.

North Topeka Avenue Apartments Historic District: Built within a span of four years, from 1926 to 1929, this cluster of four apartment buildings at 625, 630, 631 and 632 N. Topeka Avenue share common features of design and construction.

The buildings are being nominated to the National Register for their architectural significance and for their reflection of popular trends in multi-family housing seen in Wichita and nationwide during this period.

All are rectangular in plan and two or three stories in height with brick-clad exteriors and flat roofs with modest parapets. While the buildings illustrate vernacular interpretations of Colonial Revival, Craftsman, Tudor Revival and Art Deco architecture applied to multi-family buildings, their form and materials also share many traits with Tapestry Brick commercial blocks constructed during the 1920s.

One of the buildings is a stacked flats apartment building with a single residence on each floor. The other three buildings are conventional low-rise apartment buildings that house between 15 and 24 residential units organized around a double-loaded corridor. The vaguely commercial-style brick facades and their uniform setback from the street distinguish them from the single family homes that dominate the blocks in the immediate vicinity.

From the late 1920s, when these buildings were constructed, through the start of World War II, the apartments housed a mix of single men, single women, and married couples who worked a variety of jobs.

Ablah House: The Streamline Moderne-style double residence located at 102-104 Pinecrest Avenue is being nominated to the National Register for its unique architectural design and for its association with a prominent Wichita family, the Ablahs.

As young boys, Lebanese brothers Fauzie (Frank) and Hafiz (Harvey) Ablah immigrated to the United States by way of Canada in 1907 with their parents and siblings.

The family first located on the west side of Wichita among other Lebanese immigrant families. Their father Jabbour worked as a peddler, as did many of the approximately 30 Middle Eastern immigrant families in Wichita. Gradually, many of them developed storefront retail businesses.

In 1911, Jabbour broke from the tradition of clustered ethnic settlement and moved his family east across the Arkansas River to open Ablah Dry Goods, Clothing and Fancy Work on East Douglas Avenue. This move marked the beginning of a 60-year family business that Frank and Harvey would carry on and that would have a significant effect on Wichita.

Having experienced financial success and desiring a larger residence for their growing families, the brothers built the unique double residence on Pinecrest Avenue. Although prevalent in commercial and public buildings, this style is uncommon in Wichita residential neighborhoods.

The flat-roofed dual residence is situated on a corner lot and is built in two intersecting units on a plan that is neither L- nor U-shaped. Smooth surfaces and horizontality typify the Streamline Moderne style. The Ablah residence achieves this in an unusual way in that the ground floor wall surface is variegated brick, but the upper façade is clad in metal sheeting and painted with silica-textured paint. The Ablah family owned this property until 1996.

Eagles Lodge #132: The Eagles Lodge #132 building, located at 200, 202 S. Emporia, has a rich social history associated with the Eagles fraternal organization and a long-time Wichita funerary business. It is being nominated for its social history and for its architectural significance as a good local example of the Beaux Arts style on an early twentieth century building.

The building was constructed in two phases, beginning in 1916. The first two-story section, built for a cost of $11,000, originally housed a grocery store and an Eagle’s fraternal lodge. At the time of its dedication on Nov. 29, 1916, the lodge consisted of a "large lodge room, a smoking room, a women’s restroom and a kitchen."

Historic research and use of space indicates that a 1921 addition, built of reinforced concrete with brick facing, was constructed for $19,550 with a new tenant in mind. The Flanagan-Bourman Funeral Home occupied the first floor of the addition, where they continued business until 1986.