The home of Robert and Margaret Dull at 531 First Ave. S.E. in Le Mars is one of four on the Tour of Historic Homes sponsored by the Le Mars Historic Preservation Commission this Saturday. Tour hours are 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. [Click to enlarge]

This year's annual Tour of Historic Homes, sponsored by the Le Mars Historic Preservation Commission, features four homes bordering the Foster Park Historic District.

The area was recently nominated to the National Register of Historic Places. The tour will be held from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday, May 10, and start from the Le Mars Arts Center, 200 Central Ave. S.E. where tickets may be purchased.

The newest home on the tour is that of Robert and Margaret Dull, at 531 First Ave. S.E.

The elegant two story brick home was designed by by Des Moines architect Phil L. Boyle for Stanley and Grace Post in 1951, and is considered to be an example of a French Eclectic residential design that was built after World War II. Building supplies were provided by Moore Lumber Co., of which Mr. Poster was part-owner.

The house has a L-shaped plan with a low-pitched hipped roof, using gabled wall dormers on the front facades and hipped wall dormers on the rear slopes. The house has matching red brick walls and foundation with coursed ashlar limestone on the circular turret at the inner corner of the L-plan. Decorative brick pattern work along the shallow eaves of the house and turret include a corbelled header course.

A curved walkway welcomes you into the home with a smaller sidewalk leading toward the back door.

Guests enter the house into a large foyer, where a stone entrance floor protects the oak flooring found throughout the remainder of the house.

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The massive living room lends itself well to entertaining because of a center hall. Nearly all of the ceilings in the home exhibit this wide birch coving. When the Dulls replaced the earlier Pella windows with new Pella windows, they removed all of the window sash and refinished them before re-installing.

A walnut chest with burled walnut inserts and unique pulls is from the old First National Bank. Each drawer is individually indexed with its contents in this Amber's Patent Cabinet Letter File. One date found is 1895. Burton Dull used it in his Dull Law Office.

In the library/den, coved ceilings tie the wood bookshelves with the entire room to the closet. Near the door is an early intercom which is connected to all bedrooms. Original blueprints will be on display here.

The winding staircase is entirely enclosed within the turret. The wrought-iron rail curves up the steps, with two differently designed balusters alternately spaced on each of the curved steps. All of the light fixtures in the upstairs are original.

The two roomy bedrooms to the south housed the two Post daughters. Both rooms have wonderful views of the park. The steamer trunk came from Italy to the U.S. with Marge's grandmother, Mary Falcone.

The turret dressing room is every woman's dream. A myriad of drawers and doors organize accoutrements every woman needs.

Windows on three sides of the master bedroom offer not only great ventilation, but also views over four streets. The closet doors were replaced as in the dressing room; note the intercom over the bed. The rug is vintage, but not antique. The side tables are from the 40s, matching the set from the foyer.

The dining room offers a chair-rail as well as two built-in corner hutches on both sides of a former door leading to the screened-in porch, now converted to a low window.

The kitchen has been completely remodeled twice. These cupboards have been reconfigured from the 1970s remodel. Using a 50s theme, the Dulls installed the black and white tile floor and rechromed the stools, which came from the Rogers Drug Store downtown. The wall to the mudroom was removed, and they rearranged the layout of the kitchen.

Guests going downstairs to the basement will use the new stair rail tooled by Roger Pitts. A peek into the large laundry/storage room will find recycle bins from the former mud room upstairs. Perhaps the Posts were ahead of their time with their enclosed, roll-out galvanized recycling tubs.

Depending on a new tenant's schedule, tour giets may visit the upstairs apartment over the garage. The Posts lived in this apartment for two years, while Stanley was overseeing the building of the house. Hardwood floors exist throughout the apartment; as do unusual three-paneled doors and typical arched open doorways. The living area looks over the park; one can enjoy the concerts without leaving home. Two small bedrooms (each boasting two closets), a telephone niche, and a remodeled bath complete the private area of the apartment. The kitchen has been recently updated with new flooring and sink. The cupboards may be original.

This property was laid out as part of block 69 of Le Mars Third Addition to the Original Town of Le Mars in 1881 by the Iowa Railroad Land Company. In 1881, all of Block 69 was sold to T. L Bowman, who worked as the general agent for the Iowa RR Land Co. He built a house at the center of the block and resided here in 1882. In 1894, Bowman sold the entire block to Frank W. Burns, general manager and corporate secretary for the Plymouth Roller Mills Co, reportedly the largest flour mill in Iowa by 1900. The Burns family resided in the original house (Mrs Burns was a daughter of Benjamin Foster!). When Burns died in 1898, the block was subdivided into 10 individual lots by the Plymouth Roller Mills Co. The house was divided into halves and placed on the Southwest Central side. The east side of this block was the last to be developed. About the same time, the four Foster children gave the block to the south to the city for use as a park.

In 1907 this lot was transferred to Maude and George Cunningham, a dentist. They built a four-square home sometime between 1907 and 1913 with foreclosures in 1932. The sheriff's sale resulted in no bids. Stanley Post and his wife, Grace, moved to Le Mars in 1939 when Stan joined his father, Frank Post, in operation of the family business, Spotts and Post Drug Store, and the Moore Lumber Company, his mother's family business. The Post family bought and resided in a house two doors up the street at 515 First Ave. S.E. beginning in 1941.

After buying this prominent corner lot, the Posts had the Cunningham House moved from the site in 1949 to a vacant parcel three blocks away at 731 Second Ave. S.E. Post commissioned a design for a new house. It was completed in 1951. In 1958, Stan, who was trained as an electrical engineer, took over sole operation of Moore Lumber Co., which dated its operations back to 1877. The firm had yards scattered throughout Northwest Iowa and South Dakota. After the demise of Grace and Stanley, the home was sold in 2003 to current owners, Robert and Margaret Dull. Robert is a Plymouth County Judge and Margaret owns ABC Travel in Le Mars and Sioux City.