South Park Historic District (Boundary Increase)

This boundary increase extends the South Park neighborhood in Dayton, Ohio, across about 31 acres of narrow lots and shallow setbacks. It takes in eight residential blocks and two commercial blocks along Wayne Avenue. The streets are lined with repeated house types: two-story gable-front houses, one-and-a-half-story L or T cottages, and narrow shotgun houses, along with brick duplexes and apartment buildings. Decorative detail drawn from Gothic Revival, Italianate, Queen Anne and Eastlake styles gives these vernacular forms a Folk Victorian character. Small shops, often with the shopkeeper's family living upstairs or behind, stood at key corners. The area is tied to John H. Patterson, head of the National Cash Register Company, who rebuilt the neighborhood around his factory between 1885 and 1920, with cleanup, gardening programs and improved streets. Most of his designed landscapes have vanished, but the neighborhood itself remains. Later infill and garages are the main noncontributing elements.