South Sandusky Avenue Historic District

South Sandusky Avenue in Upper Sandusky is lined with substantial nineteenth-century houses on wide, tree-shaded lots. The district covers about 20 acres along a one-block stretch and mixes brick and wood frame buildings built between the 1850s and about 1930. Italianate houses predominate, including the 1867 house at 486, called the best Italianate example in the city. The house at 449, built about 1854, is described as the only Italian Villa in Upper Sandusky. Others include a Second Empire house of 1875, a Queen Anne house with towers from about 1890, and a Georgian Revival house from about 1930. The district matters both for this concentration of architecture and for its residents. Many homes were built for bankers, merchants, a hardware dealer, a drug store operator and a mayor, and the grand houses reflect the wealth those men accumulated. Housing outside the boundaries is smaller in scale or newer and less important.