West 21st Street Historic District

Built between 1857 and 1939 along West 21st Street in south Erie, the district contains thirty-five buildings, mostly brick in the 100 block and frame Victorian houses in the 200 block. Its architecture includes Italianate, Queen Anne, Romanesque, Victorian and Colonial Revival homes, reflecting the tastes of middle and upper class residents. The oldest building, the Italianate residence at 125 West 21st Street, was built in 1857 for Heman Janes, co-founder of Standard Oil. Henry Shenk, a prominent contractor, built a Romanesque Revival stone residence at the corner of Sassafras Street in 1882. The district is regarded as the best preserved concentration of middle and upper class housing of this period on the south side of Erie. Its homes were built on large lots and illustrate the growth of South Erie after it was annexed to Erie in 1873 and the railway opened in 1870.