W17 House
By Beth S. Buxbaum
Imagine living in what was a girl’s finishing school in Newtown Borough in the mid 1800’s. The Ann Buckman School was believed to have been built 1835 and is still standing today on a private residential street on Newtown’s south side. After its short history as a boarding school, the house was converted into a private dwelling in 1854.
Today it is home to the Waitkus Family, Karen, Jim and their two teenage sons, Luke and Ian. No strangers to the Newtown Borough, Karen and Jim lived in three nearby properties before purchasing this home in May of 2013. They met at Penn State, both were in the landscape architecture program. After experiencing a semester abroad in Italy in 1990, Karen and Jim were an item. Karen grew up in West Chester and Jim is from Doylestown. They were married in 1996 and began looking for a place to live.
“We knew we wanted to live in a quaint, walkable town,” Karen explains. With their jobs in separate directions they knew they needed to find a town in the middle. “We decided to look at Newtown and fell in love with Court Street,” Karen adds, “and rented the first floor of an old Victorian in the borough.” From that rental they bought a twin right behind the Victorian and then they moved two blocks down and bought their first single home where they lived for nine years.
Even though they were not in the market to move, Karen had noticed that this 1835 historic house was for sale. They were intrigued with its history and potential, especially with the amount of land around the property. “As a corner lot, there was more privacy and more space with potential to landscape,” Karen continues, “which is a rarity to find in the Borough.” She talks about how the house was on the market for almost two years and the price kept dropping and it went into a short sale. “We made an offer and after some time dealing with the bank, we finalized the deal,” she adds. As the newest owners of a slice of Newtown history, Karen and Jim are enjoying all the details about the house’s past, especially the fact that it was a girl’s boarding school.
Newtown Borough is home to a variety of historic buildings and residences, including their 1835 historically-significant home. The residence was built by a prominent local educator, Ann Buckman, on land she purchased for a girl’s private boarding school. Buckman wanted to provide a better education to girls, something she felt was lacking. The original vernacular Federal house was built from local fieldstone. Described as a basic Pennsylvania farmhouse, the structure was designed as one pile (room) deep. Accounts from the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission indicate that this five-bay house has had two additions to the main stone house, a weather board addition built c. 1880; which is now the kitchen and a third section is a modern weatherboard addition believed to have been constructed in 1976, which is an eating nook and family room. Mention is made of the interior’s asymmetry with the parlor in one (bay) section and an adjacent space (which is now the living room) is speculated to have been the original classroom. The principal entranceway was between the two large rooms. In addition to documentation about the house, they found information about the property.
From a borough map of 1893, referenced in historical documents, there was an open meadow believed to have been a public pasture for horses and other animals. The original brick sidewalk along the street is said to be one of the first sidewalks in Newtown Borough. Accounts note that it was constructed to keep the boarding school girls’ dresses clean, because the streets at that time were dirt. Karen also pointed out that their street served as a trolley line for the Bucks County Interurban Railway of 1913, which ran from Doylestown to Bristol. Another historical fact stated in an old issue of the Bucks County Intelligencer, from March of 1935, is that tuition was $23 per quarter, payable in advance. Buckman died soon after opening the school in 1839 and it was run as a boarding school by several other owners until 1854 when it became a private residence.
In May 2013 it became the news residence of the Waitkus family. With all living space as is, Karen and Jim and their two sons began their next adventure in this historically documented property. As they began to explore the property they found several interesting things from the house’s past, like a summer kitchen and a cistern. Aside from the discoveries of the past, they have also enjoyed making the house theirs and taking it into the present. You would think that a house of this age would need a lot of attention.
“The house had good bones,” says Karen, “and most of what we did initially was cosmetic. Every wall had wallpaper and stencils in a country style. We stripped all the wall paper and repainted.” All the wood trim was a dark brown. To lighten up the space they repainted all the trim white. In addition to giving the walls and trim a facelift, they also refinished all the pumpkin pine hardwood floors, which are not original to the property but recorded as wood floors from a razed building in town that was the headquarters of General George Washington. Nothing structural was tackled until they renovated the kitchen in 2014. “We like projects. In our last house we did a lot of renovations, like turning the barn into our office,” Jim explains,” and with our design sense we can visualize how we want a space to function.”
When it was time to renovate the kitchen they worked with local contractor James River Carpentry to do the renovation. Jim describes the original 1976 addition as a galley kitchen. The entrance to the kitchen was the original 1830s stone wall before the 1976 addition. A few original elements were maintained, including the Australian Cypress floors and a tiny section of the stone wall where a niche was created for a small desk area. There was a three-quarter wall with an opening to the eat-in area. “We took out the wall and added a square center island topped with Bucks County soapstone,” continues Jim. He explains how this counter top was designed with irregular edges, a Franklin edge, to make it look like it is old and worn. Custom cabinetry and storage was designed by Jeff Hogge of James River. Once the kitchen was expanded and redone, the 1976 addition was recreated as the family room and eating area.
Once they completed the kitchen renovation they turned to their outside living space. After redesigning and adding to the landscape, their next project was the area on the side of the house.
With the newfound exterior space, they were delighted to do what they do best, and transformed their small patch into an outdoor gathering and entertaining space. They designed and built a natural stone seating walls, grill enclosure and wood burning fireplace to create a cozy outdoor room to be used year-round. “The prior owner had beautiful gardens that we added to gradually,” Karen adds. Especially the area around the barn which is just steps below the side of the house. Karen and Jim transformed the space into a mix of gardens, walkways and stone walls as borders.
Presently they are tackling the original barn that was badly burned in a fire 45 years ago and it was never addressed. Records indicate that this two-and-a half-story, three-bay barn was originally the town barn used for a garage and storage by the town, housing horses and carriages. They believe that, at the time that the school functioned, the barn housed the carriages that transported the girls living at the school back and forth from town. Karen points out that the middle door of the barn lines up with the curb cut on the street. “I think it was a drop off point when bringing the girls back to school by carriage, which was then parked in the barn,” she adds.
The barn is of post and beam construction and the beams have rotted out. “The entire back of the barn was charred and ready to collapse,” Jim adds. “We gutted the interior to where it was structurally sound and kept the exterior wood, a stipulation of the historic society of Newtown Borough. “We re-did all the windows and doors so the building would not fall down,” Jim explains. The next phase is to rebuild the interior space.
Taking a break during the winter months for the holidays, they are getting the house ready for their fifth Christmas here. Last year they were on the Newtown Holiday House Tour. This year, just as last, the house is decorated for the holidays. One special element of their decorating are the hand-carved Santa ornaments made my Karen’s dad. “Every year he carves a new ornament to add to our displays,” she adds. For embellishment, Karen artistically accents the house with most organic, native plant materials. Karen collects berries, sprigs of pine and boxwood, winterberry holly, osage oranges, birch braches, viburnum, American holly, straw, pine cones and magnolia leaves. “I went around town and took cuttings from neighbors,” Karen adds. Decorations are a reflection of who they are and what they are all about. “We use all natural materials because we are all natural, outdoor people,” says Karen. Karen and Jim are also successful landscape architects.
Creating spaces outdoors is an art and a passion that they share and have built their careers on. Karen previously worked for an urban planner and also for an architectural firm that specialized in designing pharmaceutical headquarters and larger development projects. Jim worked for 12 years designing and building golf courses throughout the northeast prior to joining forces to work together. Karen and Jim started Waitkus Designs in 2005. This business has grown and has allowed them the comfortable lifestyle they share with their friends and family. “It’s a very happy house,” Karen smiles. They feel they have the best of both worlds. “We feel like we are in the country but can walk to town to shop,” she continues. Karen and Jim love the privacy of their back porch and enjoy sitting on their front porch watching the world go by. “We love it here,” she says, “and we enjoy living in a piece of Newtown history.”
Beth S. Buxbaum is a freelance writer from the Philadelphia area.