Henry Homelius had no formal education, but the man born in Buffalo in 1850 would be, by the late 19th Century, perhaps Batavia's foremost architect. Together, with his son, Frank Homelius, he would design some of Batavia's grandest homes and commercial buildings.
Bill Kauffman shared a little booklet with me the other day titled "Henry and Frank Homelius: The Men Who Built Batavia."
Late this afternoon, I drove around and snapped pictures of some of the homes they designed. In the course of doing so, I also came across a number of homes not included in the book that were equally as grand as those credited to the Homelius's. So maybe they didn't build Batavia single-handedly, but they sure did build some great homes.
They also built some of Batavia's great commercial buildings as well, such as: the Batavia Daily News building on Jackson Street; the Batavia Times building on Center (now Center Street Smoke House); the former State Police barracks (now home to the Batavia Police), and the old firehouse on Main Street.
Henry Homelius is responsible for several of the homes on Ellicott Avenue.
Start with Ellicott Avenue, after the jump below are the pictures I took of some of the homes designed by Henry (mostly) and Frank:
(Top photo above is 130 W. Main St., originally built for George D. Weaver in 1889)
7 Ellicott Ave.
8 Ellicott Ave.
16 Ellicott Ave.
24 Ellicott Ave.
32 Ellicott Ave.
33 Ellicott Ave.
39 Ellicott Ave.
41 Ellicott Ave.
52 Ellicott Ave.
57 Ellicott Ave.
23 Summit St.
151 Summit St.
111 Washington Ave.
145 State St.
35 Richmond Ave.
56 Redfield Parkway
2 North Ave.
39 Ross St.
308 E. Main St.
Beautiful money pits.
Beautiful money pits.
George took a tour of the
George took a tour of the Louvre recently. As he was leaving the museum, a reporter for La Monde asked about his experience: "...Close off a few of those wings and it'd be cheaper to heat...get rid of those paintings and statues- must be murder to dust all that stuff."