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Park City Museum’s Historic Home Tour is a trip into the past

The Park City Museum's annual Historic Home Tour is set for Saturday, June 23. The event, now in its 21st year, will feature eight homes located in the 8th Street to 10th Street block around Woodside Avenue and Park Avenue. Park City Museum Executive Director Sandra Morrison is grateful for homeowners who open their doors to the tour.
Courtesy of the Park City Historical Society

Park City Museum will host its annual Historic Home Tour from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. on Saturday, June 23. Tickets are $20 for the public and $15 for Park City Museum members. Tickets can be purchased in advance online at http://www.parkcityhistory.org or the day of the tour at the Town Lift Plaza, 825 Main St. Free parking will be available in the garage under the Town Lift. And there is free parking at China Bridge until 6 p.m.For information, visit http://www.parkcityhistory.org.

The Park City Historical Society invites the public to step back in time with the upcoming Historic Home Tour.

The event, now in its 21st year, will run from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. on Saturday, June 23. It will feature eight houses located in the 8th Street to 10th Street block around Woodside Avenue and Park Avenue, said Park City Museum Executive Director Sandra Morrison.

“Most of the homes on the tour were built in the 1800s,” she said. “These were typically built in the T/L cottage style that have gables over the door and porches.”



There are also two bungalows that are included on the tour, one built in 1916 and the other in 1926.

There is a small-home movement and the town’s Historic District has done more than its share to represent that…”Sandra Morrison,Park City Museumexecutive director

“There homes look very different from the T/L cottage style, because they came around when designs became more horizontal,” Morrison said. “These homes have low-angle roofs and long windows.”



The tour will start at a kiosk set up at the Town Lift Plaza bridge.

Park City Museum volunteers will sell tickets at the kiosk, but Morrison encourages tourists to purchase the tickets in advance online at http://www.parkcityhistory.org. Those tickets will be available for pickup at the kiosk on Saturday.

Tickets are $20 for the general public and $15 for Park City Museum members.

“Memberships are available all year, and you can purchase a membership and get the home tour discount as well,” Morrison said.

Once people retrieve their tickets, they can start the tour.

One home was once owned by long-time Park City residents Ted and Wilma Larremore, Morrison said.

“Wilma was a nurse at Miners Hospital and Ted was a miner,” she said. “They met when Ted came in for a hernia operation.”

The couple purchased the home when they got married and lived there for 50 years, according to Morrison.

“Ted died a number of years ago, and Wilma is now at an assisted-living facility in Heber,” she said. “The home’s new owners have done a lot of preservation work to maintain the historic nature of the home, and we’re excited to look inside it.”

Another home on the tour is the Hewitson residence, which was built in 1896, Morrison said.

“Jim Hewitson, another longtime Park City resident, owned the home, and his kids, who are now in their 70s and 80s, grew up there,” she said.

The Hewitson home is undergoing renovation, and the contractor Gary Bush of Bush Construction will be onsite to talk about what it takes to restore historic homes, Morrison said.

“Jim’s kids inherited the home and, along with their children, have done some preservation work on it,” she said. “So there have been three generations of Hewitsons who have lived there.”

The Park City Museum’s Historic Home Tour also has a history.

It started in 1997 as a way for the museum to educate the public and preserve Park City’s history, Morrison said.

“The tour predates me” she said with a laugh. “But kudos to my predecessors who came up with the idea to do the home tour, because we get wonderful attendance every year.”

Each home features one or two volunteers who will take visitors on their tour.

“They need to know the history of the home, so our research coordinator, Mahala Ruddell, spends months gathering any type of interesting information that the volunteers will need to relay to the people who come see the homes,” Morrison said.

The information can range from historic milestones to facts about the homes’ furniture, which, in some cases, have been handed down through the families for generations, she said.

“Volunteers will also talk about how the homeowners have managed to live in these pretty small spaces,” Morrison said. “Park City, over the years, has become known for a lot of its big homes, but there is a small-home movement and the town’s Historic District has done more than its share to represent that.”

The selection process of the homes this year was a continuation of last year’s home tour, Morrison said.

“We did last year’s route in the same area, and that helped when we began to approach this year’s homeowners,” she said. “So we had some of last year’s participants tell their neighbors how fun it was to open their doors to the tour.

“We want to thank the homeowners for opening their doors,” Morrison said. “It always amazes me that people are so willing to open their doors and allow the public to take a peek inside.”


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