Home Considered for Historic Registry

Although it has a modern-day swimming pool in its yard, the house located at 1537 Clayton Woods Ct. has seen a wealth of Wildwood's history. Previous owners of the residence, Timothy Herter and Kathleen Freemann, applied for it to be put on the city's historic registry. The new owners who just moved in this month, Kimberly and Jason Derucki, added the historic designation to the list of things they loved about the property.

Called the Ben Baumer House after its owner in 1891, it was added to through the years with improvements and room additions. The former address was 246 Strecker Rd. It is located in Ward 4.

Wildwood's Historic Preservation Commission recommended the house be placed on the registry after reviewing the 13 established criteria the city uses to determine if properties meet pre-agreed upon standards. A property only has meet one criterion to qualify, said Wildwood director of planning and parks Joe Vuhjnich. However the Ben Baumer House met five of the 13 areas:

1. its character, interest or value related to part of the development, heritage or cultural characteristics of Wildwood;
2. its potential to be returned to an accurate historic appearance;
3. its embodiment of distinguishing characteristics of architecture valuable for the study of its period;
4. its character as a unqiue example of utilitarian structure
5. its suitability for preservation or restoration.

According to the Historic Preservation Commission recommendation report, the house's original owner, Benjamin Baumer, was born in Missouri in June 1866. Both of his birth parents were born in Germany. He married his wife, Elizabeth (Lizzie), in 1891. She had German ancestors as well. They bought 80 acres along Strecker Road and built of the portion of the dwelling now being contemplated, including a stone basement foundation and hand hewn beams. They were farmers.

city council members first considered the request at the Aug. 8 council meeting. The petitioners did not seek any land use changes or incentives as part of the request. Council members did not take the final action on the project at the Aug. 22 meeting, however.

"The Commission appreciates and supports the restoration project that has taken place relating to this dwelling and believes it is a wonderful asset to the Wildwood community in terms of an illustrative example of its history and value of historic preservation," said Lynne Martin, chair, Wildwood Historic Preservation Commission, in the report.