This property now houses several apartments

With the cooperation of the Southeast Iowa Union/Mt. Pleasant News, The Mt. Pleasant Historic Preservation Commission will be publishing, every week or two, peeks at some of the featured homes in the 1909 book, Mt. Pleasant Beautiful.

In the series, the 1909 picture will be contrasted with one of recent vintage. The Commission has been collecting information for the eventual issuance of a new book updating the information on the still standing homes from the 1909 publication.

You can test your knowledge of historic Mt. Pleasant with this column. The identity of the featured home will be published with the next featured home.

The last featured home was the Hall House at 414 North Broadway.

This week the featured home has seen a great variety of uses over the years, but served as a residence for members of the Snyder family, early Mt. Pleasant pioneers, for a long period of time.

Henry Snyder and Susan Ellis were wed in one of the first, if not the first wedding, in what became Mt. Pleasant on July 27, 1837. They had come from Virginia and Kentucky respectfully.

Henry ran a grocery and was involved in the starting of Iowa Wesleyan, the establishment of the Methodist church in town and taught in the original school.

On top of this, he served on the City Council and as county treasurer. Unfortunately, he passed away at the young age of 41, leaving his mid-30s aged widow with seven small children.

At some point Susan purchased an interest in the local Free Press which was run for several years by her son, Oscar, and son-in-law, Frank Hatton, husband of Elizabeth Snyder (1844-1944).

The Hattons subsequently moved to Washington, D.C., and were friends of Robert Todd Lincoln. Hatton was appointed Postmaster General by President Chester Arthur and later was an owner of the Washington Post.

At this time, we do not have the build date of the house or when the Snyders took possession.

At the time of the publication of Mount Pleasant Beautiful in 1909, the house was owned by the youngest Snyder daughter, Mary. However when Susan died in 1894, she was living at this location.

In 1919 the home was purchased by Dr. Jonathan Pitcher, and in 1932, it was leased by Nora Kracaw, who operated the very successful Yellow Lantern Tea Room there until 1945.

At that time it was converted to apartments, but in 1968, it was purchased by Robert Beatty, who operated his funeral chapel at the home before moving to North Broadway in 1977, taking over the operation of the Young family.

Records do not indicate at what point major renovation of the building took place, but presumably, it was during one of the periods of conversion to apartments. The exterior look of the home it somewhat changed from the 1909 presentation.

Presently, the property is divided into several apartments.