This property was owned by Samuel H. Reasin (1818-1872) and his wife, Emily M. Reasin (1816-1885) when in June 1861 they sold it to Conrad C.P. Cook. Samuel was a tailor with his business at the corner of Franklin and St. John Streets while his wife, Emily, was the owner of three hotels as listed in The 1878 Maryland Directory. Conrad Cook and his wife, Catherine A. Cook, sold “that lot or parcel of ground” in November 1898 to Amos Spencer (1816-1899). When Amos Spencer died, his two sons inherited the property. They were Amos D. and Agnes Spencer of Philadelphia and John N. and Margaret Spencer of Havre de Grace. John Spencer (1845-1918) also was the owner of the Spencer-Silver Mansion at 200 South Union Avenue. In January 1901, the Spencers sold this property to Sarah H. Slymer, but she died the following year. Upon her 1902 death, Sarah Slymer bequeathed this to the widowed Sarah H. Worthington (1854-1926), her daughter. Some litigation ensued concerning the estate of Sarah Slymer, who also owned property at 551 Bourbon Street when she died.

In March 1922 Harry T. Preston granted a mortgage to Robert H. Gorsuch (1885-1944) and Eva M. Gorsuch, his wife, for their purchase of this property; Edith M. Dinsmore granted a second mortgage to them. Due to default in mid-1925, this property (“all that lot of ground being the westerly end of Lot 89 in Square 246”) was assigned to Frederick Lee Cobourn (1885-1962) who sold it at public sale to Annie Howlett Cobourn (1889-1948), his wife. Frederick Cobourn was a WWI veteran, served in the Maryland House of Delegates, and later was a judge in the Third Judicial Circuit Court. Together they owned several properties.

In 1926, the Cobourns sold this property to Walter M. and Hilda C. Gilbert. Walter worked at the Perry Point V.A. hospital from which he retired in 1942. The Gilberts made this their home from 1926 through Walter’s death.

Deeds for this property do not provide sufficient information to know exactly when this home was built. Harford County records show 1900 as the “built date” but those records are historically known to be unreliable. This house could have been built by the Spencers at the turn of the century, by the Gorsuchs around 1922; by the Cobourns in 1925; or by the Gilberts around 1926. Inspection of the interior of the house could possibly reveal an accurate built date. There is a unique curved wall on the second floor of this house that is said to have originally formed the hull of a ship.

The widowed Hilda Gilbert sold the property in 1951 to Beulah Wall (1901-1969). Beulah Wall was the paternal grandmother of Gary Pensell (whose son now owns the Tidewater Marina) and Gary remembers when she lived in this house. Her first husband had been killed earlier in an auto accident and Gary remembers that she married Ken Wall while living here. She owned some businesses in town including a restaurant on Warren Street, followed by a hobby shop on Franklin Street. Gary worked for her in the hobby shop as a youngster for 50 cents an hour selling their planes, boats, trains, birds, and tropical fish, and was always saving for something. He remembers wanting to buy an English bicycle that was for sale by Roger Stottlemyer (1911-1980) here in his grandmother’s house and how pleased he was when he finally saved enough to get it. After that, he said, he was saving for boats and cars.

Beulah and Ken Wall sold their home in 1953 to Roger W. Stottlemyer, Sr. (1911-1980) and his wife, Alverta, who had three sons and two daughters. After Alverta died in 1973, Roger and his family continued to live here until Roger’s death in 1980. Their son and his wife, Steven and Cheryl Stottlemyer, lived here until 2008, making this a Stottlemyer home for about 51 years. For some time around 1975, Steve operated “Steve’s Skate and Bicycle Shop” here.

In May 2008 a Court-Appointed Trustee sold this property to John R. and Beth S. Ward of Ward Enterprises, LLC, presumably as an investment property because they owned other properties. At the same time, the Wards deeded this to Ward Enterprises LLC. After about five years of ownership Ward Enterprises deeded this home back to the Ward individual names (John Raymond Ward and Beth Squier Ward, his wife) in 2013 and dissolved the LLC.

In 2015 John and Beth Ward sold this property to Kyle and Tawni Kuhling as a single family home.

County Records
Built 1900. 1144 sq ft, 2 stories, 1 bath, fireplace, attached garage.