Historic home goes to Muscatine couple

DAVENPORT, Iowa Through overgrown shrubs and brush, Richard Stone could see the outline of what was once a beautiful Italianate-style house with a tower on top.

Walking through Davenport's historic Gold Coast neighborhood for a "home tour" in September, Stone remarked to his wife Linda that there didn't seem to be anyone taking care of the property behind the brush.

Stone later learned that the city of Davenport was buying the abandoned house through condemnation proceedings and would put out "requests for proposals" from people interested in rehabilitating it and making it their home.

The Stones, of Muscatine, have always been interested in old homes, so they submitted a proposal (the only one, as it turned out), and on Friday they became the new owners of the Lambrite-Iles-Petersen house at 510 W. 6th St.

The building is considered one of the most significant in the historic Gold Coast neighborhood because of its association with prominent citizens, its architectural style and the architect who designed it.

The Stones paid $38,000, which allows the city to recoup the cost of acquisition and initial clean-up.

The couple expects to spend an additional $310,000 restoring the home to its 1850-1860 appearance by September 2017. And although they've only seen the inside once, the Stones believe they have the experience and knowledge to see the project through.

Stone recently retired as the engineering manager for H.J. Heinz Co. in Muscatine, a job that included the management of capital and maintenance projects in addition to engineering. In that capacity, he worked with regulatory organizations, contractors, equipment vendors, and local, state and federal governments.

Before that, he worked for Nestle, Gerber and the State of Minnesota in the engineering or research fields. He has a master's degree in engineering from the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor.

His previous building work has included doing more than 80 percent of the labor in constructing a three-bedroom house in Michigan, the rehabilitation of a flood-damaged home in Illinois and the restoration and conversion back to single-family use of an 1890s Victorian home in Waverly, Iowa, that had been made into three apartments.

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Historic home goes to Muscatine couple