Hopffgarten House

The house was constructed around 1899 for Albin C. DeMary, a clerk at the U.S. Assay Office in Boise.{{cite book |last=Garceau-Hagen |first=Dee |title=Portraits of Women in the American West |publisher=Routledge |location=Abingdon-on-Thames |date=2004 |page=237 |isbn=9781136076107 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=2_GwyvHcT-EC&pg=PA237 |accessdate=December 16, 2018}} In 1905 DeMary sold the house to E. Van Buskirk, and Van Buskirk made extensive improvements.{{cite news |title=South Boise |newspaper=Idaho Statesman |location=Boise, Idaho |date=November 13, 1905 |page=3}} Harry Hopffgarten purchased the house in 1915,{{cite news |title=South Side |newspaper=Idaho Statesman |location=Boise, Idaho |date=April 12, 1915 |page=8}} and he hired contractor Arthur O. Maus to remodel the residence in 1919.{{cite news |title=Building Permits Total $14,175 |newspaper=Idaho Statesman |location=Boise, Idaho |date=July 17, 1919 |page=5}} In 1922 Hopffgarten hired Wayland & Fennell to remodel the residence, including an addition and basement excavation, and the work was completed in 1923.{{cite news |title=Building Permits |newspaper=Idaho Statesman |location=Boise, Idaho |date=May 30, 1923 |page=7}} After Wayland & Fennell's Georgian Revival modifications, the house has not been altered substantially.

In 1960 a 75-ft tree fell against the back side of the house, and Hopffgarten subsequently removed from the property all of his 50-year-old trees.{{cite news |title=About Town |newspaper=Idaho Statesman |location=Boise, Idaho |date=September 11, 1960 |page=32}}

John Harry Hopffgarten (May 1, 1883 – September 1, 1975) and Anna Mae (Williams) Hopffgarten (February 12, 1884 – November 18, 1972) moved from Spokane, Washington, to Boise in 1904 and founded the Hopffgarten Sign Co. In 1915 the Hopffgartens moved from their house at 13th and Resseguie Streets (A. Q. Artz House) to their namesake house at S Denver and W Boise Avenues.{{cite news |title=Other Deals |newspaper=Idaho Statesman |location=Boise, Idaho |date=December 8, 1905 |page=5}}

Hopffgarten was a muralist as well as a sign painter, and his murals survive in the Hopffgarten House and in Boise's El Korah Shrine Temple.{{cite news |title=150 Boise Icons: El Korah Shrine Center |author=Anna Webb |newspaper=Idaho Statesman |location=Boise, Idaho |date=March 20, 2013}} He is known also as the artisan who applied gold leaf to the George Washington equestrian statue (Charles Osner, 1869) in the rotunda of the Idaho State Capitol Building.{{cite news |title=George Washington Equestrian Statue to Seek Protection from Vandals behind Plateglass in Idaho's Capitol |author=Suzanne D. Taylor |newspaper=Idaho Statesman |location=Boise, Idaho |date=June 3, 1966 |page=29}}{{cite news |title=(photo) General George Washington |newspaper=Idaho Statesman |location=Boise, Idaho |date=June 1, 1975 |page=35}}

In 1916 the Hopffgartens donated to the city a triangular piece of land adjacent to their house, now known as the Hopffgarten Property, to be tended as a public park.{{cite news |title=Would Change Values |newspaper=Idaho Statesman |location=Boise, Idaho |date=June 14, 1916 |page=5}}

{{reflist}}

• {{commons category-inline|Hopffgarten House}}
• {{commons category-inline|Hopffgarten Property}}
• [https://web.archive.org/web/20161224015518/https://www.boiseweekly.com/boise/1115-boise-ave-boise-built-in-1895-3202-square-feet-4-bed25-bath-97-acre/Content?oid=1013782 Hopffgarten House], Jennifer Hernandez, Boise Weekly, 2009

{{National Register of Historic Places}}

Category:National Register of Historic Places in Ada County, Idaho

Category:Colonial Revival architecture in Idaho

Category:Houses completed in 1899

{{Idaho-NRHP-stub}}