The Saunders House

The Saunders’ House and the Historic 200 Block of Perry Street
(by Fred Edison)

Few buildings in Castle Rock can claim a history going back to the 1870s.  The wood frame structure at 203 Perry Street, known today as the Saunders’ House, holds such a pedigree.  George Lord, then local school superintendent, purchased two lots at auction on a portion of Jeremiah Gould’s original homestead in 1874.  Within the next several months a pioneer house went up on the property.  Originally the front door and porch faced Second Street.

For the next seven decades the 1½ story home accommodated many owners.  Wilbur F. Waller, editor of the newspaper, owned the building in the 1880s and moved his Founder’s home down the hill and attached it to the northeast corner of George Lord’s former building.  Over the next seventy years 203 Perry’s Chain of Title read like a ‘Who’s Who of Castle Rock.’  The owners in succession were Mary Russell, William Whitney and Wallace Holcomb (hardware store owners), Charles Woodhouse (pioneer brick manufacturer), Ada Ritchey and then George Leonard (plumber).  Mr. Leonard used his skills and the help of a local carpenter, Ben Saunders, Sr., to completely remodel the home’s interior during the Roaring Twenties.  In 1950 a pair of long time residents began their lives in the home at the corner of Second and Perry.  Generations later the house still carries their name.

That year, Ben Saunders, Jr., a successful carpenter like his father, and his wife Elizabeth ‘Bette’ Saunders purchased 203 Perry.  Both were born in 1914, attended DCHS (on Wilcox St.) and lived in Douglas County their entire lives.  Ben grew up in Sedalia, after graduation he served in the Navy during WWII and then returned home to pursue a building and trade career; most notably the construction of Safeway Stores around the West.  Bette grew up in Cherry Valley a frontier community with unpaved roads, working farms and ranches, horse drawn sleighs, Model T’s, one-room schools, no electricity or radio or TV.  Her father, David Gilbert, was mayor of Castle Rock and a County Commissioner in the 1940s.  When Bette began dating Ben she was working as a telegraph operator at the D&RG depot.  They married in 1945 and Bette earned a living as a seamstress.  Both became active community members, Ben as a volunteer fireman and Bette participating in the Red Cross and local historical society.   Their home at 203 Perry Street provided the Saunders a picture window view of the tiny Post-war community.  At the time of Ben’s death in 1987 the town was beginning a phenomenal growth spurt.  Bette passed away in 2006 bearing witness to Castle Rock’s shift from a tiny hamlet of 400 into a small city with over 35,000 residents.

Today the Saunders’ House anchors the west side of the 200 block of Perry Street one of the last historic blocks in town, if not the last, to have its original buildings still intact.  Just to the north, stands 207 Perry and what many consider the oldest house in town built by storied pioneer Samuel Dyer, son of famed Methodist Circuit Rider Father John L. Dyer. To the north the 1887 Owens House at 213 Perry Street once welcomed affluent travelers many seeking respite from the maladies of Tuberculosis.  Finally at the corner of 3rd and Perry resides the Covenant Church, once the Methodist Episcopal Church, opened in 1922.

All four buildings are places that matter and currently sit on center stage in the Development and Preservation Debate.  Each building by itself represents an important piece of Castle Rock’s history.  However when taken together, left standing in their original locations, they take on a more significant meaning.   They stand as sentinels to a Castle Rock established by the Saunders’ and the rest of their generation.

(Sources used for this article include the Colorado Cultural Resource Survey from the State Office of Archaeology & Historic Preservation; the Biography Files in the Douglas County History Research Center; and the Town of Castle Rock’s Historic Downtown Walking Tour brochure)