By Nancy Burgess

On March 19, 2007, the house at 309 East Goodwin Street in Prescott was severely damaged in a fire. This was the home of George E. and Elsie Briggeman from 1949 until 1964. This small, classical bungalow has an interesting history.

Prescott and Yavapai County have a long history of moving houses. Houses were moved to face a different direction on the lot, moved down the street and around the corner or to a completely different part of town. Houses were moved from Jerome and Humboldt to Prescott and from Prescott to Chino Valley and beyond. Some houses were moved more than once, such as the John C. Fremont House now on the Sharlot Hall Museum campus.

Around 1920, four nearly identical bungalows were built on the southwest corner of Gurley and South Mt. Vernon Streets. A bungalow, by definition, is a one-storied house of a type first developed in India and characterized by low sweeping lines and a wide veranda. These houses on Mt. Vernon Street replaced a large Victorian-Era Queen Anne house on the corner lot which had burned down. It had been the home of the 6th Territorial Governor, Frederick A. Tritle (governor from 1882-1885).

In about 1947, the two northernmost bungalows (closest to Gurley Street) were moved so that a "modern" gas station could be built: one to 132 South Virginia Street, the other to 309 East Goodwin Street. So, the little bungalow found its new home on East Goodwin Street on a tiny lot with a tiny garage. The house was listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 1998.

George E. Briggeman came to Prescott, Arizona Territory in 1906 at age 7 from Springfield, Ohio with his mother, father and two brothers. The Briggemans lived in West Prescott and George attended Washington School and Prescott High School, graduating in 1919. By 1921 he was working for the Arizona Power Company. He got the job doing repair work and line work because he had "experience" from an after school and summer job working for an electrical company. Because he was "short and skinny" the electricians used George to crawl into attics and under houses to pull wire when the openings were too small for the other men. In 1926, he married Prescott native Elsie Hicks. George worked in Prescott for Arizona Power Company until 1927 when he was transferred to Cottonwood. He and Elsie raised their two children, George and Carol, in the Verde Valley.

In 1949, George was transferred back to Prescott by the Arizona Power Company (which later became Arizona Public Service) where he worked in the "meter shop". It was then the Briggemans bought the little bungalow on East Goodwin Street. In an oral interview in the 1970s, George Briggeman described the search for the house: "We looked around and found a house that we liked very much at 309 East Goodwin Street, just two blocks up from the Plaza and it’s a nice home – two bedrooms with a back porch that is also usable as a bedroom. It has a nice big living room, a nice kitchen and a nice lot. We paid, in 1949, $7,500". Several owners later, now restored and repaired, the little Bungalow today looks much as it did sixty years ago when the Briggemans moved in.

George Briggeman died in Lakeside, Arizona in 1997, having just celebrated his 98th birthday. His wife, Elsie, died the previous year.

(Nancy Burgess is the Historic Preservation Specialist for the city of Prescott.)

Sharlot Hall Museum Photograph Call Number:(bure4087p). Reuse only bypermission.

The four bungalows, shown here in the 1930s, on South Mt. Vernon Street were built in the early 1920s. The two houses on the left remain in their original location while the Briggeman bungalow, second from the right, was moved to 309 East Goodwin Street and the house on the far right was moved to 132 South Virginia Street in 1947.

Sharlot Hall Museum Photograph Call Number:(courtesy photo Alan Krause) Reuse only by permission.

Two of the original four bungalows that remain on South Mt. Vernon Street, 2009. Note the streetlight on the left is the same light seen on the photo taken in the 1930s. The houses are much the same as they were originally built in the early 1920s.

Sharlot Hall Museum Photograph Call Number:(courtesy photo Alan Krause) Reuse only by permission.

On the left, a 2009 photo of the Briggeman bungalow, moved in 1947 from South Mt. Vernon Street to its new home at 308 East Goodwin Street. The bungalow on the right, as it appears today, was also moved in 1947 from South Mt. Vernon Street to 132 South Virginia Street.