National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet

NPS Form 10-900-A OMB Approval No. 1024-0018 (8-86)
United States Department of the Interior
National Park Service
National Register of Historic Places
Continuation Sheet
Section Number: _7_ Page: 38 Geneva-Minnesota Historic District, Medford, OR
photographs indicate that the Vawter-Gilstrap was constructed just following the Gates-Richardson
House at 31 Geneva.
The original purchaser of the subject property was a Mary W. Shapleigh, who acquired the property
from Clarence Knight [with a mortgage from H.M. McFarland] in late 1912. 103 No information
regarding Shapleigh was located and in 1915 the property reverted to Knight and McFarland,
apparently for non-payment. In 1919 Vernon and Althea Vawter purchased the property. 104
Vernon Vawter was the son of pioneer Jackson County banker William I. Vawter (See Site 30,
above) and with his brother followed their father into the banking business. Influential and highly
regarded statewide, Vawter served as a regent of the University of Oregon and was active in a wide
variety of other civic and social activities. 105 Unfortunately, Vawter's homelife was less than
harmonious and he abruptly left his reportedly shrewish wife and moved to Santa Barbara,
California in the early 1930s. 106 By 1935 the house was being rented by Ernest R. Gilstrap who
would purchase it from Mrs. Vawter in 1942. 107 Gilstrap was a member of a prominent publishing
family and played an important role in the development of the newspaper industry in Oregon. Two
of his brothers, Will and Frank, had founded the Springfield Messenger in 1892. Later, they
recruited others of the family, Otto and Ernest, who were also newspapermen, to Lane County.
Eventually the Gilstraps would acquire the Eugene Register and in varying combinations operate the
paper until its November 1930 merger with Alton Baker's Guard. Ernest Gilstrap, apparently the
youngest of the brothers, took his profits and invested in the Southern Oregon Publishing Company,
the "...owners and operators of the Roseburg News-Review, Klamath Falls Morning News, Klamath
Falls Herald and Medford Mail Tribune." 10* In 1933 Gilstrap moved to Medford and assumed the
position of Manager of the Mar/7 Tribune, a role he held until his death on 8-March-1954, aged 76
years. 109 Members of the Gilstrap family retained ownership of 35 Geneva until 1962.
The Vawter-Gilstrap House retains a high degree of integrity to its original design. Two window
alterations, the installation of projecting "greenhouse" style windows on the south elevation, are the
single deviation from the historic appearance. The structure continues to relate its historic
associations and successfully conveys its period of construction.
103 Certificate of Title #1345,7-November-1912.
104 Certificate of Title #2491, 8-November-1919.
105 Who's Who in Oregon, Vol. 1-1929-1930, (Oregon City; Oregon City Enterprise, 1929), 223.
106 Roland Hubbard, op. cit. Reportedly Mrs. Vawter's aloof and difficult nature was a source of considerable
gossip in Medford during the period.
107 JCD 241:130.
108 Capitol's Who's Who in Oregon, 1942-1944, (Portland, Capitol Publishing Company, 1942), 169. The exact
nature of Gilstrap's ownership role in the Mail Tribune, controlled by Robert Ruhl, remains unclear
however he clearly was a minority owner.
109 Peggy Anne Hutchinson, personal communication with the author, 12-March-1993.