Thursday, February 03, 2011

Linfield history: Northup Library, Northup Hall, Northup House




















Photo of Northup House with this story was taken by Wildcatville on 6/9/2015.

Linfield listing in a 1947 directory in the McMinnville Public Library reference section:

LINFIELD COLLEGE...McM-69

Commons College Bg...McM-338-W
Failing Hall...McM-483
Failing Hall Penthouse...McM-202-J
General Office College Bg...McM-179-J
Graver Cottage Women’s Dormitory College Bg…McM-202-W
College Bg...McM-202-W
Library...McM-486-R
Miller House, 501 S Davis...McM-138-M
New Dormitory...McM-192
Northup House, 436 S Baker...McM-176-R
Potter Hall...McM-352-J
President's Residence...McM-325
President's Office, College Bg...McM-484
Shirley House, 435 College...McM-345-R
Music Hall, College Bg...McM-345-J
Treasurer & Comptroller...McM-69
Villa Cottage, 335 College...McM-352-R

Depending on your connections to Linfield you recognize some or a few (or none?) of the entities in the list. Of most interest to Wildcatville at the moment (June 2015) is:

Northup House, 436 S Baker...McM-176-R

The Northup name was for Emanuel Northup, a long-time member of the McMinnville College/Linfield College faculty, faculty dean and the college’s interim president, 1905-1906. He died in 1933.

A McMinnville Telephone-Register story (Thur. Jan. 22, 1948) when Northup's wife, Maud Galer Northup, died, said the Northups came to McMinnville from New York and "settled in McMinnville in 1892." It says he was a member of the McMinnville college faculty for 41 years, 1892-1929. Subtract 1892 from 1929 and you have 37 years. Other sources say he started at the college in 1888. Add 41 years to 1888 and you have the year 1929.

The college’s new library, a cooperative effort of the college and City of McMinnville, opened in 1936. It succeeded a library located in Pioneer Hall.

According to Bricks Without Straw, published in 1938 and written by Jonas A. Jonasson, it was “deemed peculiarly fitting and proper” that the library “should be named the ‘Emanuel Northup Library,’ in honor of one who had been a civic leader and mayor of McMinnville as well as dean of the college faculty.”

In 2003, what is now called Jerald R. Nicholson Library opened on the Linfield campus. At that point, what was Northup Library became Northup Hall. In 2011, following extensive renovation, Northup Hall was dedicated at T.J. Day Hall.

Although Northup’s name is no longer on the building, there is a plaque in the building which reads:

In memory of 
Emanuel Northup
Professor, Dean (1888-1929)
Interim President (1905-1906)
This Building Served as
Northup Library, 1936-2003

The plaque should also include:
Northup Hall, 2003-2011

This brings us to Northup House at 436 S Baker in McMinnville. Today the address of the same house is 436 SE Baker.

The appendix of  Bricks Without Straw includes a section about the campus and buildings. It says, “On or near the campus of 44 acres at the edge of the city of McMinnville there are nineteen buildings used for educational purposes by Linfield College.” This list includes:

Northup House, erected 1935, now valued at … ($)5,000

As part of the City of McMinnville’s Historic Resources Survey, information about the house was compiled July 25, 1980.  This compilation says the first portion of the house, which it calls the “Dr. Northup House,” was built in 1890. It also says it was the “home of one of Linfield’s first presidents, Dr. Anderson. Dean of the College, Emanuel Northup lived here in 1912. The house was used for a fraternity house for a time.”

McMinnville College became Linfield College in 1922. So, while Northup lived in the Northup House in 1912, he was working for McMinnville College.

Roy “Hap” Mahaffey, long-time Linfield speech professor and his wife, Marian Mahaffey, knows for her long time association with McMinnville’s Lon Dee Flowers, bought the house from Linfield “around 1950.”

Some know the structure as “Mahaffey House.”

Elam Anderson was Linfield president, 1932-1938. Apparently, Elan and his wife, Colena (who was a Linfield English professor 1932-1938 and 1946-1964) lived in it from immediately after the house’s erection in 1935 until he left Linfield to become president of the University of Redlands in 1938.

See the photo (taken 6/9/2015) of Northup House with this posting. Go to this link and access …


… the third page of the three page PDF  shows photos of Northup House from Aug. 2001 and 1983.

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On 12/4/2020, Katherine Huit posted at Linfield U Facebook: “Besides serving as a professor, dean and interim president of McMinnville College, (Emanuel) Northup was also elected Mayor of McMinnville on November 7, 1905. In that capacity he selected the first members of the McMinnville Water and Light Commission, and as mayor served on the Commission as its ex-officio chairman. The four other members of that first Commission included John Wortman, W. C. Apperson, Dr. Leroy Lewis and George H. Hauser."