Azalea Residential Historic District

Tyler's dynamic economy, somewhat diverse populace and stratified social and racial structure created a community of neighborhoods and historic resources significant for their associations with local history and local, state, and national architectural trends. The Azalea District reflects these associations and is the largest and best-preserved concentration of early to mid-20th-century vernacular, popular, and high-style dwellings in the city. The district documents eclectic subdivision patterns and the variety of housing available to upper and middle-income Tyler residents and is associated with Tyler's increasingly dominant position between 1900 and 1930, as a business, transportation and commercial hub and with the 1930 to 1970s East Texas Oil Boom, a period of tremendous growth and prosperity during which Tyler became an important regional business and service center. Related to the historical context of Community Development in Tyler, Smith County, Texas 1846-1950, the district is comprised primarily of domestic and domestic auxiliary resources, which are defined in more detail in section 7 of this nomination and in the Historic and Architectural Resources of Tyler, Texas Multiple Property National Register nomination. The Azalea Residential Historic District is maintained in excellent condition and retains a high degree of integrity. It derives its primary significance from its architectural form and its associations with Tyler's upper and middle-income residents during a period of economic growth that fostered intensive community development. For these reasons, the Azalea Residential Historic District is eligible for listing in the National Register of Historic Places at the local level under Criteria A and C in the areas of significance of Community Planning and Development and Architecture within a period of significance extending from ca. 1900 to 1953. Although the period covered by the historical context could not be extended beyond 1950 for financial reasons, Tyler's social and economic patterns continued unchanged into the 1960s while local development patterns began to favor mass-produced tract-type development over eclecticism by the mid-1950s, making the Azalea District one of the last areas of the city to develop within the context of eclecticism. Thus, the period of significance for this district is extended to the current 50-year mark, which is 1953.

THE AZALEA RESIDENTIAL HISTORIC DISTRICT

Developed between about 1900 and the 1960s, the Azalea Residential Historic District is one of several Tyler neighborhoods that grew over a long period of time and thus incorporates informal platting and subdivisions of varying sizes/shapes upon which are built an eclectic mix of houses types, styles and sizes. The majority of district dwellings and related non-residential resources were built between 1925 and 1953, making the area a distinct cluster of early to mid-20th-century architecture. The Azalea Residential Historic District began as farmland at the south edge of Tyler and grew slowly from about 1900 until the late 1920s when an increasingly strong economy, a growing population, and the exploration for and discovery of oil and gas fields within 50 miles of town spurred rapid development that continued through the early 1960s. The district contains 36 known subdivisions as well as land sold from large parcels never formally subdivided. Block and lot size vary with the subdivision although lot size is relatively consistent within each subdivision.
The eclectic nature of the district's land patterns and architectural form is consistent with residential construction throughout Tyler in the pre-1950 period. Other neighborhoods with similar patterns include the Charnwood Historic Residential District, the Selman Neighborhood in central Tyler, and the area immediately west of the Charnwood District. Only a few small areas of Tyler built prior to 1950 contain identical, or nearly identical housing forms. These include the East Ferguson Residential Historic District and the Donnybrook Duplex Residential Historic District. Formulaic housing forms are most commonly associated with neighborhoods dating from the latter half of the 20th century that feature tract housing with a mix of facade treatments based on a single architectural mode such as Ranch or Colonial Revival or a combination of these two styles.

Land speculation in the Azalea District began in the late 1880s, spurred by the steady economic expansion and population growth of the previous 20 years. By 1885 the area that became the Azalea District included a few scattered homesteads and dwellings occupied by local businessmen and others employed in Tyler. Prominent businessmen and professionals such as John C. Robertson, E.C. Williams, Rudolph Bergfeld, John Durst and Benjamin W. Rowland who lived north, east and west of the district owned farmland now within it. District land west of Broadway was largely open land with a few dwellings and farms, while eastern portions of the district had a similar character and were adjacent to Victory Lake, a small reservoir, which is no longer extant. Between 1906 and the 1960s, the west side of the district was subdivided by many owners, including Rudolph and Carolina Bergfeld, R.W. Fair and the Fair Realty Co., and Carolina Bergfeld and her second husband Clarence E. Hightower who sold lots to successful businessmen, oil entrepreneurs, and professionals made wealthy or secure by Tyler's diverse economy and the discovery of oil. The east side of the district developed from several large parcels, including a 75-acre plot between present-day Broadway, East First Street, Donnybrook Avenue, South Sneed Avenue and Troup Highway purchased in 1876 by the East Texas District Fair Association and sold in 1904 to Rudolph Bergfeld, who platted it that same year. This parcel passed to Bergfeld's sons, Julius A. and Rudolph L. and in 1935 Julius A. Bergfeld created the J.A. Bergfeld Subdivision from a portion of it, holding the remainder for future development. Lots in the J.A. Bergfeld Subdivision and the remaining land within the 1904 R. Bergfeld Subdivision were sold individually to successful Tyler businessmen, oil entrepreneurs and skilled workers. Other east-side district areas developed from the lands of Tyler pioneer R. B. Long who subdivided his holdings in 1891 into small and medium-sized lots.
Out of this plat came several re-subdivisions created by new owners and mostly developed with modest brick veneer and wood dwellings for middle-class residents. More than two dozen known subdivisions were filed in Tyler between 1887 and 1900 involving land in all directions within Tyler's developing suburbs, but only the Williams Addition (1887), the Robertson Park Addition (1893), the W. L. Watkins Addition (1896), and the Durst and Bergfeld Addition (1897) are within the boundaries of the district. Lots in the Williams Addition and the Watkins Addition were varied sizes and shapes with portions configured into parcels of equal or near equal size and shape. The Durst and Bergfeld plat divides the land into a grid with each parcel a full block. Only the northeastmost block is further divided into lots. An area for a park is set aside between Sixth and Eighth streets along College Avenue and the S. R. Green homestead of seven acres on the west edge of the subdivision is excluded from the plat. But despite a strong economy in the 1880s, local bank failure in 1891 and the nationwide Panic of '93 slowed development in Tyler until about 1896 when business activity increased. In the 1890s the area that now encompasses the Azalea District was still in the "country" and economic and population growth not rapid enough to support intensive development. In this period, most building activity occurred north and east of the town square, and directly north of the Azalea District in the Charnwood Residential Historic District and other areas within one-half to three-quarters of a mile south of downtown. Some of the subdivisions platted in the district prior to 1900 incorporated an existing house or two within an area of newly created lots, which accounts for some of the irregularity in lot configuration; none of these have survived. Sales activity in the four pre-1900 district subdivisions varied from brisk to sluggish through the early years of the 20th century.

During the first decade of the 20th century, Tyler's economy remained strong overall but fluctuated with the vagaries of agricultural production. The district's earliest dwelling is the ca. 1900 Queen Anne style Leonidas and Cornelia Shaw House at 204 Lindsey Lane, in the Watkins Addition. Shaw was a clerk in the offices of the St. Louis Southwestern Railway (Cotton Belt). As Tyler's population increased so did land speculation and housing demand. Many new residential subdivisions were platted, including South Park Heights in 1906. Entrepreneur and land speculator Rudolph Bergfeld saw potential in the city's continuing prosperity, but South Park Heights, Bergfeld's replat of the 1897 Durst and Bergfeld Addition, located between present-day South Broadway, West Ninth Street, Chilton and Robertson avenues and Shaw Street, remained too far south to generate much construction. Land in South Park Heights is divided into a grid with roughly equal block and lot sizes. The public park is moved to its present location on Broadway between Second and Fourth streets and only the southern and westernmost blocks remain undivided into lots. In 1909, apparently hoping to generate sales interest in South Park Heights, Rudolph Bergfeld, deeded land along South Broadway for one dollar to the City of Tyler for a public park. The transaction stipulated the City improve the land with a park within six months and continue to use and maintain the land as a park. When the City failed to install a park there, the land reverted to Bergfeld. Then in 1913 with increasing southerly residential development and a new city government, the City purchased this same land from Bergfeld, covering a little more than eight acres between Broadway, College, Second and Fourth streets, for $4,000, and built Bergfeld Park thereon. Despite the park, strong interest in Bergfeld's plat as well as the other early subdivisions would come only in the late 1920s, 1930s, 1940s and 1950s when regional oil and gas discoveries and then the East Texas oil boom created intense housing needs and fostered frenzied building activity well south of the initial district land divisions.

As the city weathered the ups and downs of agricultural decline and recovery brought about by fruit blight in the 1910s, and manufacturing gained importance, population increases continued to shape the physical form of the community and affect the social, civic and religious programs offered by its institutions. Ties among immediate and extended families, business associates and acquaintances fostered real estate development, as in the Charnwood District and the area immediately west of it. In south, east and central Tyler, subdivisions were speculative investment ventures where subdividers sold individual lots for development by the new owners. Many district subdivisions are refinements or further divisions of larger parcels previously divided. During the 1910s most development activity was in north or east Tyler or in the areas immediately north of the Azalea District, however, interest in district land on both sides of Broadway increased at this time and many land sales occurred. Actual construction was limited with the most activity at the north end of the district where vernacular wood-sided, one-story pyramidal roofed dwellings and Craftsman-influenced bungalows were erected. In 1915 Rudolph Bergfeld sold a large parcel at 1215 South Broadway to the Judge family. They built a two-story wood-sided Classical Revival-influenced dwelling on the land and established a successful florist business that remained in operation until 2001. In addition to sales and construction within Bergfeld's South Park Heights plat, two additional subdivisions were filed in the 1910s in what is now the district, as Tyler's population grew and residential development crept south. In 1914 prominent Tyler businessmen O.M. Boren and J.D. Patterson platted a small area between Broadway, East Dobbs Street, Lake Street, and South Fannin Avenue called the Boren and Patterson Addition. Initially developed with residences, this property was acquired by the Tyler school district in the 1920s and redeveloped with Hogg Junior High School between 1928 and 1935. In 1919 N.P. and Laura W. Dodge, residents of Nebraska, platted the Belmont Addition, located between Frazier Street, Sneed Avenue, Lake Street and Donnybrook Avenue.

Construction continued through the 1920s, 1930s and 1940s in this plat producing modest brick veneer and wood-sided Craftsman, Tudor and Colonial Revival-influenced bungalows along with a few modern house forms displaying Ranch style features. Among these are the 1931 Tudor Revival style Carlos and Corrie Kaemmerlin House and the 1945 R.W. and Winnie Carter Investment House, both on East Dodge Street and the ca. 1930 Tudor Revival style J.F. and Cora Steed House on East Frazier Street. Kaemmerlin was a bookkeeper for a Tyler firm, and the Steeds were retired. Also in this subdivision are the Noncontributing 1930 Tudor Revival style S.W. and Ola Dunwoody House, the Contributing 1931 Tudor Revival style Walter Jernigan Investment House, and the ca. 1930 M.C. and Gladys Carden Investment House, all on East Rix Street, and the Noncontributing 1935 Colonial Revival style Howard and Grace Lyle Rent House on South Wall Street. One of the last houses built in this subdivision was designed by E. Davis Wilcox for himself and his wife Nell and their children at the corner of Lake and Sneed in 1950. Dave Wilcox was a successful architect with a statewide reputation.

The 1920s saw increased land speculation and population growth associated with Tyler's strong, diversified agricultural, manufacturing and commercial base. Furthermore, Tyler was attracting new residents from other areas of East Texas where oil and gas were discovered in the 1920s. With newfound wealth, or at least a comfortable income, some of these arrivals settled in the northern end of the Azalea district. Subdivisions in south Tyler flanking South Broadway reflected the growing prosperity of the city's white middle and upper middle class and the steady push southward of Tyler's most economically fortunate. Among the many plats filed in the 1920s are five in the Azalea District: R. W. Fair's Subdivision of Block 306 (1923), Bergfeld's Re-Subdivision of a Portion of South Park Heights (1924), the R. Bergfeld Subdivision of NCB 277 (1925), R. Bergfeld's Second Re-Subdivision of South Park Heights (1928) and the Brown Subdivision (1929). Bergfeld's replats involve the renumbering of some lots and blocks to conform with the 1908 City block numbering system, as well as the revision of large parcels into lots, and the dedication of alleys in some blocks. The Brown plat, dedicated by Medicus L. Brown, was a partition of family lands at the southwest corner of East First and Donnybrook into five lots. Two other subdivisions appear on City plat maps but were not located in the land or deed records of the Smith County Clerk: the E. F. Swann Subdivision and the Knight Subdivision, both of which are on the west side of Broadway near the northern end of the district. Their location just south of R. W. Fair's 1923 plat, and their development with dwellings dating from the 1930s suggests they were platted about 1930.

In responding to the real estate market of the 1920s, Azalea district residents, speculators, and developers capitalized on a growing economy, but they also positioned themselves for the coming boom. R. W. Fair's 1923 plat subdivided a portion of family-owned lands located south of West Dobbs Street and east of South Robertson Avenue. Fair, a prominent businessman involved in agriculture, built a two-story brick veneer dwelling in 1923 for himself and his family at the north end of the subdivision and sold the remaining parcels on a speculative basis. After the discovery of oil on the family farm in Arp, Fair became wealthy and continued his real estate ventures through the Fair Realty Co. In 1937, Fair and his wife Mattie sold their merchant-class dwelling to a local resident who moved it several blocks south of the original Chilton Avenue location. On the site, the Fairs built a new, expansive Classical Revival-style dwelling worthy of being called a mansion. Other lots in the Fair Subdivision developed in the 1920s, 1930s and 1940s with vernacular one and two-story Craftsman-influenced bungalows and modest Colonial Revival style dwellings. One of these is the ca. 1924 E.D. and Blanche Rice Investment House, a Craftsman-influenced bungalow on South Robertson Avenue. Rice was a local physician. The northerly portion of Bergfeld's South Park Heights Addition and its 1920s replats were experiencing increasing development by 1928 when the A.D. Clark House, a high-quality Tudor Revival style bungalow was built on Mockingbird Lane. Clark moved to Tyler from Van in 1932 after making money in the Van gas field, which was discovered in the 1920s. He purchased a Tudor Revival-style dwelling built in 1928. Lots of 19th-century subdivisions within the district were also developing or being redeveloped at this time with larger, more substantial dwellings fostered by the prosperity and population growth of the 1920s. In 1924, William and Bennie Henson built their Classical Revival style dwelling on West Dobbs Street. Henson was a partner with R.W. Fair in the Texas Pecan Nursery.

In 1930 with the discovery of oil and the influx of cash it generated, a south Tyler residence became highly desirable and lots in existing subdivisions sold rapidly, while new subdivisions were created. The Belmont Addition and South Park Heights were no longer at the southern edge of town but in the midst of a much sought-after developing neighborhood that within a few years took on its identity as the Azalea District. Previously moderate construction activity in the Azalea District suddenly exploded as the newly wealthy and the comfortable-cum-rich sought land on which to build new, imposing dwellings. Developers such as Fair and the extended Bergfeld family, along with many other, smaller and less prominent capitalists not only sold lots but built houses and duplexes on spec for sale or rental and increased their fortunes. While R. W. Fair and his sons James and Wilton continued real estate development activities into the 1950s, Rudolph Bergfeld died in 1930 and left his entire estate to his widow, Carolina Pabst Bergfeld. To their children, she distributed more than half the estate she and her husband had accumulated in their nearly 50-year marriage. At the same time, Mrs. Bergfeld continued her own real estate activities, and in 1934 she remarried. After her marriage to Clarence E. Hightower, she and Hightower remained active in Azalea District development until her death in 1944.

Hightower continued in business until the mid-1950s when he retired. Meanwhile, Rudolph and Carolina's son Julius developed a portion of the east side of the Azalea District and was active in the land business until the 1950s. In the 1930s and 1940s, the Shuford family, grandchildren of Emir Hamvasy, a highly-educated Hungarian-born Anglican priest who came to Tyler in the 19th century, informally subdivided a large portion of the district located along South Chilton Avenue and Old Bullard Road south of Jacksonville Highway. The Shufords formally platted their holdings in 1954, as the Emir Shuford Addition, after many lots were already sold and developed. The Bergfelds and Shufords were the largest landholders in the Azalea District and responsible for subdividing more than half of the land within it. However, other smaller land developers also contributed to the Azalea District's development. In all 13 subdivisions were filed in the 1930s, three in the 1940s and two in the 1950s. Providing support for the nearly 1,000 dwellings, civic building and church facilities in the Azalea District are a variety of infrastructure and recreation properties created by Depression-era Federal and state relief programs and constructed by Tyler and Smith County men. These include the construction of Hogg Junior High School, the brick and concrete paving of numerous streets, the rock lining of city creeks, the construction of the amphitheater and other improvements at Bergfeld Park and the installation of gas and sewer lines.

In the 1930s the South Park Heights subdivision developed as one of the four most prestigious in the Azalea District (along with Park Heights Circle-1935, the area platted by the Hamvasy heirs, and the J.A. Bergfeld Subdivision -1935) with a mix of high-style, merchant class and more modest dwellings for Tyler's most prosperous citizens, while homes in the Belmont Addition were more modest, targeting stable wage workers associated with retail, service and oil businesses. Among the first residences built in South Park Heights after the discovery of oil are the 1931 Mediterranean Revival style William E. and Bertha McKinney House on South College Avenue, the 1931 French Eclectic style W.F. and Gertrude Summers duplex on Mockingbird Lane, the 1932 George and Rose Saleh House a Spanish Colonial Revival style dwelling at the southeast corner of Mockingbird and South College Avenue, and the ca. 1932 Tudor Revival style Carolina Bergfeld Investment House on West Third Street. McKinney was an oil entrepreneur and the Salehs were successful local merchants and entrepreneurs and part of an established Tyler merchant family of Lebanese descent. Development continued throughout the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s in South Park Heights with speculators and individuals purchasing lots. The partnership of Caldwell, Delay and Allen, who had platted a small subdivision in the northern part of the district, also owned land in other areas of the district including the 1600 block of South Chilton and also speculated with lots on West Fifth Street (Burke interview). Dwellings built in the South Park Heights plat during the 1930s after the initial oil find include the 1932 Tudor Revival style J.A. and Rhoda Bracken House on South Chilton Avenue, the ca. 1934 Tudor Revival style Carolina Bergfeld Hightower Duplex on West First Street, the 1934 Mediterranean Revival style Hughes-Genecov House on West Fifth Street, the 1936 Art Moderne style Simon Saleh House at the southwest corner of Mockingbird Lane and South College, the ca. 1937 Colonial Revival George and Alice Pratt House on West Eighth Street, the 1939 Monterey Revival style John and Patsy Kittrell House on South College Avenue, and the 1953 Ranch style Sam and Mary Bright House on South College Avenue. The Brackens, McKinneys, and Genecovs were all successful oil entrepreneurs, and the Kittrells were Tyler real estate developers. Fred Hughes was an attorney also involved in the oil business and with his wife in real estate speculation. George Pratt was a successful local jeweler. At the same time, district plats dedicated in the 19th century were finally seeing intensive construction. In the 1930s, parcels in the Watkins Addition along Lindsey Lane were developed with large and more modest revival-style dwellings including the ca. 1930 Tudor Revival style Hugh and Mary White House and the 1938 Colonial Revival style William and Virginia Jenkins House. Hugh White was a partner in Campbell & White, a successful Tyler general contracting firm and builder of many Tyler buildings. William Jenkins operated a service station and garage in downtown Tyler and married the daughter of successful Tyler businessman A.F. and his wife May Sledge. The 1931 Classical Revival style Woman's Building, a civic and cultural community center on South Broadway is also in the Watkins Addition.

Other 1930s subdivisions in the district included three re-plats of portions of South Park Heights. The 1931 Re- Subdivision of NCB 294, South Park Heights Addition by W. H. Caldwell, Tom H. Delay and Robert Allen, all prominent local businessmen created small lots on which were built moderately sized one- and two-story, brick veneer Tudor Revival and Colonial Revival style dwellings. Located between Fourth and Fifth Streets, Chilton, and College Avenues, the area is just southwest of Bergfeld Park. The 1935 Park Heights Circle Subdivision of South Park Heights, platted by C. E. Hightower was an elite subdivision of very large lots. The first house in this plat is the 1937 Ernest and Ida Mae Pinkston House, a grand, two-story, red brick "mansion" in Tudor Revival style. Ernest Pinkston was a successful oil entrepreneur. Development on other lots in this subdivision followed suit with high-quality dwellings erected through the 1990s. Amenities included Colonial-style metal gas lamps installed as street lights. Four of these survive. One of the last dwellings erected in this subdivision is the Noncontributing 1995 Tudor Revival style Britton and Sunni Brookshire House. The Brookshires are part of the extended Brookshire family that owns and operates the Texas grocery chain of the same name.

The 1937 Re-Subdivision of a Portion of South Park Heights by C. E. and Carolina Bergfeld Hightower illustrates the ongoing demand for building sites in the Azalea District. In this action, the Hightowers petitioned the City of Tyler to extend utility lines into the unincorporated areas of the plat along South College and South Chilton streets, south of the then-current city boundary. This action was sought to assist the Hightowers in selling the lots and provide services for a growing population that was building high-style, expansive Revival-style dwellings on large lots. One parcel in this re-plat is the 1951 Colonial Revival W. Howard and Vera Bryant House. Bryant was a successful local physician who made a fortune backing oil exploration. By the early 1950s, the city boundary extended just beyond Hamvasy Lane and district construction included large, high-style Colonial Revival or Ranch style dwellings as well as more modest versions of these architectural modes.

Two additional subdivisions were created on the west side of the Azalea District in the 1930s. These are the 1936 Robertson Heights Addition, dedicated by J. T. and T.J. Thompson, along Hilltop Lane. This area includes two-story Colonial Revival dwellings. In 1937, W. A. Stripling created a subdivision of the same name from land along the west side of South Robertson Avenue. Stripling, Tyler building contractor, owned the property since 1918 and as Tyler developed southward, he capitalized on a long-held investment. Stripling and his wife Lora built a substantial two-story Colonial Revival dwelling at the north end of the plat and sold the remaining lots on spec. They developed with a mix of grand and more modest revival-style dwellings and residents included oil entrepreneurs such as the Roosth family. Finally, the grandchildren and heirs of Emir Hamvasy began subdividing family land located along Jacksonville Highway, Chilton Avenue and Old Bullard Road. This area, and additional family land south of Hamvasy Lane, was initially developed with modest and substantial brick revival style dwellings and a number of dairies on large parcels By the late 1940s as the city pushed south, the dairies closed and the land was converted to residential use. In 1954, the Hamvasy heirs formally platted the area along Chilton and Jacksonville as far south as Hamvasy Lane as the Emir Shuford Addition, after one of the heirs. The remainder of the area apparently was not formally platted but continued to be sold as individual large lots of varying sizes. Development continued into the 1960s in this area with large and moderate-sized revival and Ranch style dwellings on large to very large lots. Among the most visible are the ca. 1951 Colonial Revival style J. Chester and Fleetwood Wynne House, on South Chilton Avenue and the ca. 1951 Colonial Revival E. Nolan and Genevieve Adams House on Old Bullard Road. Adams was a local physician; Wynne was a highly successful Tyler attorney and oilman. Others in this plat include the Noncontributing ca. 1957 Hassler and Irene Lowe House on Jacksonville Highway. Hassler Lowe was an insurance adjustor and Irene Lowe was a teacher at Hogg Junior High School.

During the 1930s the east portion of the Azalea District also underwent a transformation from farmland to a prestigious suburban neighborhood as nine new subdivisions were platted. In 1931 the Fred Ford and J. Ford plats were created. The Fords were members of an established Tyler family of carpenters and contractors and this family land located east of Fannin Avenue, north of East First Street and west of South Donnybrook Avenue was platted into two subdivisions. Divided by Ford Street, the two blocks were split into small lots developed primarily with modest one-story wood frame bungalows. A third plat was filed in this area in 1931 when Sam and Eugenia Eltife created a subdivision of 22 lots of uniform shapes and nearly uniform sizes. Called the Eltife Addition and located between Fannin Avenue on the west, Lake Street on the south and Donnybrook Avenue on the east, the subdivision abuts the Belmont Addition on the north and east. This plat was developed with modest, one-story brick veneer and wood-clad bungalows displaying Tudor and Colonial Revival and Ranch style influences. The Eltifes, successful entrepreneurs and members of another Lebanese family, sold most lots to investors while building some houses themselves on spec. In 1947 F. D. Sawyer built the one-story Colonial Revival style wood-clad dwelling on East Rix Street. It is one of the last houses to be built in the subdivision. These three plats include some of the most modest dwellings in the district, and historically provided rent housing for newly arrived oil workers as well as unmarried residents and those in lower-paying jobs.

By 1935 development in the western portions of the Azalea District north of Jacksonville Highway was intense and prime lots were becoming scarce. To accommodate demand, three local landowners filed plats for five plats within 13 months. All are located on the east side of Broadway. In February 1935 W. G. Tyler filed the Belmont Park Unit No. 2 and recorded an adjacent plat, Belmont Park Unit No. 1 in April 1935. Located between East First and East Second streets along Sneed and Belmont avenues, Belmont Park Unit No. 2 was developed in the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s with high-quality revival-style dwellings. Those along Belmont Avenue are more expansive and detailed than the dwellings on Sneed Avenue. Belmont Park Unit No. 1 extended development one block north to Lake Street. Dwellings are similar to those built in Unit No. 2 In October 1935 W.G. Tyler filed Belmont Park Unit No. 3, which stretches south along Sneed and Belmont avenues from East Second to East Fourth streets and continues the development trends of Units No. 1 and 2. Although laid out on a grid pattern, all three of the Belmont Park plats are distinguished by slightly curving streets. Dwellings in Belmont Park Unit No. 1 include the ca. 1935 Colonial Revival R. Stanley and Maude Florence House, while residences in Unit No. 2 include the 1935 Tudor Revival R. H. and Ethel Stocks House, and the 1937 Thad and Affie Allen House.

In June 1935 Julius A. Bergfeld platted about half of his father's 1876 purchase from the East Texas District Fair Association. Called the J. A. Bergfeld Subdivision, the plat is located between Broadway on the west, First Street on the north, Donnybrook on the east and East Fourth Street on the South. Gently curving streets front lots of roughly similar dimensions staggered within each block; corner parcels are frequently larger than interior parcels. This plat developed with expansive, high-style, substantial revival style and Ranch style dwellings with most residences built by 1950. In this plat are the 1937 Monterey Revival style Christ Episcopal Church Rectory on Roseland Boulevard as well as the 1937 French Eclectic Julius and Augusta Bergfeld House the 1940 Colonial Revival style Wilton and Myrtis Daniel House and the 1946 Ranch/Colonial Revival style William and Myra York House. The latter three are all on East Third Street. Bergfeld was, of course, the subdivision's developer, while Daniel was Executive Vice President of Gulf State Lumber and York was a local attorney. On East Second Street at the corner of Broadway is the ca. 1948 Classical Revival style First Church of Christ, Scientist. The congregation relocated here from an older, smaller church in central Tyler. More modest dwellings in this addition include the 1946 Colonial Revival Iredell and Norman Smith Jr. House on South Wall Avenue. Norman Smith Jr. was a drilling superintendent for oilman Billy Byars who lived nearby at 118 East Second Street. On Wall Avenue are the 1936 Tudor Revival Charles and Fay Deiches House and the ca. 1946 Colonial Revival J.J. and Ruby Swinney Investment House. These properties are within the 75-acre parcel Rudolph Bergfeld purchased in 1876 and part of his 1904 plat of the area known as the R. Bergfeld Subdivision. The George Murphy Subdivision, in March 1936, was the last of the plats filed in the eastern portion of the district. It is between East Lake Street and East Second Street, along the east side of Donnybrook Avenue and both sides of Wall Avenue. Lots in this plat are smaller than in the J. A. Bergfeld Subdivision and the three Belmont Park additions and follow a regular north-south orientation with no curving streets. Houses built here are relatively small, modest and unadorned. Most date from the late 1930s and 1940s.

In 1946, the Sunnybrook Addition Unit # 3 and Sunnybrook Addition Unit # 4 were platted by Lee B. Smith, J.M. Stephens, and Earl P. Stuart in anticipation of a surge in construction and population in the immediate post-World War II period. This area, which is in the southwestern part of the Azalea District, largely developed with one-story brick veneer Ranch-style dwellings, including the 1948 William and Opal Kirkham House on Oak Lane. Kirkham worked for Humble Oil and Refining. A few parcels in these two plats contain wood dwellings in revival or Ranch styles. The Fair Realty Co., headed by Wilton H. Fair, son of R. W. Fair, platted the Fair Addition #1 in 1948. This was the first of several plats in south Tyler undertaken by the Fairs in the late 1940s and the 1950s. These subdivisions were south of the city limits and were developed with quality, small and medium-sized brick veneer dwellings in Ranch, revival, and Ranch/Colonial Revival style modes. An example is the 1950 Ranch/Colonial Revival style Harold and Lou Phipps House on South Chilton Avenue. Phipps was the director of the Tyler Kiwanis Youth Center. The 1952 Broadway Addition at the north end of Old Bullard Road at its junction with Broadway Place was subdivided by Lee B. Smith, who also created district subdivisions on Sunnybrook Drive in the late 1940s. The second to the last subdivision in the district, Magnolia Gardens, was dedicated by Tyler resident D. K. Caldwell in 1961. Nearly all residences in this subdivision, along Tremont Street, were built in the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s. The final district plat, the So. Sunnybrook Addition # 5, was created in 1994 by Robert and Lisha Dennis to subdivide a large parcel privately held and minimally developed in the 1940s.

Unifying the district's eclectic architecture and complex subdivision history is the use of mass azalea plantings, pecans, oaks, crepe myrtles and Japanese maples as anchors in individual landscape schemes. These elements appear throughout the district. Azaleas were introduced to Tyler in 1929 (Tyler Public Library d) by Maurice Shamburger, a member of a prominent local family engaged in rose growing and other horticultural pursuits. In the late 1920s, Shamburger planted a test garden of about 100 azaleas and found four varieties that did well: Snow White, Hinodegeria, the Pride of Mobile and Tennessee White. In 1934 he began selling the plants and using them in mass plantings including the rear gardens at 121 Lindsey Lane. See the right rear of Photo 7 for portions of this garden. Shamburger went on to landscape many gardens in what became known as the Azalea District including those at the northwest and southwest corners of South Broadway and Lindsey Lane. In 1940, Shamburger's sister Margaret Shamburger Morris joined him in his practice and the two continued to provide Tyler with some of its most colorful and climatically appropriate garden designs. Maurice Shamburger is also credited with introducing Japanese maples and crepe myrtle trees to Tyler (Morris interview). Like the azalea, these trees are widely used in the Azalea District. At least nine gardens in the Azalea District were designed by Shamburger or Shamburger and Morris including the garden at 2600 South Chilton, and the gardens at 1404 South Chilton, 905 South Chilton, 223 East First, 209 East First, 118 East Second, 1619 South College and 1804 South College. The first district garden with azaleas is thought to have been the dwelling at 121 Lindsey Lane (Tyler Public Library d). In the 1960s district residents began highlighting their colorful gardens with tours of homes and gardens in the district. This event became known as the Azalea Trails and grows larger every year, drawing visitors from all over Texas.

The Azalea Residential Historic District is the largest and best-preserved concentration of early to mid-20th-century vernacular, popular, and high-style dwellings in the city. The district documents local eclectic subdivision patterns of the era and the variety of housing available to upper and middle-income Tyler residents and is associated first with Tyler's increasingly dominant position between 1900 and 1930, as a business, transportation and commercial hub and more importantly with the 1930 to 1970s East Texas Oil Boom, a period of tremendous growth and prosperity during which Tyler became an important regional business and service center. The Azalea District is the core of a larger south Tyler area that continued to develop into the 1970s in conjunction with ongoing oil boom-related prosperity. However, it is a distinct enclave, set apart from nearby areas by its eclectic early to mid-20th-century architecture and complex land divisions. This pattern repeats throughout the region and be seen in neighborhoods in cities such as Longview, Texas and Athens, Texas where on a smaller scale oil fostered similar growth and development in the same period.

The Azalea District is a distinctive, large concentration of substantial to modest dwellings that represent the most widely built architectural modes of the 1900 to 1955 era. Because the district largely developed between 1925 and 1953, when Colonial and Tudor revival modes were at their peak of popularity in the United States, these styles predominate. Other revival styles popular in the 1920s, 1930s and 1940s also are in the district including Classical Revival, Spanish Colonial, Mediterranean, French Eclectic, and Mission Revival modes. The primarily revivalist nature of Azalea District architecture is diversified by styles and plan types that predate 1925 including those displaying Queen Anne and Craftsman elements as well as by modern residential designs including those with International Style and Ranch styling. Most modern house forms in the district utilize massing, materials and detailing uncommon in small and medium-sized communities in the 1940s and early 1950s. The presence of such dwellings as fully developed examples of their respective styles reflects district residents' awareness of and access to au current cultural trends. Architectural quality in the district is very high no matter what the age or style of the house, suggesting that most district residents consider up-to-date and high-quality materials and craftsmanship vital to their social position, prosperity, and lifestyle.

While architectural and land division patterns throughout pre-1950 Tyler are eclectic, other neighborhoods display different mixtures of dwelling ages, sizes, types, and styles, setting apart the Azalea District. The Charnwood Residential Historic District, which is north-northeast of the Azalea District contains Tyler's oldest and most diverse residences on lots of greatly varying sizes. Dwellings in that neighborhood range in age from ca. 1870 to 1950 and include Queen Anne, Classical Revival, Craftsman, Tudor and Colonial Revival, Ranch, and Minimal Traditional modes. The neighborhood immediately north of the western portion of the Azalea District includes patterns and development similar to that found in the Charnwood District, but the development there is not as old, not as dense and includes few, expansive high-style dwellings. Extant residential properties there range in age from about 1885 to 1940. That area also lacks the concentration of substantial Revival-style residences that characterize the Azalea District.
Lot sizes in most post-1953 developments in Tyler are typically less diverse than within most Azalea district subdivisions. Residences built south of Sunnybrook Drive and Fair Lane, outside of the Azalea Residential Historic District, developed in the 1950s but tend to display more characteristics of post-war mass production and less of the individuality and eclecticism of residences within the historic district. As the oil boom continued through the 1970s residential development pushed south, southeast, and southwest of the Azalea District. Dwellings in these areas range from modest to expansive, but as is characteristic of residential design built nationwide between 1955 and 1980, these homes display much more formulaic design than do those in the Azalea District. Neighborhoods farther east, north, and west contain tract developments created in the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s and these display only limited lot size and little architectural variation.