Reuben Borland House (Delavan Terrace Historic District)

The Delavan Terrace Historic District, located in northwest Yonkers in Westchester County, NY, is home to nine private residences that date back to the early part of the twentieth century. Included in the district is the Reuben Borland House, a late Queen Anne and Shingle Style residence built in 1904. The two-and-one-half story home was originally constructed for Reuben Borland, a hometown Yonkers legend known for his rise within the Alexander Smith & Sons Carpet Mills from bobbin boy earning $8 a week to president earning $100,000 a year. In the 1920s, it was also the residence of film and Broadway star, Billie Burke, best known for having played the role of Glinda the Good Witch in the 1939 movie classic, The Wizard of Oz, and for having married Florenz Ziegfeld of Ziegfeld Follies acclaim. The Delavan Terrace Historic District, which includes the Reuben Borland House, was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1983.

Surrounded by homes of various architectural styles, the Reuben Borland House stands out as an intact example of the successful implementation of late Queen Anne and Shingle Style architecture in a suburban development. The residence of two-and-one-half stories on a 60-by-125-feet lot contains two major bays, a recessed entrance porch, an entrance architrave featuring Ionic pilasters, and a recessed attic porch in gable end with curved shingled cheek walls and a semi-elliptical balcony supported on brackets. The home also exhibits intersecting gambrel roofs with flaring eaves and denticulated raking boards.

Reuben Borland erected his home in the neighborhood bounded by Delavan Terrace, Palisade Avenue, and Park Avenue in 1904, attracted by not only the unobstructed views of the Hudson River just east of the community but also the proximity to Yonkers’ commercial centers and industrial complexes. Borland, a Yonkers native, achieved local acclaim for his rise at the Alexander Smith & Sons Carpet Mills of Yonkers, which at one point was the world’s largest carpet manufacturer in the world. Having started out as a bobbin boy making $8 a day, Borland held the position of president of the company from 1916 to 1925, with a salary of $100,000 a year.

A subsequent owner of the Reuben Borland House was Billie Burke, a famous actress of silent films, hit Broadway productions, and one of the most viewed Hollywood movies of all time, The Wizard of Oz, from 1939. During an interview, Burke told an interviewer that the Borland House reminded her of a cottage home she had spent time in during a stay in London’s St. John’s Wood neighborhood. Prior to residing in Delavan Terrace, Burke had owned Burkeley Crest in Hastings-on-Hudson in Westchester County. She lived only a short time in Yonkers, later residing in Beverly Hills, California, with her husband Florenz Ziegfeld, of Ziegfeld Follies fame, and their daughter, Patricia.

Although the area around the Delavan Terrace Historic District has changed significantly in the hundred-plus years since development of the area in the early 1900s, the homes within the district retain much of their original design and appearance, when the district’s was a comfortable middle-class section of northwest Yonkers. The Delavan Terrace Historic District, including the Reuben Borland House, was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1983.

1. “Delavan Historic District #83001827.” National Register of Historic Places. United States Department of the Interior/National Park Service. 1985. https://catalog.archives.gov/id/75323003 
2. Hayter-Menzies, Grant. Mrs. Ziegfeld: The Public and Private Lives of Billie Burke. McFarland, Inc. 2009.
3. Rebic, Michael P., ed. James D. Keen, Doris B. Keen. Landmarks Lost & Found: An Introduction to the Architecture and History of Yonkers. Yonkers, NY: Yonkers Planning Bureau and the Yonkers Environmental Impact Advisory Commission. 1986.
4. Steinhagen, Jennie on behalf of Westchester County Historical Society. "Alexander Smith Carpet Mills Complex." Clio: Your Guide to History. Sept. 22, 2021. Accessed July 5, 2022. https://theclio.com/entry/140184
5. "To See The Wizard Oz on Stage and Film" from “The Wizard of Oz: An American Fairy Tale." Library of Congress. Dec. 15, 2010. 
6. Williams, Gray. Picturing Our Past: National Register Sites in Westchester County. Westchester County Historical Society. 2003.