Isaac O. Pickering House

Isaac Orlando Pickering (1842-1923) was a successful attorney and a Civil War veteran, having served in the Ninth Kansas Cavalry. He moved from Ohio to the Kansas Territory with his parents and siblings in the mid-1850s. Like his father and two older brothers, the 19-year-old Pickering was a farmer in Liberty in1860. Major Pickering married Celona Weaver (1848-1925) in 1867. He was admitted to the bar in Olathe in 1872. Pickering also became the assistant chief clerk of the Kansas House of Representatives. By 1880, the Pickering household included three daughters and a son, aged five to twelve, and a mulatto servant and Missouri native named William Casson (age 19). From 1878 to 1885, Pickering was the city attorney for Olathe and then its mayor. Pickering ran unsuccessfully for Governor of Kansas in 1892 and 1894 on the Prohibition party ticket and was candidate for the state Supreme Court in 1908.

Three generations of Pickerings were living in the house in 1900. The fourth child, Jessie (25) was married to James A. Evans (27, a merchant) and had a three-year-old daughter, Frances C. Jessie's two younger siblings, George B. (17) and Harold W. (14) shared the home with their parents. Isaac (68) and Celena (62) were empty nesters by 1910 but added a roomer named Richard Grover (60, a shopkeeper). The couple were joined by Celena's brother, Cornelius Weaver (69), a widower, by 1920. The graves of Isaac and Celona are in the Olathe Memorial Cemetery.

A son of Isaac and Celona, Fred S. Pickering (61), lived in the West Street house in 1930 with his wife, Kate (58), and sons Ben A. (24) and John (16). Fred worked as a civil engineer and Ben was a musician in an orchestra. In 1935, Ben was living in New York and John was a resident of Baton Rouge, Louisiana. By 1940, the brothers and their wives lived in the West Street house once again with their parents and two young children of Ben. Fred was a civil engineer with the county surveyor's office and the brothers were musicians in an orchestra. The estimated value of the home dropped from $1,500 in 1930 to $1,000 in 1940.

The front porch of the Isaac Pickering House ends in a domed pavilion and likely was a later addition to the house; the adjacent northeast corner of the house is curved. A kitchen was attached to the southwest corner of the house early in the twentieth century. Mr. and Mrs. Albert Fleer purchased the house in 1961 and completed some interior renovations. The formerly wooden front steps have been replaced with concrete steps. A number of interior architectural elements survived into the late 1970s when the house was documented for listing in the National Register. A curving staircase, fireplaces and mantels, doors, molding, and wainscoting were around one hundred years old by that time; later owners reportedly sold anything of value inside the home. The original large lot once contained vegetable and flower gardens, a stable, and a carriage house. The house served as a bed and breakfast in the 1990s and 2000s.

Anonymous. "Maj. I.O. Pickering. Death Sunday to Prominent Pioneer Olathean." Olathe Mirror (Olathe, KS) May 10th 1923, 1-1.

Bhargava, Jennifer. "Glory returning to Olathe's Pickering House." Kansas City Star (Kansas City) August 24th 2015, Local: Olathe and Southwest JoCo sec.

Converse, Jim. Maj Isaac Orlando Pickering, Memorial 19029578, Find A Grave. April 20th 2007. Accessed August 13th 2020. https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/19029578/isaac-orlando-pickering.

Johnson County Museum. I.O. Pickering House (1870s). ALBUM newsletter, Johnson County Museum. March 1st 2002.

McClintock, Terry. Isaac O. Pickering (1842 - 1923), WikiTree. April 29th 2018. Accessed August 13th 2020. https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Pickering-2113.

McIlrath, Sherri. 091-4140-00001 Pickering, Isaac O., House, 507 W Park St, Kansas Historic Resources Inventory. Accessed August 13th 2020. https://khri.kansasgis.org/index.cfm?in=091-4140-00001.

Wortman, Julie A. Nimz, Dale. NRHP Nomination of Isaac O. Pickering House. National Register. Washington, DC. National Park Service, 1980.

U.S. Census. Household of Fred S. Pickering at 507 West St., Ward 1, Olathe, KS, dwelling 325, family 329. Washington, DC. U.S. Government, 1930.

U.S. Census. Household of Fred S. Pickering at 507 West St., Ward 1, Olathe, KS, dwelling 23. Washington, DC. U.S. Government, 1940.