The Glen Falls was Sears’ second grandest ‘kit’ house

By Mark Frost, Chronicle Editor

Thanks to my brother Rich, I’m following up on my story in the July 17 Chronicle about the Sears kit house tour I took with the Saratoga Springs Preservation Foundation.

Turns out Rich is a Sears kit house aficionado, and he alerted me that one of Sears’s biggest, most lavish houses was called The Glen Falls.

There much info on searshomes.org, a website apparently maintained by Rosemary Thornton, author of The Houses That Sears Built and another on Montgomery Ward’s Mail-Order Homes.

“Of the 370 models that Sears offered,” the site says “there was only one house that was fancier and bigger than the Glen Falls: The Sears Magnolia.

“In 1922, the Magnolia had sold for $5,849. In the mid-20s, the Glen Falls sold for $4,560. The Magnolia had 2,900 square feet. The Glen Falls had about 2,700 square feet. It was a very large house for its time.

“And while I love this house, it harbors some bad memories for me.

“I’ve received a verbal thrashing from TWO Glen Falls homeowners, both of whom were pretty upset when I told them that their beautiful house might be a Sears house.

“The house is so grandiose and so beautiful, people just don’t believe that this was one of those ‘crappy little kit homes.’”

Madison C. Squires, who led the July Saratoga Springs Preservation tour I took, emphasized that Sears kit houses were of high quality.

Rosemary Thornton’s post dates from four years ago, but The Glen Falls design continues to generate comment today.

In a Reddit post just last month, someone wrote, “This is really weird as I live in Glens Falls, a ‘city’ with less than 15,000 people. Yes a lot of the homes look like this.

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