The F. H. Miller House is a historic building located in the central part of
Davenport, Iowa
Davenport is a city in and the county seat of Scott County, Iowa, United States. Located along the Mississippi River on the eastern border of the state, it is the largest of the Quad Cities, a metropolitan area with a population of 384,324 and a ...
, United States. The house served as the official residence for two of Davenport's
Catholic
The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...
bishops
A bishop is an ordained clergy member who is entrusted with a position of authority and oversight in a religious institution.
In Christianity, bishops are normally responsible for the governance of dioceses. The role or office of bishop is ca ...
and as a
bed and breakfast
Bed and breakfast (typically shortened to B&B or BnB) is a small lodging establishment that offers overnight accommodation and breakfast. Bed and breakfasts are often private family homes and typically have between four and eleven rooms, wit ...
. In 2008, the building then housed the Office of Advancement and Alumni Relations for
St. Ambrose University, and was called the St. Ambrose Alumni House. In November of 2023, it was purchased privately from the university and is now '
The Hilltop Inn of Davenport''. The property is currently being restored and preserved as best as possible to many of its original styles and furnishings. '
The Hilltop Inn of Davenport'' has recently began business and is operating as a boutique hotel and event rental center for various gatherings. It has been listed on the
National Register of Historic Places
The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic v ...
since 1983.
History
The house was built by John Drew for John Dahms in 1871. He lost his fortune and was forced to sell the house in a
sheriff's sale in 1880 to Frank H. Miller, a wholesale grocer.
He had been Davenport's largest wholesale grocer and jobber from the
Civil War
A civil war or intrastate war is a war between organized groups within the same state (or country).
The aim of one side may be to take control of the country or a region, to achieve independence for a region, or to change government policies ...
to the turn of the 20th century.
[ with ]
In 1907 the house was purchased by the
Catholic Diocese of Davenport for $26,500 and it became the residence and headquarters for the diocese's bishop,
James Davis.
Previous bishops had resided at the
Antoine LeClaire House
The Antoine LeClaire House is a historic building located on the east side of Davenport, Iowa, United States. It is a community center that was built as a private home by one of the founders of the city of Davenport. It also housed two of Davenp ...
in Davenport. Bishop Davis moved into the Miller House on June 24, and a desk was placed in the corner of the living room for the Rev. Joseph P. Stahl, who served as both
chancellor
Chancellor ( la, cancellarius) is a title of various official positions in the governments of many nations. The original chancellors were the of Roman courts of justice—ushers, who sat at the or lattice work screens of a basilica or law cou ...
and secretary to the bishop.
[ Davis established the first ]Carmelite Monastery
Carmelite Monastery (Sisters of Mercy Convent) is a historic monastery at 400 E. Carpenter Street in Stanton, Texas.
It was built in 1882 and added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1999.
The property was also designated a Recorded ...
in the Midwest
The Midwestern United States, also referred to as the Midwest or the American Midwest, is one of four Census Bureau Region, census regions of the United States Census Bureau (also known as "Region 2"). It occupies the northern central part of ...
adjacent to the home in 1911.Henry Rohlman
Henry Patrick Rohlman (March 17, 1876 – September 13, 1957) was a German-born prelate of the Roman Catholic Church. He served as bishop of the Diocese of Davenport in Iowa from 1927 to 1944 and as coadjutor archbishop and archbishop of the Archd ...
, lived in the house until 1933 when he moved to the Selma Schricker House
The Selma Schricker House is a historic building located in a residential neighborhood in the West End of Davenport, Iowa, United States. At one time the house served as the official residence of Davenport's Catholic bishop. It is a contrib ...
on Clay Street. The Miller House became the novitiate
The novitiate, also called the noviciate, is the period of training and preparation that a Christian ''novice'' (or ''prospective'') monastic, apostolic, or member of a religious order undergoes prior to taking vows in order to discern whether ...
for the Sisters of St. Francis of Clinton, Iowa
Clinton is a city in and the county seat of Clinton County, Iowa, United States. The population was 24,469 as of 2020. Clinton, along with DeWitt (also located in Clinton County), was named in honor of the sixth governor of New York, DeWitt Cl ...
. After the sisters moved out in 1941 it was bought by Thomas Hinrichsen and the house was divided into six apartments to house workers at the Rock Island Arsenal
The Rock Island Arsenal comprises , located on Arsenal Island, originally known as Rock Island, on the Mississippi River between the cities of Davenport, Iowa, and Rock Island, Illinois. It lies within the state of Illinois. Rock Island ...
.[ It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1983.][
The house was bought from Hinrichsen by Herb Tyler in 1989 and was completely renovated and turned into a bed and breakfast called the Bishop's House Inn, which was named after the two bishops who had made it their home. St. Ambrose University bought the bed and breakfast in 1995 and operated it until May 2008.]
Architecture
W. L. Carroll was the architect for the residence, which was built in the Italianate
The Italianate style was a distinct 19th-century phase in the history of Classical architecture. Like Palladianism and Neoclassicism, the Italianate style drew its inspiration from the models and architectural vocabulary of 16th-century Italian R ...
style by John Drew.[ The house is constructed of red brick and features stone trim and a ]porch
A porch (from Old French ''porche'', from Latin ''porticus'' "colonnade", from ''porta'' "passage") is a room or gallery located in front of an entrance of a building. A porch is placed in front of the facade of a building it commands, and form ...
that wraps around the ground floor of the building. At one time the exterior was stucco
Stucco or render is a construction material made of aggregates, a binder, and water. Stucco is applied wet and hardens to a very dense solid. It is used as a decorative coating for walls and ceilings, exterior walls, and as a sculptural and a ...
ed and painted. The three-story structure has elaborate bracketed cornices
In architecture, a cornice (from the Italian ''cornice'' meaning "ledge") is generally any horizontal decorative moulding that crowns a building or furniture element—for example, the cornice over a door or window, around the top edge of a ...
, and was originally topped with a belvedere Belvedere (from Italian, meaning "beautiful sight") may refer to:
Places
Australia
*Belvedere, Queensland, a locality in the Cassowary Coast Region
Africa
* Belvedere (Casablanca), a neighborhood in Casablanca, Morocco
*Belvedere, Harare, Zi ...
. The house has five bays across the front with a door in the center bay. The Gambrel
A gambrel or gambrel roof is a usually symmetrical two-sided roof with two slopes on each side. (The usual architectural term in eighteenth-century England and North America was "Dutch roof".) The upper slope is positioned at a shallow angle, w ...
roof dormer
A dormer is a roofed structure, often containing a window, that projects vertically beyond the plane of a pitched roof. A dormer window (also called ''dormer'') is a form of roof window.
Dormers are commonly used to increase the usable space ...
s are a unique feature of this house.[ It was one of the first Italianate houses in Davenport that utilized windows shaped other than rectangular.]
References
External links
Office of Advancement and Alumni Relations
{{DEFAULTSORT:Miller, F. H., House
St. Ambrose University
Roman Catholic Diocese of Davenport
Houses on the National Register of Historic Places in Iowa
Houses completed in 1871
Italianate architecture in Iowa
Buildings and structures in Davenport, Iowa
National Register of Historic Places in Davenport, Iowa
Bed and breakfasts in Iowa
Houses in Davenport, Iowa