P&H Home Ad – October 2, 1953

Here's yet another vintage model home ad that ran in the Lorain Journal with an illustration of a housewife expressing her approval at the prospect of a new house. The ad ran in the paper on October 2, 1953.

Unlike other new home ads posted here (such as this one or this one) that implied that a new home was the path to a glamorous lifestyle, this ad was refreshingly different. The apron-clad homeowner depicted in the ad was no Dorothy Malone lookalike; she was obviously a housewife and mother who would genuinely appreciate the house in the ad.

I had a hard time locating the model house shown in the ad, as there didn't seem to be a house on Kneirim Drive that looked like the architectural rendering with its distinctive roof line. 

But I finally found it during a Google Maps 'drive by.' The house actually has a Pickett Road address. But it still looks great and modern, seventy years later. It's a very nice neighborhood too, with a country feeling. ( I remember as a kid I thought that whole area on the edge of town, including Pickett Road, Surf Ave., etc. was the 'boonies.')

But what's a P & H Home?

The company that designed them was Pawling & Harnischfeger, commonly known as P&H. The firm was Milwaukee-based and offered a variety of styles of home designs.

Vintage P&H Homes Brochure