John N. Gott House, 1861

709 West Huron Street

John N. Gott House, 1861

Begun in the 1850s by William C. Voorheis, this Italianate brick mansion was completed in 1861 by a creditor, attorney John N. Gott, who lived here for three decades. In 1890 it was sold to Dr. William James Herdman, a prominent member of the University of Michigan's medical faculty, who converted it to a private hospital. Fond of experimenting with medical uses of electricity in his laboratory, at home Herdman was a Victorian autocrat. "I'll do the thinking around here!" he admonished his daughter when she hesitatingly prefaced a statement with the words, "I think--" His son, school and city physician E. K. Herdman, inherited the property in 1906. After 1925, Dr. William Koch, who claimed to have a cure for cancer, treated patients in his clinic on the premises.

When the Eugene Hannahs bought the place from Koch in 1941, they named it the "Martha Washington House" as it provided lodgings for women only. Acquisition of a second rooming house for men, to be named for George Washington, was contemplated but never accomplished.

When Donald and Lorraine Haugen purchased the house in 1971, they hoped to reopen some of the seven original fireplaces, one of which has a lovely marble mantel, but were disappointed to find that the chimneys had been removed when the roof was resurfaced. Later in the 1970s, the firm of Bishop and Shelton purchased the house and, with practically no change to the interior or the exterior, converted it to law offices.

The cast iron window grilles in this stately landmark are identical to those in the Kempf House. Apparently a stock item available to local builders, the same grilles have been found on several farmhouses in rural Washtenaw County.