Rose Garden Resident
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The Alameda's Victorian landmark becomes home of accounting firm
By Mary Gottschalk
The Alameda's grande dame mansion has a new owner.
Bryan Olson, founder and owner of Controllers Group Inc., has relocated his South Bay office from Campbell to 1818 The Alameda.
Olson's move-in came a year after the Queen Anne Victorian went on for sale for $2.8 million on Valentine's Day 2006.
The price dropped to $2.5 million after a few months on the market, and Olson says he paid less than that.
Olson says he was immediately attracted to the mansion, built around 1893 and now a San Jose Historic Landmark.
"It's an appealing, attractive building to my type of client. It gives my company the right credibility with my client base. I think my clients will be impressed," he says.
Olson's 8-year-old company is an executive search firm specializing in accounting and finance. He has a second office in Pleasanton.
Attorney Mark Scott Collins did an extensive renovation of the stately structure and obtained city landmark status before moving his practice there in 2003.
Collins put both time and money into its restoration, taking it from a shabby chic look to its current refined elegance.
The two-story Victorian is approximately 4,550 square feet, with several original stained and leaded glass windows in both exterior and interior walls. The original hardware remains on the solid-wood doors found throughout the house, and many of the original plaster ceiling medallions also remain.
Sometimes called the Dunne House, it started as a private home at a time when Victorians lined The Alameda. Over the years, the Victorians gave way to newer style mansions, and now it's the only remaining one.
The exact date of construction is unknown, but research done in 2001 for its historic landmark application puts it between 1892 and 1895.
It is actually the second home constructed on that site.
Built for James Vincent Kelly, the Queen Anne is believed to be the design of Frank Delos Wolfe, the under-recognized influential San Jose architect who designed many of the homes in nearby Hanchett Park.
Kelly, a railroad commissioner and a tax collector for the Internal Revenue Service, sold the home in 1901 to Peter J. Dunne, a developer.
Dunne added onto the house in the back, and it is his name that is most often used in conjunction with the structure.
Dunne and his wife, Josephine, raised six children here, and it remained in the family until 1935, when it was sold to Dr. Jacob Leroy Pritchard. Three years later, he sold it to Gilliam Squires, reportedly for $5,000.
Squires and his wife Anna took in displaced families from Yugoslavia near the end of World War II.
They are believed to have helped some 50 families, many of whom found employment at the Mariana Packing Company.
It was in the 1950s that the house was divided into seven apartments, most likely to accommodate the refugee families.
John Tarabanovic, a child of one of the families, became a close friend to the Squires. In 1992 he inherited 1818 The Alameda from their estate.
Tarabanovic kept the property until 2001, when he sold it to Collins. It was listed for $1 million at that time.
