Fifty-two years ago, when Ed and Barbara Blake bought their two-story, Tudor revival home in North Chattanooga’s Riverview neighborhood, the young couple didn’t know its whole history.
Then one day, they pulled up the linoleum in an upstairs closet. Underneath, they discovered brochures that explained their Sunset Road house was built by The Electric League of Chattanooga and opened to the public in September 1925 as “The Model Electric Home.”
While electricity already was desirable feature to have in a home then, the Model Electric Home took things to another level.
“They did have electricity, but just not as much stuff as this home had,” Barbara Blake says. “We had cigar lighters. We had baby bottle warmers. We had a lot of fun things.”
The brochure’s list of newfangled electric features goes on, including an illuminated house number; a doorbell “on an electric transformer – no need to run batteries;” and an electric log in the fireplace.