The Beaverdale Brick: how a house type became a neighborhood language

Beaverdale is one of those rare neighborhoods where the houses became part of the name. The neighborhood association says most subdivisions were developed between 1920 and 1940, and that in 1938 contractor E.T. McMurray began building the now-famous Beaverdale Brick homes. That date matters because it marks the moment when the neighborhood’s visual identity became unusually distinct.  Those homes did not appear in isolation. The earlier growth pattern already included a business district, neighborhood organizing, and a maturing residential area. By the time the brick houses arrived, Beaverdale had the civic structure to make them stick as a neighborhood signature rather than just another building fad. That is an inference, but it is strongly supported by the sequence on the neighborhood’s own history page.  The nearby Lower Beaver area helps show the larger housing texture around Beaverdale. Lower Beaver’s history says the first housing development there began in 1919 at Beaver and Douglas, that homes were owner-built, and that they are still recognizable for their individual character and large front lawns. It also says residents once commuted via the Urbandale trolley toward what is now known as Beaverdale. So the broader northwest pattern was already mixing transit, lawns, and highly personal house forms.  That housing character still matters in the present. Invest DSM’s 2025 homeowner profile featured residents standing in front of their 1935 Beaverdale Brick home and framed the neighborhood-improvement support around maintaining and upgrading homes in the Franklin Area near Beaverdale. The story is small, but it points to something larger: these houses are still being cared for as long-term neighborhood assets, not just old structures.  Invest DSM’s broader Franklin Area materials reinforce the same feeling. They describe the area at the juncture of Beaverdale and Waveland Park as a place of leafy streets, iconic local gathering spots, and homes with character near downtown amenities. That is not a technical architectural description, but it matches the lived reputation Beaverdale has built around its housing stock.  So the “Beaverdale Brick” story is really about how architecture became neighborhood shorthand. The houses helped people recognize the place, talk about the place, and continue investing in the place. In Beaverdale, the built environment did not just shelter neighborhood identity. It helped create it.