While preparing an architectural history presentation I am delivering for Barrington Preservation Society’s plaque program this week, I learned from my co-researcher on our plaque committee that this house we are studying was that of a bomber pilot killed in action in World War II (pictured; he lived there with his wife and mother-in-law, who was the owner).
A few years ago I had learned that my own house was the home of a young man killed in the Civil War. I have been doing house-history research for years, but don’t think I’ve either thought about or come across a term for this distinction for a house from which a resident was killed in military service: like a family’s service flag (the tradition, dating from World War I, of displaying a blue star for every family member in active service, and displaying a gold stars for a family member killed in service), but applying the concept to a house.
Without detracting from the greater importance of the concept to remember the families of fallen service members, it seems appropriate to make an effort to remember these Gold Star Houses, especially in communities—urban, suburban, or rural—where the neighborhood’s families may have all changed a generation later.
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