Filer/Gobbe House

Bernard O. Mecklenburg, a prominent local architect in the early 20th century, designed this fourquare-type house.  The design incorporates Neoclassical details and is similar to adjacent houses, also designed by Mecklenburg.  The house was built in 1905 for Walter G. Filer, a manager of the Twin Falls Land and Water Co., and his wife, Esther.  After the Filers divorced in 1909, Esther sold the house to Anthony and Ruby Clawson Godbe.  According to family histories, the home was the setting for social activities involving many prominent Utahns, one being Susanna B. Emery Holmes, popularly known as the Silver Queen because of her connection with the mining industry.  She reportedly purchased the house in 1920, when the Godbes moved to the Federal Heights subdivision.  She owned it until 1922, then sold it to Lee and Annette Lovinger.  Lee was president of a local soap and disinfectant company.  The Lovingers lived here until Lee’s death in 1951.

943 East South Temple in the South Temple District of Salt Lake City, Utah.

Walter & Esther Filer House
943 E. South Temple c. 1906, Bernard O. Mecklenburg, SLC

Bernard Mecklenburg designed and built this house as well as the two houses directly to the east. All three share the foursquare floor plan popular in Utah in the early 20th century. This type of house is generally cube-shaped and consists of four roughly square rooms on each floor. It can feature ornamentation from a variety of styles, although Prairie and Neoclassical are most common.

Walter & Esther Filer House 943 E. South Temple c. 1906, Bernard O. Mecklenburg, SLC Bernard Mecklenburg designed and built this house as well as the two houses directly to the east. All three share the foursquare floor plan popular in Utah in the early 20th century. This type of house is generally cube-shaped and consists of four roughly square rooms on each floor. It can feature ornamentation from a variety of styles, although Prairie and Neoclassical are most common.

Walter Filer, manager of the Twin Falls Land and Water Company, and his wife, Esther, lived in this house until their divorce in 1909. Between 1960 and 1975, one of Salt Lake City’s many Nacey Rest Homes occupied the building. After a devastating fire in the 1980s, the house was renovated as a bed and breakfast inn.
(from Preservation Utah’s walking tour)