Stanley Matthews (1892-1942) was the son of prominent attorney Mortimer Matthews and Marianna Procter; she was a daughter of William A. Procter, senior partner in the famous soap company. As you know, many members of the Procter family lived here. The architect’s grandfather, also Stanley Matthews (1824-1889) of Glendale, was a Justice of the United States Supreme Court and US Senator from Ohio. The younger Stanley attended Glendale public schools and St. Paul’s School in Concord, N.H. He received a B.A. from Princeton University (1913), married his first wife, Maude Aldrich, and served in WWI; then earned a degree in architecture from Columbia University in 1920.

That same year, Matthews returned to Cincinnati and built his own home, Stonolden, a superb English Cottage at 60 East Fountain Avenue. The house appeared in the July 1923 issue of Country Life magazine, which was quite a coup for an architect just beginning his career. Matthews was associated at times with Archibald C. Denison (also of Glendale), A. W. Jenkins; and C. W. Short (who had a comparable Cincinnati and East Coast background). Matthews and his partners designed the Children’s Hospital (1926), Westwood Public Library (1930); and many residences including the William A. Cartwright House at 9 Grandin Lane and the Joseph and Hilda Resor House at 1075 Edwards Road. By far the most elaborate was this picturesque Normandy Manor at “Winding Creek Farm,” a 1600-acre estate built for Julius Fleischmann in Indian Hill with Short and Denison in the mid-1920s.

Matthews’ career benefited greatly from his family connections. For his brother William Procter Matthews (d. 1896-1965) and his wife, he designed this rambling English Revival Manor House at 915 Congress Avenue in 1926. Matthews and his partners also participated with his family in the Forest Place Subdivision in 1926. The resulting houses, in variations of Colonial and Tudor Revival styles, were at 35, 45, and 55 Erie Avenue, and 3 and 4 Forest Place. Other designs by Matthews include 825 Hedgerow for Bramwell Ault; 810 Woodbine, and remodelings of 95 and 110 East Fountain and 890 and 930 Forest Avenue. He designed classroom-additions to the Glendale Elementary School in 1928 and supervised the construction of the chapel at the Community the Transfiguration, which was founded by Sister Eva Mary Matthews, the architect’s aunt. The chapel was designed by Ralph Adams Cram, the leading church architect in the US during the early 20th century.

He also tried his hand at publishing a magazine, Architectural Progress. He was joined on the editorial board by Frederick Garber and Alfred Elzner, and contributing writers included Frank Lloyd Wright and Eliel Saarinen. But this project was short-lived, a victim of the Depression in 1932.