Stuart Neighborhood

Wealthy merchants and businessmen, seeking an escape from the hurried life of downtown living, built this prosperous neighborhood in the latter half of the nineteenth century. Movement to the suburbs gained in popularity after the 1850s, but lack of transportation hindered rapid development. The early suburbanites were mostly well-to-do and could afford to be a few minutes late to work if their buggies got stuck in the mud or snow. With the installation of horse-drawn trolleys in the 1880s, the middle class began to move here.