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Inventory Form
NR Nomination

LOCATION AND PROPERTY NAME
address:1125 NW 21st Ave historic name:Devers, Arthur H., House
Portland, Multnomah County (97209) current/other names:Devers, Arthur H. and Nellie, House; Arthur Devers House; Arthur and Nellie Devers House
assoc addresses:
block/lot/tax lot:300 / 2 / 1N1E33BA 3800
location descr: twnshp/rng/sect/qtr sect:1N 1E 33
PROPERTY CHARACTERISTICS
resource type:Building height (stories):2.5 total elig resources:1 total inelig resources:1
elig evaluation: eligible/significant NR Status: Individually Listed
prim constr date:1891 second date: date indiv listed:02/20/2026
primary orig use: Single Dwelling orig use comments:
second orig use:
primary style: Queen Anne prim style comments:
secondary style: sec style comments:
primary siding: Horizontal Board siding comments:
secondary siding: Wood:Other/Undefined
plan type: architect:unknown
builder:
comments/notes:
GROUPINGS / ASSOCIATIONS
Not associated with any surveys or groupings.
SHPO INFORMATION FOR THIS PROPERTY
NR date listed: 02/20/2026
ILS survey date:
RLS survey date:
106 Project(s): None
Special Assess Project(s): None
Federal Tax Project(s): None
ARCHITECTURAL / PROPERTY DESCRIPTION
(Includes expanded description of the building/property, setting, significant landscape features, outbuildings and alterations)
The Arthur H. Devers House is located at 1125 NW 21st Avenue, a block north of the northern boundary of the National Register-listed Alphabet Historic District in the northwest quadrant of Portland, Oregon. It is a 2.5-story wood-framed building of 2,288 square feet, with parged brick and concrete foundation and horizontal wood “drop” siding. The house, now a duplex, is in the Queen Anne style and was completed in 1891. The architect and/or builder are unknown. There is one contemporary noncontributing structure on the property, a small shed in the southwest corner of the lot. Exterior character-defining features include the house’s staggered front gables, one with fishscale shingle siding and a bullseye window and the other with rectangular shingles and a rectangular window. Both gables flare outward at the bottom, forming a shallow overhang over the second story. Additional features include the double-hung wood windows, most of which appear original and have ogees and wavy glass, and three faceted bays: one at the ground level on the primary (east) façade, and two full-height bays on the north and south façades. There are also three stained-glass windows, all original, including one transom window over the entry doors and two others in the north and east bays. These three windows cannot be definitively attributed but bear the hallmarks of the famous Portland art glass studio, Povey Brothers. Finally, the original horizontal wood “drop” siding, along with the shingle siding at gable ends, is a characteristic of the house’s original design, style, and materials. At the interior, character-defining features include the fireplace with its decorative surround, and the dark wood stair with turned balusters and decorative newel posts. All of these features were constructed for the Devers family, who lived in the house from 1891 to 1908, the period of time in which Arthur Devers became an important civic leader and businessman in Portland
HISTORY
(Chronological, descriptive history of the property from its construction through at least the historic period - preferably to the present)
The Devers House has local significance under Criterion B in the areas of Commerce and Social History for its association with late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century Portland business and civic leader Arthur H. Devers. Arthur Devers was a well-known, well-regarded, and important businessman in Portland as one of the owners of Closset & Devers, one of the top coffee and tea importers in the Pacific Northwest during this period. His name lives on in the Devers Eye Clinic, which was founded in Northwest Portland, just a few blocks from the Devers House, by a $1M gift from Devers in his will. The house, which Devers lived in for 17 years with his first wife and young daughter, was built for the family in 1891, when Devers was about 33 years old. The family lived in the house until 1908, the end of the period of significance. By this date Devers had become an influential leader in Portland. He had played an important role in planning and executing the Lewis and Clark Exposition of 1905; advocated and found funding for the creation of the Dalles-Celilo canal, begun in 1905; and helped put together a “City Beautiful” committee that would become the Civic Improvement League, which would go on to hire Edward Bennett to create the progressive-era Bennett Plan for Portland. The Arthur H. Devers House is the only extant resource that is associated with Devers during the most productive time of his career and civic leadership in Portland, and it uniquely represents the time period during which Devers became an important figure in Portland’s commercial and social development.
RESEARCH INFORMATION
Title Records Census Records Property Tax Records Local Histories
Sanborn Maps Biographical Sources SHPO Files Interviews
Obituaries Newspapers State Archives Historic Photographs
City Directories Building Permits State Library
Local Library: University Library:
Historical Society: Other Respository:
Bibliography:
Abbott, Carl. Portland: Planning, Politics and Growth in a Twentieth-Century City. Lincoln, NE: University of Nebraska Press, 1983. Cioffi, George A., The Devers Manual: Ophthalmology for the Health Care Professional. Baltimore: Williams & Wilkins, 1997. City of Portland Bureau of Planning and Sustainability and Portland Parks and Recreation. City of Portland Civic Planning, Development, & Public Works, 1851-1965: A Historic Context. Portland, Oregon, 2009. Accessed online at https://www.portlandoregon.gov/parks/article/299256. Comerford, Jane, A History of Northwest Portland, From the River to the Hills. Portland, OR: Dragonfly Press, 2011. Dana, Marshall N., “The Celilo Canal—Its Origin—Its Building and Meaning,” Oregon Historical Quarterly, Vol. 16, No. 2 (June 1915), pp. 109-124. Donovan & Associates/ Prohaska survey form (“Devers House”), Oregon SHPO Inventory of Historic Properties, Multnomah County, August 1992 Harrison, Michael, and Cielo Lutino, Liza Mickle, Peter Mye, Bill Cunningham, and Stephanie Gauthier. Alphabet Historic District. National Register of Historic Places Registration Form. National Park Service, 2000. Hawkins, William J. III and William F. Willingham, Classic Houses of Portland, Oregon, 1850-1950. Portland, OR: Timber Press, 1999. Lewis, David, “Willamette Valley Treaties,” Oregon Encyclopedia entry, https://www.oregonencyclopedia.org/articles/willamette_valley_treaties/ Pendergrast, Mark, Uncommon Grounds: The History of Coffee and How it Transformed Our World. New York, NY: Basic Books, 1999. R. L. Polk Co., Portland (and Seattle) City Directories, various dates 1881-1983. Ryerson, Mike; Norm Gholston; and Tracy J. Prince, Portland’s Slabtown. Charleston, SC: Arcadia Publishing, 2013. Spencer, Arthur. “New Life for 100-year-old Devers House,” NW Examiner, January 1988. Tess, John M. and Richard Ritz, Digman-Zidell House, National Register of Historic Places Registration Form. National Park Service, 1993. Ukers, William H. All About Coffee. New York: Tea and Coffee Trade Journal Co., 1922. (Available in its entirety online at https://ukersallaboutcoffee.wordpress.com/all-about-coffee/) Volkmann, Daniel G., “Sixty Five Years of A. Schilling & Company,” Schilling Family website, accessed at https://www.allelementsdesign.com/schilling/company/spices/65years.html Webfooters Post Card Club, “Portland’s Coffee Connection,” Webfooter Extra, February 2015, 4. Accessed on February 26, 2025 at http://www.thewebfooters.com/html/newsletter_archives.html Zehntbauer, John A., “History of Jantzen,” compiled by Tor Lundgren from the stories originally published in the Jantzen company paper, Jantzen Yarns, between 1928 and 1956. April 2009. Accessed online at http://www.metolius.net/family/page3/files/Janzten-History.pdf Newspapers: Oregon City Courier, 1898 Oregonian (Portland, OR), various dates San Francisco Chronicle, 1925 Seattle Star, 1918 The Oregon Journal (Portland, OR), various dates The Oregon Statesman (Salem, OR), 1944 The Centennial (Portland, OR), 190