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The Providence Journal Steve Szydlowski

In 1949, 10 professors at the University of Rhode Island, then known as Rhode Island State College, executed an innovative plan to find affordable housing near campus. Led by Frank Pelton, professor of education at the college, they banded together and bought six-and-a-half acres in Kingston.

They divided the land into building lots and allocated the lots by drawing numbers out of a hat. Then they started building their houses, doing much of the work themselves. One was Henry Campbell, an assistant professor of engineering at the time. Campbell mapped out the water system that would connect the new houses to the Kingston water supply.

A photo which ran in The Providence Journal on Oct. 8, 1950, shows Campbell, standing on a scaffold, painting the top of his nearly-completed house. Now the house, a Cape at 52 Cherry Rd., which has seen some additions and renovations through the years, is for sale.

“It’s a house with good bones and a good soul,” said Nicole Newcombe, who bought it with her husband Scott in 2007. “We thought it was adorable. We liked the layout of the house, the way everything kind of flowed … in the winter we would watch the snow fall out of the picture window and have a fire going. It’s a house that lends itself to spending time with family.”

Gallery

Walk through the House of the Week

At this time of year, the neighborhood is lush and green, with lots of big trees. The properties are divided by hedges and low stonewalls. The house itself is a classic Cape, white with black shutters and a bright red door.

Walking in that door, the living room is immediately to the left. The space is dominated by a large, multipaned bay window on one side and the fireplace, with a brick surround and pine mantel, on the other. Pine wainscoting on the walls gives the room a rustic accent.

The living room leads into the kitchen/dining area. Realtor Lynn Leffray, who lives just a few houses away, said they had probably been separate rooms at one time, but they’ve been reconfigured as one large space.

The dining room, with walls painted a soft yellow/gold, has a large window and track lighting over the table. The kitchen was completely renovated about six years ago, with tile floor, Formica counters, maple cabinets, new black appliances, and tile backsplash behind the counters, sink and stove.

A door from the kitchen leads to a back patio, built from Unilock pavers by the Newcombes, that wraps around the back and side of the house. (The patio has a gas fire pit that comes with the property.) There are some reminders of Campbell, the home’s original owner. One is the “blueberry hedge,” a row of blueberry bushes that Campbell planted in the backyard, protected from insects by netting supported on a wooden frame. “We get buckets of blueberries every year,” Newcombe said.

Then there’s a mysterious door on the back wall of the house. Open it, and there’s a large mirror. Judging by some instructional pictures of a golf swing taped to the mirror, Leffray speculated that Campbell used the mirror to practice his own golf swing.

Back inside, past the doorway that leads from the kitchen to the patio, is a pantry and a full bath, which the Newcombes put in, using space that had formerly been occupied by the garage. There’s a tradeoff at work here — more amenities inside the house, but less space for the garage, which can no longer accommodate a car.

To the right of the entrance hall is a cozy room, originally designed as a bedroom, but now used as a den/office. It has a nook in the wall that’s perfect for a desk, with built-in shelving overhead.

Upstairs there are three bedrooms and a full bath with new tiles and carpentry. The master bedroom, in gray and white, has a full closet and small doors on the side walls that lead to storage areas. The other side of the second floor has two bedrooms. One is set up for kids, with a mural of a tree on one wall. From that room, a passageway leads to a single step that drops into the third bedroom, a hideaway tucked under the eaves above the garage.

The basement is partially finished, with storage under the stairs, a carpeted room set up as an office and a cedar closet. The other side of the basement is unfinished, but includes a large workbench surrounded by cabinets, drawers and shelving.

The house at 52 Cherry Rd., in Kingston, is for sale at $349,900. It has three bedrooms, two baths and 1,760 square feet of living space, including the finished basement. Real estate taxes were $3,903 in 2008. The Realtor is Lynn Leffray, Coleman Realtors, (401) 884-5522, ext 238, e-mail lleffray@colemanrealtors.com. How to submit a House of the Week

A different House of the Week appears each Saturday in the projoHomes section of The Providence Journal. The feature tells the story of the house and the people who have lived in it. If you would like us to consider a house for sale as a subject of this news feature, send a photo, information about the house and why it is of interest, to Christine Dunn or Andy Smith,

75 Fountain St., Providence, RI 02902; fax (401) 277-8250; or e-mail pjhomes@projo.com.

For more information,

call Dunn: (401) 277-7913 or Smith: (401) 277-7262.

asmith@projo.com