127 Ralston Avenue is a 2 1/2 story, 2 bay, rectangular plan, Queen Anne-influenced, wood frame, residential building. Built c. 1880, the clapboard-clad house has an intersecting gable roof, tri-partite window grouping in its gable apex, and a Doric column-supported wrap-around porch with an extended pedimented entrance bay and porte-cochere. Additional Queen Anne details include a patterned slate-clad roof, vergeboards, cornerboards, and simple wooden window surrounds. In 1890, the house was owned by H. B. Bailey, and in 1904 by Mrs. E.W. Orvis. In a recent email to the MPHDA (July 2004), Ed Papp wrote that his family lived at 127 Ralston Ave from 1952 to about 1974.

Mr. Papp’s father was an executive at B. Altman’s dept store in Manhattan. Although a large house, it was often small for seven children! Previous owners were the Rummle’s (a teacher at Seton Hall) and the Barrymore acting family when John and Ethel were youngsters). Mr. Papp recalled that while his father was having some work done on the garage a local craftsman remembered it being used as a horse stable complete with an array of carriages and ponies.

127 Ralston