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With agricultural success in peaches and roses, R. W. Fair built a two-story brick house on this site in 1923 on land that his family owned and that he subdivided for development. When oil was discovered beneath his orchards in what became part of the East Texas Oil Field, he sold the house, which its new owner moved to 1505 S. Robinson Street (where it still stands), and built this new house. Simons had developed his own personal handling of the Georgian style as seen here in the central semicircular portico of two-story Ionic columns with a delicate iron balustrade above and a diminutive octagonal domed cupola on the hipped roof. The central bay behind the portico is painted white, and its segmental-arched entrance is flanked by small oval windows, a typical Simons feature. This portico treatment was repeated a decade later at the St. Gregory School (see TK12) and at Tyler Junior College (TK21).