The Hillcrest Estates subdivision is where Richmond's and Rosenberg's elite coalesced in the post–World War II period. This red brick, neo-Georgian suburban house built for Ruth and Walter Shult, a Rosenberg appliance and farm implements dealer, and brother of architect Ernest L. Shult, indicates the extent to which even small-town clients kept in touch with big-city styles—and architects— as late as the 1950s. Other Houston architects represented along Hillcrest Drive are William Tamminga, who was an O'Neil Ford protégé, at 900 Hillcrest of 1959; John H. Freeman Jr. designed the Donald D. Napier House (1958) at number 315; and, at number 109, Howard Barnstone and Eugene Aubry's Mayde Butler House (1969) now has its flat roof capped by an awkward series of pitched roofs.
Hillcrest begins where Front Street, the street closest to the Brazos River, and Ransom Road diverge. At 915 Front Street, on what was the edge of the original townsite, is the Loretto Lamar and Samuel B. Calder House (c. 1854), a side-gabled, five-bay, central-hall-plan cottage originally owned by the daughter of Mirabeau B. Lamar and her husband. At 902 Front Street is the McMahan House (c. 1849), a handsome, five-bay, central-hall, two-story house with double verandas.