Chris and Rachel White, owners of 334 Chester Ave., look forward to seeing their historic home restored to its original beauty.
Once in danger of being torn down, 334 Chester Ave. in Moorestown is home to Rachel and Chris White.
“We’re trying to keep as much of the historically relevant parts of the house intact,” Rachel said.
Since moving back from Australia in 2016, the couple have bought and renovated two other old houses: an 1840 Philadelphia rowhouse and their current 1920 home. When they’re not taking on major renovating projects, Chris works as an electrical engineer and Rachel is an environmental scientist.
With their kids in tow, the Whites are excited to join the Moorestown community and look forward to seeing their home restored to its original beauty.
“There’s the purest idea of bringing the house back to how it was built,” Rachel noted, “but then there’s also that evolution of how it was used and what was added on over the years. And some of that is really interesting, like the history of the house.”
The John H. Perkins house – designed by Wilson Brothers & Company – was built in 1889 for Perkins (1854-1917) and his wife, Almina. John was a cousin of T.H. Dudley Perkins, the original owner of Evergreen Lawn, now the Perkins Center for the Arts. Almina lived in the home until 1922, when it was purchased by Charles A. and Emma Reynolds.
Charles was the owner of the C.A. Reynolds Co., a prominent leather manufacturer. The property remained a private residence for 107 years, including after 1941, when the J. C. Belton family lived there and ran their funeral business. After 1996, it was rarely used for funerals and was mostly abandoned.
The house is a contributing property in the Moorestown Historic District on the national and state registers of historic places. Chester Avenue, one of the oldest streets in Moorestown, is lined with early- to late mid-19th-century homes, many designed by the area’s finest architects of the period. For Rachel and Chris, the move to the township came at the right time, and they’re ready to make the property their own.
“There are some people who just want ‘new’ because they’re afraid of things that are old or are a lot of work to maintain, or they’re going to break,” Rachel explained, “and in some cases that is true … But there’s something really special about living in these houses – for me – and raising kids in these houses that generations have lived in before, and they are more work.
“That can be really daunting for some families, but it’s not as scary as it needs to be,” she added. “It’s really special to raise a family in such a cool place.”
