Also a Greene and Greene design, the Blacker house was built for Michigan lumberman Robert R. Blacker and his wife, Nellie. Upon her death in 1946, the home and its contents (which were made specifically for the house) went into probate, as there were no heirs.
In her will, Nellie specified everything be sold as a whole, but her executor had other ideas. The executor sold the property without its furnishings, then that buyer subdivided the lot into smaller parcels and destroyed the garden in the process. Furnishings built specifically for the house were sold in a yard sale and have since ended up in the hands of private owners, who purchased them at auction for six-figure sums.
The dismantling of Blacker didn’t end there. It was sold in 1985 to a Texas rancher and an antique dealer from from New York City. They, in turn, hired a local dealer to remove its leaded art glass and light fixtures and replaced these pieces with reproductions.The originals ended up on the auction circuit, again going for six figures.
The Blacker House debacle pushed Pasadena to enact the Blacker Ordinance, which limits anyone owning Greene and Greene property from dismantling it for up to one year. Locals even guarded the house so nothing else was removed.
When the home was sold in 1994 to Harvey and Ellen Knell, they restored the property to its former glory and own it to this day. Both the Gamble House and Blacker House serve as Doc Brown’s house in “Back to the Future.”
