Charles and Eleanor Rowcliffe House

504 E Olive Street

By Noah Tang

504 E Olive St was once the home of esteemed Bloomingtonians Charles and Eleanor Rowcliffe. Charles Rowcliffe was the general secretary for the Bloomington Young Men’s Christian Association (YMCA) from 1895 until 1901. He also served as a member of the Bloomington Benevolent Society, a charitable aid group. Unfortunately, several years after purchasing the property, Charles became partially paralyzed by scarlet fever. He and his family sold the house and left for California in 1902.

The house then passed to the Drums: David Mark and Maude. David was a bank teller at First National Bank and lived in the home until his death at age 70 in 1930. Maude continued to live in the home until her death with a live-in nurse.

The home was then split into several apartment units and housed interesting characters from the 1930s all the way until the 1990s. This house was also the site of a 1968 complaint on housing discrimination by Fred Jones, testing the newly passed Bloomington Fair Housing Ordinance of 1967.