When John Harrington sold this lot in 1888, he reserved the right to mine within twenty feet of the surface—without reinforcing his mine with timbers. Understandably, the purchasers, miner Con Ambrose and his wife Sarah, built a functional, no-frills gable-front-and-wing residence. Deeds like this one provided a disincentive to invest heavily in a home, and for good reason. Mining took precedence as the nearby Berkeley Pit—once home to crowded neighborhoods—demonstrates. In 1894, the Ambroses sold the home to Philip Goodwin, circulation manager for the Butte Miner newspaper. Most of the other early owners were miners, many of whom worked at the nearby Parrot Mine. Among them were John Wallace, who lived here in 1910, and Maurice Condon, whose family purchased the residence in 1912. Maurice died in 1925 at age fifty-two of pneumonia, one of the many lung ailments common to miners working amid dynamite, damp, and dust. After his death, his widow, Annie, worked as a clerk and housekeeper. She lived here with her son, also a miner, into the 1930s.
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