Through the first decade of the 20th Century a developer was a person who bought a large piece of land, laid out streets, and divided the whole into standardized bare plots for sale to individuals. The buyers would then pay a builder to put up the house of their dreams, or at least what they could afford. This was the model for the developments of the time in this area, NW Alexandria (1890), Park Addition (1892), Del Ray and St. Elmo (1894), Mt. Ida (1908) and others.

 

The first to challenge this was David N. Rust, Jr., buying lots in the Del Ray subdivision and building houses “on spec” for sale later. He started with two duplexes in 1907 (407 E. Howell and 311 E. Custis streets). They sold quickly, and thus emboldened, he moved on to two groups of center-hall colonial-revivals in 1910. Group 1 was his more formal design (102 E. Bellefonte, 304 E. Custis, 16, 20 and 211 E. Del Ray, and 109 E. Oxford streets) and for this he established a signature of sidelights beside the front door, with similar sidelights directly above, alongside the center window of the second floor. Three of those have been torn down or completely remodeled, but the remainder, on Bellefonte, Custis and 20 E. Del Ray streets, have been well preserved, including the unusual 12-over-2 windows.

 

The second group of houses (12 and 217 E. Windsor, 305 E. Custis, and 3 E. Oxford streets) leaned more contemporary (for the time) and combined some of the features above in varying combinations, including center hall, sidelights on the second-story window, 12/2 windows, and dormers or gables.

 

There was one anomalous house, at 12 E. Del Ray Avenue, which appears to have had a wrap-around porch, but it was torn down to make way for a service station, thence to the condos on Commonwealth.