History of the Riverdale Estate
One of Indianapolis’ Hidden Jewels: Jens Jensen’s Historic Landscape Design at Riverdale, the James A. Allison Estate
Riverdale, the James A. Allison estate, is located on Cold Spring Road, once known as "Millionaire's Row” and home to the lavish estates of Allison, Carl Fisher, Frank Wheeler and Charles Sommers, among others. Constructed from 1911-1914 for automotive entrepreneur James A. Allison, the estate was completed at a reported cost of $2 million. James Allison was an investor, with Carl Fisher, in headlights for the new automobile industry. Their company, Prest-O-Lite, was later sold to Union Carbide for $9 million.
Allison, Fisher, Frank Wheeler and Arthur Newby later invested in an automobile testing track in Speedway, Indiana, now the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, and founded the Indianapolis 500 race.Allison established the Allison Engineering Company during World War I to redesign Liberty engines; later Charles Lindbergh used one of Allison's Liberty engines in the Spirit of St. Louis. One of Allison's most famous engines, the V-1717, was America's first 1000-horsepower engine, widely used in World War II. Allison engines (now manufactured by Rolls-Royce) are used in aviation to this day.
The Riverdale estate is one of two rare Indianapolis examples of the type of country home built by wealthy citizens during the American Country House Era. The Oldfields estate at the Newfields/Indianapolis Museum of Art is the other. Similar American Country House Era estates were featured in fall 2004 in the IMA exhibit at the Lilly House, “A Genius for Place: American Landscapes of the Country Place Era.”
The Allison Mansion
The Allison Mansion anchors the 64-acre estate. The exterior of the mansion, designed by Indianapolis architect Herbert Bass, is an eclectic blend of early Prairie School and Lombardy Villa architecture and is located on the top of a bluff overlooking the meadow and lakes below.
Dubbed the “House of Wonders,” the Allison Mansion contained many state-of-the-art conveniences including an elevator, a central vacuum system, a telephone intercom system, automatically lighted closets, pumped-in ice water, an indoor swimming pool and the sophisticated indirect lighting systems favored by Frank Lloyd Wright.
James Allison hired William Price, of the Philadelphia firm of Price and McLanahan, to complete the interior. The interior is lavishly designed in traditional European designs.
- The 40'x40' great foyer is done in a high Renaissance style with elaborately carved Circassian walnut woodwork (now extinct) and a one-ton German silver chandelier.
- The library is designed in the Gothic style, with gilded carved leather panels and a Rookwood fireplace.
- The small reception room reflects the era of Louis XVI and features embroidered silk wall coverings.
- The music room features a delicately carved white mahogany organ screen, and the card room on the lower level has a finely detailed hand-painted gilded mural depicting The Three Musketeers in the form of James Allison, Carl Fisher and Frank Wheeler.
- To produce this wide range of styles, Allison imported both materials and craftsmen from Europe.
- The aviary is a large glass-enclosed space executed in white Italian marble with intricately detailed balustrades and newel posts and a Tiffany-style art glass ceiling.