This house was built by Olive & Robert Richard Bell in 1920.

Robert was born in 1868 on a farm in Lamar County, Texas. Olive was born in Kansas in 1876.

Robert, an attorney, businessman, and civic leader, was best known as the father of the managerial form of government in Oklahoma City. As Chairman of a committee organized to reform city government, he wrote the city charter and defended it in the courts. Today, Oklahoma City still operates under the city manager system.

After World War I, Olive and Robert toured Italy, where they saw a villa that especially appealed to them. They returned to Oklahoma City, bought the lot on 15th, and began work on a new home inspired by that same basic look.

The home is a mixture of Italian Villa and Italianate architecture, with archways, wide eaves, a balcony, balanced facade, and stucco exterior. There are plaster angel ornaments, grand French doors and windows, a long, wide veranda, and an ornate copper entrance canopy. The interior featured an abundance of imported Italian plaster work and wood carvings: angels’ faces in the foyer, an elaborate mantle, and a wedding-cake ceiling in the dining room. The staircase was reminiscent of Charles Rennie MacIntosh. Most importantly, a delicate carved bell adorned the front and back of every door. In the backyard of the home, in the shadow of the Overholser Carriage House cupola, Olive established a cutting garden with extensive plantings of iris, day-lilies, roses, and peonies. A natural rock fishpond featured a small cascade of water. Robert died in 1944 at age 76. Olive died in 1954 at age 78. Since that time, the Bell House has had only two owners.

In 1950 Frances Lackey & Crawford D. Bennett, Jr., bought the home. Crawford was born in Oklahoma in1909. Frances L. was born in Kentucky in 1911 and moved to Oklahoma City in 1929. Crawford was a well-known attorney and the son of Judge Crawford D. Bennett and Frances Bennett. He received his degrees from OU where he also played on the tennis team. Crawford served as a captain in India in WWII in the US Army. Crawford and Frances had two daughters, Linda and Virginia. The Bennetts remodeled the kitchen, built a downstairs bath by enclosing part of the entry porch, removed several French doors, and added carpeting. Still, the floor plan remained largely unchanged, and the original radiators were still in use as long as they lived there. Under Frances’ care, the garden flourished with the addition of dozens of rare hybrid irises and lilies. Frances died in 1983 Crawford died at age 78 in December 1987.

In 1988 the home was purchased and extensively renovated by Rand and Jeanette Elliott. A nationally recognized architect, Rand created an interior that treats the house as a work of art - restoring several original features and making them focal points. The entryway arches, covered to build a bathroom, were redefined as arches of light. The lost French doors were replaced and the kitchen’s original ten-foot ceiling height was regained. The veranda was repaired and covered with ceramic tile.

To emphasize the sense of spaciousness, several walls were removed and new openings were made. To retain the image of those walls in the original floor plan, the undulating lines of Rand‘s “broken openings” make the point clear. And where a wall was removed, the white oak floors have dark wood accents to trace the original wall studs.

All finishes are white: walls, ceilings and floors. The oak hardwood floors were uncovered and stained white. Materials and high-tech fixtures are primarily from Italy and Japan. Dramatic lighting, granite countertops, and Rand’s signature “scratched” plexiglass cabinetry (the effects suggest ice) all create a drama that heightens the sense of history and gives new life to the Bell house.

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