The availability of free Sears catalogs and related mail-order home catalogs online has transformed the study of early 20th-century American housing. Researchers, preservationists, and homeowners who own Sears Modern Homes and other mail-order houses can now consult primary source catalogs without traveling to physical archives. The Internet Archive, Hathi Trust, Daily Bungalow on Flickr, and specialty sites such as SearsHouseSeeker have made digitized copies of Sears Modern Homes, Honor Bilt, Gordon-Van Tine, Radford, Wardway, Harris and Lewis catalogs accessible to the public. Internet Archive links are now working as of October 24, 2024.
These catalogs are not general merchandise catalogs. Sears houses are only those which were purchased as a bundle of plans by a Sears-employed architect, or licensed by Sears, and building supplies, and beginning in 1916 the framing lumber of that bundle of building supplies would have been pre-measured and pre-cut, and labeled with a stamped letter/number combo. Among the companies who had books of plans that were sometimes sold through the Sears and Montgomery Ward general merchandise catalogs might be George F. Barber 1905 and Wm Radford Architectural plans. Here is a 1903 book of Radford plans, sold through Montgomery Ward.
Sears Modern Homes and Honor Bilt catalogs online
Free access to Sears Modern Homes catalogs is available through several repositories.
- 1911: Sears Modern Homes -- on Hathi Trust
- 1918: Honor Bilt Modern Homes has Carlin, Lebanon, Warrenton, Madelia
- 1920: Honor Bilt Modern Homes on Hathi Trust
- 1921 May: Honor Bilt Modern Homes same cover as 1922
- 1923: Honor Bilt Modern Homes labeled as 1920
- 1923: Honor Bilt Modern Homes - Daily Bungalow Flickr album
- 1925: Honor Bilt Modern Homes
- 1932: Homes of Today edition that has no Barrington - Daily Bungalow Flickr album
- 1932: Homes of Today -- on Hathi Trust
Sears also issued catalogs for ancillary building content that support kit house research.
- Early Lighting Fixtures - 1900: Sears Electric, Gas, and Combination lighting
- Ceramic Tile designs: 1910 catalog from Sears
- Building Materials, Plumbing, Heating, Paint, Lighting, etc.: Sears 1932
- Building Materials: Sears 1939
- Farm Buildings: Sears 1928
- Sears Garages, Cottages, Log Cabins, Play houses: Sears 1935
- Building Materials: Sears Honor Bilt 1930
- Building Materials, Plumbing, Heating, Paint, Lighting, etc.: Sears 1932
- Building Materials: Sears 1939
- Farm Buildings: Sears 1928
- Sears Garages, Cottages, Log Cabins, Play houses: Sears 1935
Renovation and hardware catalogs are also digitized.
- 1912 Concrete Machinery: Triumph, Wizard, and Knox Blox Machines
- Making the Old Home New: 1914 home renovations catalog Sears
- Hardware including door hardware: 1919 Sears catalog
- Building Material millwork, fireplaces, etc.: Sears Roebuck & Co 1920 may be '23
- Building Material millwork, fireplaces, etc.: Sears Roebuck & Co 1929
- Building Materials: Sears Honor Bilt 1930
- Sears Lighting original catalogs from various years Sears 1934 & 1937 on OldHouseLights.com
- Sears Wallpaper color images from 1916 catalog - Daily Bungalow Flickr album
The 1932 catalog is available here and Sears Barns is available here. Aladdin Homes catalog for 1917 is available here. Gordon-Van Tine Company catalog for 1923 is available here. Radford Homes These were house plans only, not kit homes available here. Wardway Homes Dover reproduction of the 1925 catalog is available here.
A DVD with pdfs of many years of the Sears Modern Homes catalogs is offered on Etsy. Note: This DVD does not actually contain the 1924, 1927, or 1929 catalogs, though the covers for those years are shown in the listing... but, those years are not on the list of the catalogs included.
Gordon-Van Tine, Radford, Wardway and other mail-order catalogs
Gordon-Van Tine mail-order bundled homes pre-cut and labeled 1916 through mid 1930s.
- 1908 Plans only, no building supplies shipped
- 1916 Ready-Cut Homes
- 1916 Summer Cottages, Ready-cut
- 1917: Gordon-Van Tine Homes Ready Cut or Standard
- 1919 3e listed incorrectly as 1918: Ready-Cut Homes
- 1920: Gordon-Van Tine Daily
- 1923 1e: Gordon-Van Tine Homes same cover used in 1926 and 1927
- 1929: Plan-Cut Homes Daily Bungalow Flickr Album
- 1929 GVT interiors, in color Daily Bungalow Flickr Album
- 1931 Plan-Cut Homes
Radford catalogs are documented separately.
- 1909 Radford Cement Houses and How to Build Them
- 1910 mistakenly listed as 1902 really 12th edition, 1910 inside cover
- 1926 Home, Fireside and Garden various lumber companies
- Radford Homes These were house plans only, not kit homes available here
Wardway Homes Dover reproduction of the 1925 catalog is available here.
Daily Bungalow has a wonderful set of catalogs on Flickr, including Sears, Gordon-Van Tine, Lewis, Harris, C. L. Bowes, Liberty, Sterling, and many, many others.
Additional plan-only and building material catalogs cited in the reference material include:
- 1918 Modern American Homes Lane Lumber Company, Darlington, Wisconsin: This one has lookalikes for MANY of the Sears models, including oldest Starlight, oldest Winona, oldest Elsmore, both versions of Marina, old Concord, Flossmoor, Chelsea, Somerset, Cranmore, Sherburne, Rossville/171, Niota, Avoca, Lucerne, Elmwood, Westly, Saratoga, Avondale, Somers alternate porch roof, Maytown; Aladdin Georgia, Aladdin Detroit, Aladdin Franklin; GVT 712, GVT 526, GVT 536, and more
- ASHSB Architects Small House Service Bureau plans only
- 1922 How to Plan, Finance, and Build Your Home
- 1925 Fifty Ways to Lower Home Building Costs
- 1927 100 Bungalows of Frame and Masonry Construction
- 1929 July edition, Small Homes
- 1920s Homes by the Larcomb Construction Company
- 1920s Better Homes in America some time during Calvin Coolidge's presidency
- 1920s Help for the Man Who Wants to Build
- 1930 Colonial Homes
- 1930 Correctly Designed Modern American Homes
- Southern California Bungalow Plans not kits
- Sears Homart PRE-FAB houses These are not kits, and these were not part of the Sears Modern Homes catalogs
Archive.org catalog record example
A representative Internet Archive entry for a Sears catalog illustrates the metadata available to users.
Catalogue no. 112.
Bookreader Item Preview
Notes
Copy on some pages maybe cut off due to tight margins. The following pages jump in this book: pages 14 to 19, 173 to 180, 357 to 362, 379 to 384, 589 to 594, 649 to 652, 677 to 682, 833 to 838, 906 to 911, 1075 to 1080 and 1137 to 1142.
Addeddate 2010-06-16 11:43:21 Bookplateleaf 0004 Call number HF5466 S43a TC Camera Canon 5D Foldoutcount 0 Identifier catalogueno11200sear Identifier-ark ark:/13960/t54f2hx1f Ocr ABBYY FineReader 8.0 Ocrconverted abbyy-to-hocr 1.1.7 Ocrmoduleversion 0.0.13 Page-progression lr Pagenumberconfidence 84 Pagenumbermoduleversion 1.0.5 Pages 1176 Ppi 300 Scandate 20100722184005 Scanner scribe2.nj.archive.org Scanningcenter nj
The record has 83,954 views and 367 favorites.
How to locate free catalogs
Find online catalogs for Sears, Gordon-Van Tine, Radford, Wardway, Harris, Lewis with these links.
My own Favorites on Archive.org are listed by catalog company, so, if you click on the white box with the catalog or lumber company name, you'll get the page with the list of their uploaded catalogs.
For Example:
Once in Archive.org, clicking on this icon on my FAVORITES list, will bring you the list of Aladdin catalogs on Archive.org. Click here to actually go to the Aladdin list!
1913 catalog, available here 1912 catalog, available here 1926 catalog, available here
On ETSY, here
Our Go-To Book! This is hands-down the best reference resource on Sears houses. Published by the National Trust for Historic Preservation Available here
This is a small book, but is packed with all of the basic information about numerous mail-order home companies. Rebecca L. Hunter is a highly respected authority on mail-order homes. Available here
A thorough discussion of mail-order homes and other early 20th-century American home styles. Available here
SearsHouses.com: Visit our website for more information
Catalog chronology table
| Year | Company / Title | Notes | | 1908 | Gordon-Van Tine | Plans only, no building supplies shipped | | 1909 | Radford | Cement Houses and How to Build Them | | 1910 | Sears | Ceramic Tile designs | | 1910 | Radford | 12th edition, 1910 inside cover | | 1911 | Sears | Modern Homes on Hathi Trust | | 1912 | Sears | Concrete Machinery Triumph, Wizard, Knox Blox Machines | | 1914 | Sears | Making the Old Home New home renovations catalog | | 1916 | Gordon-Van Tine | Ready-Cut Homes | | 1916 | Sears | Wallpaper color images Daily Bungalow Flickr album | | 1917 | Gordon-Van Tine | Homes Ready Cut or Standard | | 1918 | Sears | Honor Bilt Modern Homes has Carlin, Lebanon, Warrenton, Madelia | | 1919 | Sears | Hardware including door hardware | | 1919 | Gordon-Van Tine | 3e listed incorrectly as 1918 Ready-Cut Homes | | 1920 | Sears | Honor Bilt Modern Homes on Hathi Trust | | 1920 | Sears | Building Material millwork, fireplaces, etc. may be '23 | | 1921 | Sears | Honor Bilt Modern Homes May same cover as 1922 | | 1923 | Sears | Honor Bilt Modern Homes labeled as 1920 | | 1923 | Gordon-Van Tine | 1e Homes same cover used in 1926 and 1927 | | 1925 | Sears | Honor Bilt Modern Homes | | 1925 | Wardway | Dover reproduction of 1925 catalog | | 1926 | Radford | Home, Fireside and Garden various lumber companies | | 1928 | Sears | Farm Buildings | | 1929 | Gordon-Van Tine | Plan-Cut Homes Daily Bungalow Flickr Album | | 1929 | Sears | Building Material millwork, fireplaces, etc. | | 1930 | Sears | Building Materials Honor Bilt | | 1931 | Gordon-Van Tine | Plan-Cut Homes | | 1932 | Sears | Homes of Today | | 1932 | Sears | Building Materials, Plumbing, Heating, Paint, Lighting, etc. | | 1935 | Sears | Garages, Cottages, Log Cabins, Play houses | | 1939 | Sears | Building Materials |
Conclusion
The free availability of Sears and related mail-order home catalogs online provides a complete documentary record for the pre-cut kit house era from the late 1900s through the mid 1930s. Sears Modern Homes and Honor Bilt editions, Gordon-Van Tine Ready-Cut and Plan-Cut editions, Radford cement and plan books, Wardway reproductions, and ancillary Sears building materials, lighting, wallpaper and farm building catalogs can be consulted without cost via Internet Archive, Hathi Trust, Daily Bungalow Flickr albums, and specialty sites. These resources allow accurate identification of a house as a true Sears kit with pre-measured pre-cut labeled lumber versus plan-only books sold through Montgomery Ward and other general merchandise catalogs. Continued digitization and cataloging of the 1910s to 1930s mail-order home literature will continue to support preservation, historical research, and restoration work.