CONWAY — The house that has been the residence of Hendrix College presidents since 1992 is for sale.
Debbie Stobaugh, a real estate agent with J.C. Thornton & Co. in Conway, said “there is a contract on it, but it has not closed yet. We’ve just started the process.” She declined to say who made the offer, which came after the house was on the market only a week.
The 4,477-square-foot home at 1256 Winfield St., in a neighborhood called the Hendrix Addition, was placed on the market Nov. 29 for $318,900. The home is north of the Hendrix College Library at Washington Avenue and Winfield Street.
Hendrix President Bill Tsutsui and his wife, Marjorie Swann, lived in the residence when he was hired in 2014. However, they built a private home nearby in The Village at Hendrix, which they moved into in August.
Tsutsui said the most important feature of a home for him and his wife is a walkable neighborhood.
“I love being able to take the dog out for a walk and walk to work on good days,” he said. Both The Village at Hendrix and the Hendrix Addition fit the bill and have “strong cohesive neighborhood feels,” he said.
Tsutsui said the home on Winfield, which was built in the 1970s, has “good bones,” but it needs upgrades in the kitchen appliances.
“It needed some cosmetic work; I couldn’t justify spending college money on it,” he said. “It’s a whole lot easier for Marjorie and me to build the house we wanted to have; it’s not coming out of Hendrix’s pocket.”
He said that according to an article he read in The Chronicle of Higher Education, the trend is for college presidents to buy their homes.
“My greatest hope is to get it sold to somebody who will put some money into it,” Tsutsui said.
Stobaugh said she was “a little bit” surprised that the house received an offer so quickly, although it is not a done deal.
“It’s a unique property — the size of it, the location,” she said. “If you’re looking for some room and to still be able to walk downtown, you don’t find houses like that with a five-car garage.”
Stobaugh said the home was built in 1975. It was the home of John McConnell and his wife, Martha, until John died in 1991, and it was sold to Hendrix College. John McConnell was a longtime Conway School Board member, and the football stadium at Conway High School is named for him.
Hendrix purchased the home for former President Ann Die, who served from 1992 until 2001. The late Joe Hatcher, who was Hendrix president from 1981 to 1991, lived off-campus in private homes.
Tim Cloyd, who was president from 2001-2013, lived in the home until he left office to go back to full-time teaching. The home was vacant until Tsutsui became president in 2014, and he and his wife moved into the home, along with their dog, Kiba, and two cats, Junior and Krum.
Kiba loved to bask in the sun in the front-window seat of the home on Winfield, and Tsutsui said she misses it.
“We tried to get her an ottoman, but she did not care for it,” he said.
The four-bedroom, four-bath Winfield Street home is zoned R-2 residential or duplex and would have to be rezoned to be used for Hendrix events, said Rob O’Connor, the college’s associate vice president of marketing/communications.
“The college has a strong interest in keeping the Hendrix Addition a vibrant residential neighborhood, and we would be thrilled to have a house-proud owner-occupant” in the Winfield house, O’Connor said.
Ellis Hall on campus was used as a home for presidents, too. When Ellis Hall was completed in 1914, then-President John Hugh Reynolds moved into it. Roy Shilling, who served from 1969 to 1981, was the last president to live there.
Senior writer Tammy Keith can be reached at (501) 327-0370 or tkeith@arkansasonline.com.