James A. Cornelius was a developer and builder who designed his own houses. This is what Pittsburghers call a Normandy—a house in the fairy-tale style with a turret entrance. It was meant to be one of a whole block of houses built on the old Liggett estate in Shadyside.

Note the photograph of this house, and the house circled on the perspective map. The houses were meant to have their main fronts facing inward, where a landscaped common would make them into a garden community.

Only this house and the one next door were built, however. It appears that the project fell on hard times—1930 was not the best year to begin a development of luxury houses. The rest of the property, according to researcher David Schwing, was eventually sold to Herman Kamin, who developed apartments on it.