The house at 2132 Oak St. was the home of George M. Klein and his family and was located on the northwest corner of Oak and Klein streets. It was a rambling frame Italianate residence to which a one-story addition and lots of porches were added. George Klein and his father, John, were the owners of the Mississippi Valley Bank, among other ventures. The bank failed in 1883 leaving many people angry and broke. The bank’s assets were sold and distributed to pay some of the debts. After John Klein died, his widow, Elizabeth, paid the taxes on properties of widows and the poor who had lost their money in the failure of the Mississippi Valley Bank.

The family lived in the house until about 1914, when it became the home of George and Martha Oakes and then  Mr. and Mrs. V. L. Oakes. In 1938, The Vicksburg Post reported the following about the historic landmark: “The old George Klein house is now owned by the Oakes estate, it is occupied by two or three families. The house in all its ells and arms is the result of years of development during the Klein occupancy. The original part was the cottage-like portion facing Oak. The other portions were added on as needed. Off from this original part runs a long, enclosed hall, with a stair therein leading to the upstairs stretched long ways east and west. In the downstairs hall they say a bowling alley was once maintained. Rooms spread both sides, downstairs as well as up. With quaintly banistered galleries, ornaments and such, all hand-turned, the outside always attracts notice. Aged chimney pots tower in twin pairs, or single where one has been broken or lost. Outside little huts are built for this and that, the brick servant house is a well-preserved auxiliary, with old stables under its west side. Loelreuteria trees sprout under the eaves and grow up wildly to send forth younger sprouts. Aged remains of shrubbery and flowers and vines add vegetable sang-foid. Antique collectors have finally managed to acquire the old figures once conspicuous on the yard. Yet many relics remain, such as ornamented door sets of knobs, locks and hinges. Persons have tried at time to buy these, and even such things as the chimney pots. The mantels are an ornamented stone, with what seems to be the shield of a coat-of-arms affixed.”

The house continued to hold its own and, 14 years later, The Post reported that, “it is, indeed, a ragged wraith of its newer self-that less-celebrated Klein house which still stand on the northwest corner of Klein and Oak streets, here lifts by its own hardiness its wooden sides which might have fallen long ago if they had been made of poorer materials. It was erected, though, when things were built to stay. Probably if it were razed its inner parts would be found sounder than many a last year’s abode built with too much speed-for mass production and to sell. This Klein house was once a wooden thing of beauty, but today its several rambling arms and turret-like stories look out of eyes whose sags beneath and all around have become dark with trouble and the beating elements. The once-ornate trimmings under the eaves are broken its chimney pots lean awry and are not mates, the metal deer and other mute figures are gone from the lawn, the upstairs galleries that once looked out on the Mississippi and its elegant packets now hang with broken banisters, and only a new-coming varnish tree stands trying to rejuvenate hopeless age where rare floral species once spread.”

In 1944, the house was renovated into the Kleinston Terrace Apartments with 12 units. It was damaged by a fire on Oct. 19, 1981, that was started by a space heater and was subsequently demolished. The 77 residents of the apartment building who were displaced were helped with clothing, linens and food by the Red Cross and the auxiliary of Tyner-Ford American Legion Post No. 213. The two-story brick servants quarters remain on the lot today.  

Nancy Bell, Vicksburg Foundation for Historic Preservation.