Red Cross Building, or the Clement House: either name fits the 1913 mansion in front of you. This 17,000 square feet (1,600 m2) mansion was built in 1913 and was designed by architect Edward Brodhead Green of Green & Wicks for Stephen Merrell Clement, president of Marine National Bank, and his wife Carolyn. It is a contributing property to the Delaware Avenue Historic District, designated in 1974.
The story here begins in 1908, when Augustus Franklin Tripp died and his daughter, Carolyn Jewett (née Tripp) Clement, inherited the Tripp residence at 786 Delaware, a house originally built by Erastus S. Prosser around 1855 and purchased by Tripp in 1881. The Clements tore that residence down in 1911 and commissioned Green to build a palatial new home. If you look closely you might imagine the old drawing room fireplace that was removed from the Tripp house and installed in the master bedroom of this new house.
Before moving into this project, the couple had been living at the home of Stephen’s later father at 737 Delaware Avenue. Stephen Merrell Clement died in Atlantic City, New Jersey, on 26 March 1913, before the house was completed later in 1913. Picture the fireplace inside, salvaged from the older Tripp residence that once occupied this same lot.