WOSU's Curious Cbus answers your questions about our region, its history and its people.

Grace Freeman wrote in to ask, Why do so many houses in Clintonville have shutters with cut-out shapes such as crescent moons, candlesticks and clovers?

We asked Mary Rogers of the Clintonville Historical Society to tell the story.

So a lot of the architecture here in Clintonville is from the 1920s through the 1940s.

And during that time period, a number of major companies like Sears and Roebuck and Montgomery Ward were selling kit-built homes.

And one of the things that was included in this kit-built home was a selection of cutouts that you could use for your front shutters.

Now, these shutter cutouts were kind of interesting because prior to the 1920s, the arts and crafts movement was taking place and shutters weren't really a part of the house design for most arts and crafts style houses.

So in the 1920s, these new house styles were introduced and these different shutters were something that you could use to really personalize your house.

Now, some of the houses that Sears and Roebuck offered actually had limited numbers of shutter cutouts that you could choose from.

So those very popular cutouts were the crescent moon, the urn, and the shamrock.

So here in Clintonville, we have a lot of shutter cutouts, but you'll see mostly the crescent moons, the shamrocks, and the little urn patterns.

So for the most part, when these shutter cutouts first started, they were kind of known to be with the kit homes.

But you can buy and make all kinds of shutter cutouts in today's world.

So you could purchase online today.

You could purchase ones that have sailboats or candlesticks.

And then there's patterns that you can purchase that allow you to make your own.

So you could have lots of different personality associated with your shutter cutouts.

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