To clear the site, the lodge did not tear down the house standing on the corner lots. The house was placed on rollers and moved north up Harvard Street, a common practice of the era and a neighborly one. The account is a later local history’s; no permit or newspaper item confirming the move has been found, and which house it was is unknown.
It raises a genuine research question this project is still pursuing: somewhere in the Heights, the corner’s pre-temple house may be standing today.
The source
Source: Sister Agatha, History of Houston Heights (a secondary local history; no period confirmation has been found).