The Intercultural Council Houses, built between 1947 and 1952 have been added to the National Register of Historic Places as an historic district, according to the latest city manager’s report.

The houses—bounded by Blanchard Place, Claremont Boulevard, East First Street and Brooks Street—are a cluster of 12 single-family homes on a single residential block in Claremont’s Arbol Verde neighborhood.

The Intercultural Council was started by a committee of the Congregational Church (UCC) as a social experiment that brought together Anglo university graduate students and Mexican-American laborers in an attempt to build bridges of friendship and neighborliness between the communities.

Renowned painter and architect Millard Sheets had one of his architecture students draw plans for the houses. The lot owners either built the houses themselves or hired the work out.

The Arbol Verde district joins five other Claremont sites on the National Register including the Russian Village, the Santa Fe Train Depot, the original Scripps College campus, the Padua Hills Theater and the Pitzer House at Towne Avenue and Base Line Road.