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Architect Arthur Brown, Jr., prepared the Timothy Hopkins House plans in late 1927. Hopkins (nee Timothy Nolan, 1860-1936) was the adopted son of one of the "Big Four" owners of the Central Pacific Railroad, Mark Hopkins (1814 -1878). (Mary Frances Sherwood Hopkins [1818-1891], wife of Mark Hopkins, adopted Timothy shortly after the Mark's death; this step had been considered while the railroad mogul was alive. By all accounts, Timothy Hopkins was a diligent, good-humored and trustworthy executor of the Hopkins Estate. Relations between Mary and Timothy were good for some time; he even married Mary's niece, Mary Kellogg Crittenden (b. 1863). Relations broke down by 1890, and Timothy became disinherited from a fortune of over $20 million, in favor of Mary's second husband, an interior designer, Edward Frances Searles, (1841-1920). Timothy sued and won, managing to claim $8 million from the Hopkins Estate. Timothy Hopkins also had a weekend house, "Sherwood Hall" on 280 acres in Menlo Park, CA, a town where many wealthy San Franciscans kept alternate domiciles.

Hopkins would have known Brown from his many works at Stanford University, where Hopkins was an early trustee.

PCAD id: 16663