Juanita Strait didn’t want her aging home turned into a parking lot.

As it turns out, the 1892 building on the slope of 14th Street near Kansas University’s campus will be saved after all.

“I think she’d be really pleased that the house is going to be restored,” said Ken Stoner, KU’s student housing director.

Renovations will begin in about two weeks on 1346 La., the home Strait bequeathed to the university when she died in 2002. The white house will be converted into a community gathering space for KU’s scholarship hall residents.

James Dunn, president of the Oread Neighborhood Assn., said the association is fairly pleased with the plans for Strait’s home.

Dunn said it’s good that the university isn’t going to tear the structure down like it has with so many other homes in the area.

“So many houses through that area were faculty homes,” he said. “Most all of them are gone now. It’s kind of like one place that’s left. It kind of gives an idea of how faculty lived.”

Dunn’s wife, Nancy, spent her much of her childhood living at 1318 La. She took piano lessons from Strait. Nancy Dunn’s childhood home was torn down years ago to build a scholarship hall.

Nancy Dunn said she has mixed feelings about her former home’s fate.

The former home of Juanita Strait, 1346 La., will soon be renovated and turned into a meeting hall and gathering space for KU students in the adjacent scholarship halls. Ken Stoner, director of student housing at KU, stands on the porch of the 113-year-old house.

“I’m sorry to see the house go for that, but it’s actually a very nice looking building,” she said.

Strait’s house, which has had many modifications in its lifetime, will have to be lifted up from its foundation and moved so a new foundation can be set.

Stoner said if the renovation moves forward on schedule, the project could be completed in May.

The home sits on a site once owned by Charles Robinson, first governor of Kansas, and William H. Carruth, a professor of German whose name graces Carruth-O’Leary Hall at KU.

Strait taught piano lessons for decades.

“I bet she gave piano lessons to half the people in Lawrence,” Stoner said.

A $300,000 gift from KU alumni Tom and Jann Rudkin will pay for renovations.