For Immediate Release

Contact: Kara O’Keeffe

Kara.okeeffe@wisconsinhistory.org

608-261-9596

July 13, 2018

The Charles and Gertrude Rietz house Listed in National Register of Historic Places

Silver Creek, Wis. - The Wisconsin Historical Society has announced the listing of the Charles and Gertrude Rietz House in Silver Creek, Sheboygan County, in the National Register of Historic Places. National Register designation provides access to certain benefits, including qualification for grants and for rehabilitation income tax credits, while it does not restrict private property owners in the use of their property.

The house was designed by the prominent Milwaukee-based architectural firm of Leenhouts and Guthrie in an eclectic blend of popular early-twentieth-century residential architecture.  Constructed in 1903, the Rietz House features key architectural elements associated with the Queen Anne and Craftsman styles, such as a dominant front-facing gable, wraparound porch, variety of surface textures, and cutaway bays combined with wide overhanging eaves with exposed rafters and decorative knee braces.  It is one of the few unaltered residences dating to the early 1900s within the community.  Many of the extant historic-age residences within the community have been significantly altered by replacement siding, large additions, and the removal of decorative details, or replaced by modern residences.  The Rietz House is a striking, architect-designed home having distinctive characteristics of the Craftsman and Queen Anne styles, and as such is notable as a house of architectural distinction.

The register is the official national list of historic properties in America deemed worthy of preservation and is maintained by the National Park Service in the U.S. Department of the Interior. The Wisconsin Historical Society administers the program within Wisconsin. It includes sites, buildings, structures, objects and districts that are significant in national, state or local history, architecture, archaeology, engineering or culture.

To learn more about the State and National Register programs in Wisconsin, visitwww.wisconsinhistory.org.

About the Wisconsin Historical Society

The Wisconsin Historical Society, founded in 1846, ranks as one of the largest, most active and most diversified state historical societies in the nation. As both a state agency and a private membership organization, its mission is to help people connect to the past by collecting, preserving and sharing stories. The Wisconsin Historical Society serves millions of people every year through a wide range of sites, programs and services. For more information, visit wisconsinhistory.org.

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