Property Record
11142 W BRADLEY RD
Architecture and History Inventory
| Historic Name: | Isaac Leister House |
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| Reference Number: | 27731 |
| Location (Address): | 11142 W BRADLEY RD |
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| County: | Milwaukee |
| City: | Milwaukee |
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| Year Built: | 1855 |
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| Additions: | |
| Survey Date: | 1980 |
| Historic Use: | house |
| Architectural Style: | Greek Revival |
| Structural System: | |
| Wall Material: | Stone - Unspecified |
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| Other Buildings On Site: | |
| Demolished?: | No |
| Demolished Date: |
| National/State Register Listing Name: | Not listed |
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| Additional Information: | A 'site file' exists for this property. It contains additional information such as correspondence, newspaper clippings, or historical information. It is a public record and may be viewed in person at the Wisconsin Historical Society, State Historic Preservation Office. Locally designated: 12/6/1983. Milwaukee retains scarce remnants of its pioneer architecture. On the city's far northwest side, originally an agricultural area, Isaac Leister's solid limestone Greek Revival farmhouse belies Milwaukee’s pioneer days. Its thirty-inch thick basement foundation supports limestone ashlar walls. The roof has hand-hewn oak joists and rafters, connected using mortise-and-tenon joinery. Leister's house lacks the front porch and classical columns found on some Greek Revival dwellings, but it has other characteristic features, including returned eaves on the side gables and a wide trim band running under the cornices, suggesting classical Greek entablature. Using local wood, stone, and other building materials, pioneers like Isaac Leister brought the familiar Greek Revival motifs into their new surroundings. Leister, born in 1817 in Pennsylvania, arrived in 1839, becoming one of the Town of Granville’s earliest settlers. The house remained in Leister’s family until 1944. The City of Milwaukee annexed Granville in the 1950s, leaving Isaac Leister's well-preserved house to mark the area's rural, pioneer past. |
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| Bibliographic References: | Tax records. 1876 county atlas. Buildings of Wisconsin manuscript. |
| Wisconsin Architecture and History Inventory, State Historic Preservation Office, Wisconsin Historical Society, Madison, Wisconsin |