| Additional Information: | 2018 survey report write-up: This 1960s Contemporary Style house can be categorized as Wrightian, as a result of its low-lying profile, flat roof and wide overhanging eaves; it does not have a basement. Set back on a heavily wooded parcel, the home is anchored near its center by a tower-like element that includes a series of four small, rectangular windows, the house is sheathed with both horizontally laid, board and batten siding and roughly laid limestone set in courses. A large expanse of windows is evident within the south wing of the home.
Designed by Madison architect William V. Kaeser, this house was built in 1968 for Raymond and Eleanore Mikich. Raymond was born in Winchester, Wisconsin, in 1918 and graduated from Minoqua High School in 1937. In 1942, he wed Stevens Point-born Eleanore Spreda; together they had four daughters. Following service in World War II, Raymond resumed studies at UW-Madison, from which he graduated in 1947. At the time the house was built, Raymond worked as a department manager at Employers Mutual Liability Insurance Company (later Wausau Insurance), where he worked for thirty-four years. Eleanore, who attended Central State Teachers College and Business School in Stevens Point, is identified as having worked as a supervisor at the U.S. post office in Wausau. Following retirement in 1980, the Mikichs’ sold the house and moved to Eagle River, where Raymond and Eleanore died in 2004 and 2016, respectively. The house was then owned/occupied for the next three years by Beth J. Goldbach, the manager of Joanna’s Fashion Salon in Wausau. As of 1984, the home’s owners were Richard and Anita Olsen.
Architect William Vogt Kaeser was born in Greenville, Illinois in 1906. He first attended Milliken University, after which he went on to receive a B.S. in Architecture from the University of Illinois and an M.S. from MIT (in 1932). After additional training at the Cranbrook Academy of Art (1933-1935), Kaeser opened his own firm in Madison (in 1935), while also serving as Madison’s city planner (from 1935-1939). He maintained the architectural firm alone until joining with Arthur M. McLeod in 1954, after which the firm was renamed Kaeser & McLeod, with whom he was with at the time of the design of the Mikich home. Like Frank Lloyd Wright, Kaeser often turned his home designs away from the street and employed large expanses of windows to bring the outside in. Like the Mikich home, Kaeser’s own home is clad with board and batten and limestone. |
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| Bibliographic References: | Citations for 2018 survey information below: “Col. Raymond D. Mikich,” Obituary, Wausau Daily Herald, 1 January 2005, 4/3; “Eleanore C. Mikich,” Obituary, Stevens Point Journal, 1 December 2016, Accessed online, July 2018. Entries for William V. Kaeser in George S. Koyl, ed., 1st and 2nd eds., American Architects Directory (New York: R.R. Bowker Co., 1956, 1962), pages 286 and 362, respectively and John F. Gane, ed., American Architects Directory, 3rd ed. (New York: R.R. Bowker Co., 1970), 468. |
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