| Additional Information: | Metal cornice; segmental arched windows; arcade above storefront; appliqued design on window arch; exterior stairway to second floor; contemporary storefront. Related buildings: MP26/23, 34/19, 20, 21, 23.
The storage, office and dwelling of the Sparta Iron Works was completed sometime betwene 1880 and 1884.
The Sparta Iron Works began in 1867. Sparta second foundry was built by Lowrie, Irwin and Gillette on East Oak Street. This foundry was purchased by the Sparta Manufacturing Company, but thereafter the foundry was damaged heavily in a fire. In 1872, L.M. Newbury and J.P. Ward purchased what was left of the charred remains of the foundry and began the Sparta Iron Works. In 1872, they rebuilt the main building of the foundry on the southwest corner of East Oak Street and Chester Streets. Subsequently, many other buildings were added over time. In the 1870's, this foundry did an annual net business of $20,000, most of it from well-drilling machinery for digging artesian wells. It is at this time that these particular buildings wer added to the complex. In 1888, the Sparta Iron Works advertised that it manufactured iron and brass castings, rotary saw mills, shingle mills and boilers. In ecember, 1893, it was turned into a stock company and incorporated as Sparta Iron Worls Company. The officers of the company were L.M. Newbury, J.U. Durant, and C.M. Newbury. By 1894, the plant occupied two acres of land with a foundry, machine shop, planing mill, pattern shop, pattern house, blacksmith shop, engine room, paint shop and storage house. At this time, the Company employed twenty-five hands, and it was well equipped, including a steamhammer weighing over 11,000 pounds. Later, the operation passed to Carl Newburg and T.N. Durant, and then even later Robert and Lee Canfield assumed control over the business.
By 1900, the Sparta Iron Works continued as a foundry and machine shops, but the foundry casting business had dropped off. In 1900, they continued to make special lines of well-drilling apparatus and furnaces, as well as engines, boilers and all kinds of agricultural machinery, employing forty men in the works and five traveling salesmen. In 1910, Samuel Kent Dickinson assumed management of the business, which did a large amount of work during World War I. However, sometime after 1922, the business was discontinued.
The Sparta Iron Works Storage, Office, Dwelling Building gains local historical significance under criterion A in association with the Primary Metal Processing and Metal Products Industries topic of the industry Theme. The Sparta Iron Works was a major contributor to the growth and economy of Sparta in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, serving the community and the region at large with their metal products. The building's period of historical significance ranges from its erection circa 1880 to 1884 to the closing of the foundry sometime after 1922.
This two-story stone industrial building, contructed with a brick facade, displays an Italianate influenced plain projecting cornice, segmental arched windows with brick voussoirs, and an ornamental arcade of round arched brick moulding across the lower facade. In addition, arched wooden panels decorated by appliqued scroll ornament fill the upper part of the arch in the windows.
This early stone industrial building has been altered by the addition of a storefront on its lower facade and by the metal replacement windows on the second story of the facade.
This stone industrial building, one of the early buildings in the Sparta Iron Works complex, probably was constructed around 1879-1880 after Newbury purchased this lot on the corner of Oak and Chester as an addition to his original property located at 317 East Oak. This building originally housed storage on the lower story and residential quarters on the second floor. It was used as the office of the Sparta Iron Works in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
The Sparta Iron Works was established in 1869 when L.M. Newbury purchased the burnt out remains of the Lowrie, Irwin and Gilbert Foundry. New buildings for the foundry, according to the Sparta Tax Records, were constructed on the corner of East Oak and South Chester beginning in 1872.
The Sparta Iron Works office and storage room is significant unde Criterion C as an example of an Italianate styled 19th century industrial buildings. More ornate than the remainder of the complex, this Italianate styled building apparently originally was not used to house the actual manufacturing processes. Unfortunately, the stone work at the rear of this building is in poor repair.
This early industrial building is one of the very few 19th century industrial buildings remaining in Sparta and apparently one of the few mid-19th century stone buildings remaining in Sparta. The only other examples of mid-19thc entury industrial buildings identified in the 1989-1990 survey of Sparta are the accompanying buildings in the Sparta Iron Works including the machine shop (MO34/23) and the moulding room building (MO34/21). |
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| Bibliographic References: | (A) Sanborn-Perris Insurance Maps 1889, 1894, 1900, 1911, 1922, 1931.
(B) City of Sparta Property Tax Rolls, 1870-1940.
(C) Map of Sparta, Wisconsin. Milwaukee: Phoenix Map Company of Milwaukee, 1875.
(D) Sparta Herald May 11, 1869; March 6, 1894.
(E) Barney, Tyler Davis "A History of the Growth of Sparta, Wisconsin, 1850-1890." B.A. Thesis. University of Wisconsin, 1922, pp. 31b and 36.
(F) "History of Sparta," installment 31.
(G)) Koehler, Lyle P., From Frontier Settlement to Self-Conscious American Community: A History of One Rural Village (Sparta, Wisconsin) in the Nineteenth Century. Evansville, Indiana: Unigraphic, Inc., 1977, p.43.
(H) No Auther, History of Northern Wisconsin: Containing an Account of its Settlement, Growth, Development and Resources: An Extensive Sketch of its Counties, Cities, Towns and Villages...Etc., Chicago: The Western Historical Company, 1881, p. 634.
(I) Richards, Randolph A, History of Monroe Country, Wisconsin: Past and Present, Including an Account of the Cities, Towns and Villages of the County. Chicago: C.F. Cooper and Co., 1912, pp. 273 and 323-324.
(J) Ellsworth, C.S., Views in and Around Sparta, Giving a Brief History of the City and Setting Forth Its Advantages for Manufacturing and as a Place of Residence, Together with Some Account of its Celebrated Magnetic Mineral Water. Portage, Wisconsin: Register Printing Company, 1888, p. 41.
(K) Gregory, John G., West Central Wisconsin: A History. Vol. 4, Indianapolis: S.J. Clarke Publishing Company, 1933, p. 87.
(L) Jones, Ida Lucille, "A History of Sparta, Wisconsin." B.A. Thesis. University of Wisconsin, 1915, p. 5.
(M) City of Sparta Tax Records, 1868-1930.
(N) Wisconsin State Gazetteer and Business Directory (CHicago: R.L. Polk, 1876, 1879). |
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