Birdseye view of the Stillwater Lift Bridge and the Commander Building in Stillwater, Minnesota. The Stillwater Lift Bridge is a vertical-lift bridge crossing the St. Croix River between Stillwater, Minnesota, and Houlton, Wisconsin. It first opened to traffic in 1931.
The Brunswick Inn is located at 114 Chestnut Street East Stillwater, Minnesota. Known as the Brunswick House, this building was constructed by William C. Penny, a carpenter by trade, about 1848, the same year in which Stillwater was platted as a town and the year the territorial convention took place. In 1849 the first meeting of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows (I.O.O.F.) in Minnesota took place in the upstairs of the house. The Pennys sold the house in 1863 to Julius Brunswick. Brunswick, from Switzerland, worked in the mercantile trade.
The Ann Bean house is located at 319 Pine Street West in Stillwater, Minnesota. In 1879, the Stillwater Lumberman in noted ""Edward Hersey about to build on lots at Pine and Sixth."" Behind those few words are numerous associations: the construction of another opulent home for another of Stillwater's well-to-do lumber families, the possible involvement of architect George Orff in his second home for a Hersey brother, and the abundant use of large, eye-catching architectural elements. The Victorian home offers a virtual laundry list of stylistic elements: a tower, a veranda, a gable, a large chimney, and a two-story bay. While calling such an elaborate structure a ""starter home"" seems strange, Edward Hersey did indeed decide to start over with a new home, selling the house to fellow lumberman Jacob Bean in May, 1881 and building a new home at 320 Pine in 1883. In 1889, Jacob Bean was appointed to the prestigious and powerful position of surveyor general of logs, with the St. Paul Daily globe noting he was ""considerably more than half millionaire, and one of the heaviest log dealers in the Northwest. "" (February 3, 1889) As a political appointment, he held this position until 1893. Cynthia and Jacob made a permanent move to the Alhambra home in Stillwater in 1901, and the Lehmicke family became the home's long-term residents. In recognition of Ann Bean Lehmicke's long association with the house, it became known as the Ann Bean Mansion over time.
Freight House in Stillwater, Minnesota. Listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The Chicago, Milwaukee and St. Paul Railroad Freight House and Depot is overlooking the St. Croix River on the eastern fringe of Stillwater. The freight house and depot, built in 1883, is a simple vernacular building. Exterior ornamentation consists of a series of arched doors and windows on both sides of the building. Constructed of limestone and brick the building measures 200 feet by 40 feet. The limestone foundation walls measure approximately two feet thick. The brick bearing walls are eighteen inches thick and thirty feet high. (The limestone was quarried in the nearby North Quarry.) Date of its construction is 1883. The mill construction and truss system of the building are significant as examples of .wood structural engineering. The first map of Stillwater (1848) indicates that the present site of the building was once Lake St. Croix. Therefore, the building required elaborately engineered pilings to support the tremendous weight of the limestone foundation and brick walls. One of the most interesting features of the building was its dual use - passenger and freight. The building served as a freight house and passenger depot until 1955.
North exterior view of the Isaac Staples Sawmill Building in Stillwater, Minnesota. Also known as the St. Croix Lumber Mills- Stillwater Manufacturing Company on the National Register of Historic Places.
Ivory McKusick's small French Second Empire bluff-top home reflects McKusick's successes in lumbering and government supply contracts during the Civil War. The heavy mansard roof was the height of style during the era, and the home is on the National Register of Historic Places. The original house was built in 1866, with a prominent addition in 1872 becoming the front, or main, part of the home. Ivory was one of several McKusick brothers who established themselves in lumbering in Stillwater. The house is located at the corner of North Second Street.
The Rivertown Inn, also known as John and Anna O'Brien House, in Stillwater, Minnesota. John O'Brien was born in Maine in 1849. Anna was born in New York State in 1855. They were married in 1879. In 1870, when John was 21, the logging firm of the O'Brien Brothers [James and John] was formed, which later merged into the firm of Anderson [James] & O'Briens. The firm did well, and by all accounts John was a prosperous man. The house has been called the first full-fledged Queen Anne style house in Stillwater, the purest specimen of that style, relatively simple and impressive. In 1896, according to a building permit application, the Stillwater Manufacturing Company added a two-story, six-by-sixteen-foot addition on the west side of the O'Brien house, and a two-story fourteen-by-thirty-foot addition on the north side, requiring rebuilding the roof. William and Mary Bean lived in the house at 306 West Olive Street into the late 1930s, moving to Pine Street shortly before William's death in 1944. The house later became the Rivertown Inn.
The John and Mary Curtis House is located at 706 West Churchill Street, Stillwater. Constructed in 1858 by John Curtis, a stone mason from Ireland. By 1894, Charles Jackson and Claude Jackson were residents. Charles Jackson was one of the few black men in Nineteenth Century Stillwater. He was born a slave in central Georgia about 1851. After the Civil War, he followed the Union Army north, and eventually ended up in St. Paul, Minnesota. While working in a livery stable in St. Paul, he met Albert Lowell, proprietor of the Sawyer House, Stillwater's grand hotel. Lowell offered him a job, and Jackson came to Stillwater to work as a barber, first for Lowell, later on his own, and at one time, as a partner with Samuel Hadley, another black barber. His son Claude, also a barber in 1894, was also a longtime choir director at the Church of St. Michael in Stillwater.
Judge Hollis R. Murdock built the original house in 1859 at 210 Laurel Street East in Stillwater, Minnesota. Also known as the Mildred Houghton Comfort home.
Historic home at 118 Oak St. W in Stillwater, Minnesota was built between 1860 and 1872. Seth and Elizabeth Sawyer first owned the home (they're not listed on the sign), selling it to Philomena Potts. Owned by lumber merchant Samuel McClure in 1888. And then Reginald ""RA"" Kilty bought the home in the 1920s after emigrating from Ireland. He and his brother ran an oil and coal distribution business in Stillwater called JJ Kilty Company. RA's son, Richard Kilty bought the property.
The Mulvey House is located at 622 Churchill Street West in Stillwater, Minnesota. The refined, well-executed and respectfully preserved exterior of this Italianate home makes this one of the finest examples of its kind in Stillwater, Minnesota. The Mulveys owned a small, one-story house before the Civil War. Over time, other additions were made to the rear of the home. The site also includes a stone carriage house, built to house James Mulvey's horses and carriage collection.
The one and one-half story Ray Anderson house at 1901 North Second Street in Stillwater, Minnesota is one of a few remaining examples of a typical worker's cottage from the nineteenth century in the city.
The Roscoe Hersey home at 414 South Fourth Street is on the National Register of Historic Places. The Eastlake/early Queen Anne style Roscoe Hersey House is an irregular plan 18 room structure made by machine-produced decorative woodwork. Roscoe Hersey played an important role in the early development of Stillwater's lumber and mercantile development. His house reflects the commercial success of the Hersey-Staples partnership, the strong link between the St. Croix Valley and Maine capital and personalities, and the boom years of Stillwater's lumber years. Roscoe Hersey was the eldest son of Samuel F. Hersey, Isaac Staples financial partner. Roscoe Hersey moved to Minnesota in 1867, after serving in the Civil War at the age of 26 to look after his family's business. He took charge of the Lake City branch of the Hersey, Staples and Co. In 1872 he moved to Stillwater and entered the firm of Hersey, Bean and Brown, a land, lumber, merchandise firm. In 1878 he was elected and served one term as a state senator. Hersey built the house in 1879-1880 and occupied it for seven years.
Located at 626 4th Street North in Stillwater, Minnesota, William Sauntry's house might be considered a Queen Anne, but was constructed with the enthusiastic use of other architectural style elements, including Eastlake millwork, a mansard-roofed tower common to Italianate villas, and hints of the Gothic in the gable. The house reflects the Sauntry lumbering fortune and the range of architectural fashion during its construction in 1881-1883. Wiliam Sauntry, raised in New Brunswick, Canada, came to Stillwater in a second generation of St. Croix loggers and began a career in a partnership with Albert Tozer, gaining the trust of the Weyerhauser interests, and leasing stock in the St. Croix Boom company. He also built and managed the Nevers Dam and had interests in other lumbering companies, with his wealth eventually estimated at two million dollars.
View of 3rd Street South and Myrtle Street West in Stillwater, Minnesota. Historic Hassoy block in background; Steeple Town Commons condominium ( formerly First Presbyterian Church) in foreground. Building constructed in 1851.