Christian Turck House

The Christian Turck House is a log farmhouse from the late 1830s which currently serves as a museum called the Schottler House at Old World Wisconsin in Eagle, Wisconsin, United States.[2][3] It was originally built by a German immigrant near Germantown, Wisconsin.[4] In 1973 it was added to the National Register of Historic Places.[3]

Christian Turck House
After 1933, on its original site near Kirchhayn
Nearest cityEagle, Wisconsin
Coordinates43°16′16″N 88°4′50″W
Area0.1 acres (0.040 ha)
Built1830
Architectural styleGerman Blockbau
NRHP reference No.73000097[1]
Added to NRHPOctober 25, 1973

In the late 1830s Christian Turck walked into a swamp near his home a mile south of Kirchhayn in Washington County and began to cut cedar logs to build a house. He squared them and laid them horizontally on top of each other, notching the corners to hold them together. A summer beam runs down the center of the house at each level, with other beams connected to it by mortise and tenon joints. Perrin points out that in this eastern German Blockbau style, the logs aren't fitted as tightly as in most Norwegian log construction, since the logs would shrink anyway, and chinking would be needed. This house was chinked with clay, rye straw, and lime plaster.[5][6] The resulting log cabin was large - two stories plus attic. Across the front (sunny south) Christian built a full-width porch sheltered by a cantilevered shed roof. On the back the roof extends down to a one-story level, adding a couple rooms and giving the building a saltbox profile.[7] Near his house, Christian laid up a brick structure which served as a smoke house, bake oven and summer kitchen.[5]

View from another angle, after 1933

Perrin points out that the Turck house is important because few examples of this German Blockbau style (solid logs) remain in Wisconsin, in contrast to the more common German Fachwerk style, where the framing logs are filled with brick or some other material.[5] Because of this, the Historic American Buildings Survey carefully documented the house in 1936. At that time John Schottler was living in the house and the surveyor described its condition as excellent in one place and fair in another.[8] That 1933 survey produced these documents:

In 2013, reconstructed at Old World Wisconsin

By 1971 the NRHP nomination described the condition of the house as "ruinous." Vandalism could not be prevented in its location near Kirchhayn, and it was facing demolition. Recognizing its importance as a representative of its style, the State Historical Society bought it. Because it couldn't be moved as a whole, it was carefully disassembled, with each piece numbered, and placed in storage.[7] A few years later, the house was moved to Old World Wisconsin and reconstructed as the Schottler House - an example German farmhouse.

References
  1. "National Register Information System". National Register of Historic Places. National Park Service. July 9, 2010.
  2. "Christian Turck House". Landmark Hunter.com. Retrieved 2012-01-26.
  3. "Old World Wisconsin Site: Architecture and History Inventory". Wisconsin Historical Society. Retrieved 7 August 2013.
  4. "Christian Turck House". Photograph. Wisconsin Historical Society. Retrieved 2012-01-26.
  5. Perrin, Richard W.E. (1967). The Architecture of Wisconsin. Madison: State Historical Society of Wisconsin. p. 9.
  6. Perrin, Richard W.E. (Spring 1961). "German Timber Farmhouses in Wisconsin: Terminal Examples of a Thousand-Year Tradition". Wisconsin Magazine of History. 44 (3): 200–202. Retrieved 2019-10-30.
  7. Donald N. Anderson (1971-05-27). NRHP Inventory/Nomination: Turck (Christian) House. National Park Service. Retrieved 2019-10-29. With two photos.
  8. Guth, Alexander. "Christian Turck House" (PDF). Historic American Buildings Survey. Retrieved 2019-10-30.


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