Milwaukee’s Historically Preserved Buildings Tell Untold Stories

A presentation at a meeting of Milwaukee’s Historic Preservation Commission on Monday, Apr. 1 revealed low numbers of locally preserved sites associated with African-Americans, LGBTQ+ and Latinx history.

The project analyzed which locally preserved sites in Milwaukee are associated with historically underrepresented groups. The presentation defined these underrepresented groups as: “communities, people or individuals who have generally been excluded from mainstream history due to race, gender, class or sexual orientation despite having a crucial role in history.” The least represented of the groups in the study were African-Americans, LGBTQ+ and Latinx individuals, with five, three and two sites respectively.

HPC intern Cody Kern gave the presentation and carried out the research for the project. Kern is also a graduate student at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee in the school’s urban historical studies program. Kern hypothesized that the low number of locally preserved buildings related to these groups may be due to several factors, including the historic underrepresentation of these groups in Milwaukee’s population.

“Compared to other industrial Great Lakes cities like Chicago, Detroit and Cleveland, the Black Milwaukee population was actually pretty low,” said Kern. “Then, it started really increasing in the second half of the 20th century.” Kern said that Milwaukee’s LGBTQ+ and Latinx populations also underwent a similar increase over time, which prevents sites associated with their histories from being locally preserved. “There’s a ‘50 years or older’ qualification for local preservation,” said Kern. “A lot of black, Latinx and LGBTQ+ communities didn’t really start increasing until after the 1980s, so we’re still in that little 40 to 50-year gap to even qualify for local preservation.”

According to Kern’s presentation, there are currently 192 locally preserved sites in Milwaukee, 80 of which are related to one or more underrepresented groups. The most represented of these groups found in the study were the working class and women, with 26 and 18 sites respectively. 

“We felt it was just necessary to have this documented,” said Kern in an interview, “to have documented what locally preserved sites are connected to underrepresented groups. There was really no definitive document connecting the two.”

Kern also cited interstate construction as having a major effect on the number of locally preserved sites. “Interstates like I-43, I-794, they demolished a lot of sites that would have applied to locally preserved sites,” said Kern. He also mentioned that a shortcoming of the study lies in the fact that much of Milwaukee’s indigenous history has been erased over time, making it difficult to determine which sites may have been related to the history of the city’s indigenous populations.

Kern highlighted the Catherine Foley Building at 266 E. Erie St. as an example of a site that was associated with several underrepresented groups, including female immigrants, working-class individuals and the LGBTQ+ community. 

Construction began on the building in 1884 after a permit was obtained by Catherine Foley, a widowed Irish immigrant. The structure was one of the few that was spared by the Third Ward fire of 1892, according to a historic designation study report from 2014. The building was sold to Miller Brewing Company in 1896, where it became a tavern primarily frequented by Milwaukee’s working class. 

The building later became The Wreck Room Bar from 1972 to 1995, one of the city’s prime LGBTQ+ bars at the time, according to Kern’s presentation. In 1996, the building was sold to the Milwaukee Institute of Art and Design and served as the school’s student union until a fire in 2013. 

In January, General Capital Group and Joseph Property Development donated the building to the Milwaukee Preservation Alliance, according to the MPA’s website. “When we talked about acquiring this building, it was something that we realized aligned perfectly with our mission,” said Emma Rudd, the MPA’s executive director.  “Our mission is to make preservation mainstream and to preserve the storied history of Milwaukee through the stories that these buildings tell.”

The MPA is currently preparing for the restoration process of the building. “We are, in the next week or so, going to be stabilizing the building,” said Rudd. “It’s sat vacant for about 10 years. Currently there’s a lot of water infiltration, so we are going to do some temporary stabilization that includes supporting the second floor structure, bracing the bulging northern masonry wall and patching the roof for the time being, just to stop any more water and let it dry out.” 

The Alliance’s goal of preservation is similar to Kern’s goal of documenting historically significant sites. “We want to use it as a living example of what preservation can be,” said Rudd. “It’s something that is not necessarily the most architecturally significant building, but it has such a rich and colored storied history. Preservation is more than just about the best-looking buildings in the city or the most unique architecture, it also has to do with the stories that these buildings tell.”