German Heritage of Madison Walking Tour

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The Madison Candy Company building has stood at 744 Williamson Street since 1903, four years after the company was founded. The brick three-story building with limestone belt courses and cornice was designed by John Nader, a Madison architect and engineer. Madison Candy Company operated until 1927. The building housed the Wisconsin Farm Bureau from 1935 to 1945. Ela Welding Company first occupied the building in 1945 and sold welding and industrial supplies. Eldorado Grill restaurant has been operating in the Madison Candy Company building for over twenty years, moving in after the welding supplies firm left. The Madison Candy Company Building was listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 1997, the Wisconsin State Register in 1996, and became a Madison Landmark in the 1990s. The building has importance in local industrial history, architecture, and for its association with Nader.

2. Biederstaedt Grocery

Biederstaedt Grocery stands in a neighborhood that was occupied by many German immigrants beginning in the 1850s. The brick building at 851-853 Williamson Street was built by Charles Biederstaedt in 1874, to replace a wood frame building that burned down. Biederstaedt operated both his grocery business from the corner/ east half (853) and a saloon on the west half (851). George C. Breitenbach bought the building in 1891 and moved his family into the second floor residence; the family lived there until 1951. The Biederstadts built a new house next door at 847 Williamson in 1890 and moved there. The 853 corner space continued to contain a grocery store until 1960. Biederstaedt Grocery became a Madison Landmark in 1977 and was listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 1982. Only nine corner grocery stores from the nineteenth century remained in Madison by 1977. The first floor continues to contain businesses.

3. Hyer's Hotel

Hyer's Hotel, on the corner of Jenifer and Patterson Street, was constructed as a hotel in 1854 for David R. Hyer, a local carpenter and hotelkeeper who helped build the first capitol building in Madison in 1837. Henry C. Jacquish bought the hotel in 1855. The rear portion of the hotel and stables were wood frame and were destroyed by fire in 1874. The Hyer's Hotel building became a private residence after the fire. A brick wing was added to the rear, keeping with the Italianate style of the surviving hotel building. Hyer's Hotel continues to be a private residence containing two apartments in the rear wing. Hyer's Hotel was listed in the National Register in 1983 and became a Madison Landmark in 1975; it is one of the oldest surviving hotel buildings in Madison.

4. Harvey Hospital Site

In 1852, construction began on a three-story, octagonal-shaped mansion overlooking Lake Monona on Spaight Street. The home was owned by former Wisconsin Governor, Leonard Farwell (1852-1854), who sold the property in 1860 to a group of investors from Milwaukee. Today, that building no longer stands and the only physical memory of what was to become the Harvey Hospital and the Soldiers’ Orphan Home is a historic marker that reads: “On this city block stood during the Civil War, Harvey Hospital, and later the Wisconsin Soldiers’ orphans home. Both established through the influence of Mrs. Cordelia P. Harvey, whose honored husband, Governor Louis P. Harvey, had, April 19, 1862, been accidentally drowned in Tennessee River, near Pittsburg Landing, Tennessee, where, after the battle of Shiloh, he went with supplies for the comfort of sick and wounded Wisconsin soldiers. Presented to the City by the school children of Madison May 29, 1908.”

This Tour is a Walking Tour.

German Heritage of Madison Walking Tour

Created by Laurie Paonessa on November 19th 2020, 2:35:16 am.

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Description

This short walk through the neighborhood east of the Capitol and north of Lake Monona was settled by German-speaking immigrants in the mid-nineteenth century. The walking tour starts at a former candy factory built in 1901 and continues on to the site of a corner grocery store that served as an anchor for this historic community. The tour continues on to a historic hotel and concludes at a historic marker dedicated to preserving the history of a former hospital.

Entries on This Tour

German Heritage of Madison Walking Tour

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