217 Bushaway Rd
Wayzata, MN 55391, USA

217 Bushaway Road, Wayzata, MN, USA

Excerpt from the History of Bushway Road and Its Neighborhood (1858-2009) by Irene Stemmer, of the Wayzata Heritage Preservation Board (HPB) as a means of preserving the history of the Bushaway Road and its neighborhood.

1939: The Howard House – 217 Bushaway Rd.
This delightful Cape Cod was designed by Magney, Tusler & Setter, Architects and Engineers, for Robert L. and Martha Howard. Mr. Howard was a Grain Trader at the Minneapolis Stock Exchange. In 1962. The Howards sold the house to Frank C. and Jean Blodgett and their family. Mr. Blodgett was Vice Chairman of General Mills (1961-1992). There have only been three owners of the house. The present owners purchased the house in 1983.

However, the property has had several owners. In 1855, it was part of Amasa Richard’s preempted quarter section. Other land owners were Joseph and Annie Lacher, George Draper Dayton, Kenneth Dayton Williams, William Bleakley and Roberta Cargill. One of the early owners of the land built a log cabin on the property.

Cargill owned the property from 1927-37. According to the abstract, in 1930, Streeter Lumber Company filed a lien against Roberta Cargill’s property for “lumber and building materials for the construction, erection, alteration and repair of buildings on the property” at a total cost of $1153.93. Perhaps the alterations were to the log cabin that Robert Howard says was on the property when he purchased it in 1937.

The Howards considered incorporating the cabin with its large fireplace into the plans for the house to be used as a library. Apparently, there was a change of plans as the cabin is not a part of the house nor is it still there and was probably razed at that time. Did Roberta Cargill build the cabin or remodel it? Was it a summer cabin at the lake or did it belong to an early settler? A mystery to be solved.

Magney, Tusler & Setter, Architects designed the Foshay Tower in 1929, the Minneapolis Post Office, the Young Quinlan Building, and the Carlton College Historic Facilities Management Building to name just a few.