300 4th Avenue Northwest
Austin, MN, USA

National Register of Historic Places - Arthur W. Wright House

Statement of Significance:

The house at 300 4th Ave. N.W. in Austin Is significant as Mower County’s earliest and most intact example of the Italianate style. Italianate style houses were the first high style of architecture in the county and were used for farmhouse and town house designs alike. Most of the extant Italianate houses in Mower County date from the early 1870s. The first owner of the house is unknown, but the property is most closely associated with Arthur Winfield Wright, Austin realtor, banker, business mail and city attorney. The house dates from ca. 1866-1874 and is in a neighborhood just northwest of the center of Austin which contained some of the earliest and finest residences in town, quite a few of which were originally designed in the Italianate style. Across 2nd. St. N.W. to the east is the Cook-Hormel house, on the National Register, which began as an Italianate style house like the one at 300 4th Ave. N.W. but was extensively remodeled and enlarged into its present Classical Revival style appearance. The juxtaposition of these two houses illustrates the way the Italianate style could be transformed into the popular Classical Revival style through tum-of-the-century remodeling.

Arthur Winfield Wright was born in 1861 in Ohio and came to Minnesota in 1875, completing his education at Carlton College. Wright lived in the house at 300 4th Ave. N.W. from the middle 1880s until his death. His son, Winfield Wright sold the house to Herald Williams in the early 1930s. Arthur Wright was married in 1885 and admitted to the bar in 1888. His first business was banking through his association with the First National Bank of Austin. In 1887 he formed a partnership with Lafayette French under the name French and Wright. Wright looked after the real estate end of the business until the.; firm dissolved in 1898. Wright carried on an extensive law practice, was county attorney for eight years, city attorney of Austin for several years, and a trustee of Carlton College. Wright also served as a major in the Twelfth Minnesota Regiment in the Spanish War of 1898. In later years he was president and director of the Austin Weed Exterminator Company and treasurer and director of the Alliance Fire Insurance Company of Minnesota.

The Abstract of Title indicates that Julia Wheat and Dr. John N. Wheat warranty deeded the property to Julia Wheat’s brother, John F. Cook in 1866 when the property was worth $1,400. Julia and John F. were children of John F. Cook who built the Cook Hormel house across the street. Bt 1874, the property was warranty deeded by W. L. Austin and his wife, Mary, to Converse L. Chase for $6,000. Although the original owner of the house is not known, the jump in valuation suggests that the house was built ca. 1866-74.