3402 Monroe Street
Madison, WI, USA

Plough Inn (Madison, Wisconsin)

Plough Inn is located in Madison, Wisconsin.


History

The house was originally built as a residence for Frederick and Amelia Puanack, both German immigrants. John and Isabella Whare later turned it into a roadhouse. During the American Civil War, it was a popular destination for soldiers stationed at Camp Randall. Currently, it is used as a bed and breakfast called 'Arbor House'. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1980 and the State Register of Historic Places in 1989.

National Register of Historic Places - Plough Inn (Madison, Wisconsin)

Statement of Significance:

The Plough Inn is a significant remnant of Madison's early development. Serving pioneer farmers, traveling businessmen and legislators, Civil War soldiers and city visitors, this was one of several such inns that once dotted the fringes of Madison. But most of these pioneer buildings were demolished as the city expanded into the countryside.

The two major early roadside inns remaining in Madison are the Plough Inn and the Old Spring Tavern (NRHP 1/21/7*0 just down the street. Both were built in the early 1850s and are vernacular brick buildings with elements of the Greek Revival, a style once common in Madison but now very rare. Both houses were built as residences and quickly converted to inns as the number of travelers on the newly improved Madison-Wiota Road increased.

The Plough Inn, in addition, is constructed partly of local sandstone. This material was used extensively in the finest of Madison's 19th century buildings, many of which have been lost. The stone portion of the Plough Inn was built in 1853 by Frederick and Amelia Paunack, natives of Saxony, Germany.

Paunack emigrated to America in 18^9, living in Baltimore until 1852 when he arrived in Madison'. A stone cutter by profession, he immediately found work here in the university buildings and later the state capitol. After a few years he had saved enough money to purchase a stone business which he actively maintained until his death in 1§76. The quarry for Paunack's business was located somewhere on what Is now University Avenue near Ridge and Harvey streets—Quarry town—where several stone structures remain to this day. There Js reason to presume that the stone for the house, however, was quarried locally on the site of "The Glen." The oral tradition that surrounds the creation of the park and the existence of exposed rock faces in an unusual topographic arrangement seem to support this judgment. The Paunack family continued to be prominent throughout the 19th century with interests not only in the stone business but in architecture add banking as wel1.

The property was conveyed briefly to a Thomas Griffiths, who held it between February 1855 and September 1857, at which time the house became the property of John Whare, listed as a tavernkeeper In the i860 census. He had a wife, Isabella, and four children: George, May, John and William. It was during Whare's ownership that the building acquired the name "Plough Inn." During his ownership Whare improved the building; a substantial rise in his assessment occurred in 1858, presumably the year of the brick addition.

The Inn fronted directly on the Madison-Wiota Road, constructed as an access road from the State Capitol to the southwest and improved by authorization of the legislature in 1851-52. It was also near the route of the St. Paul Railroad tracks that would be laid beginning about 185A. In fact, census tracts for 1855 for the Town of Madison in the area of Plough Inn lists a household of 21 males headed by "John Dooling railroad." Another establishment in the neighborhood apparently indicates booming activity, for one household headed by Jonathan Wither by (Ki1loughly?) housed eight males and twelve females-- an unusual proportion. During Whare's ownership through 1865, the area was one of considerable popularity among both the local and traveling populace, including the men in blue encamped nearby.

In later years the house was occupied by the Roland Stebbins family. Mr. Stebbins was a university professor and a painter.