ARCHITECTS and BUILDERS

 
Among the principal objectives of an intensive survey is the identification of  the designers and the builders responsible for creating the resources in the area being surveyed, followed by the compilation of an inventory of the work associated with the persons in each of these groups.  This objective is central to the primary intent of intensive surveys, which is, to provide information that will help determine which resources are potentially eligible for inclusion in the National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) and it is embodied in National Register Criteria C, which states that "The quality of significance in American history, architecture, archeology, and culture is present in districts, sites, buildings, structures, and objects that possess integrity   and that embody the distinctive characteristics of a type, period, or method of construction or that represent the work of a master."  One result of the many intensive surveys done over the last decade has been a redefining of the term "master" to make it broader and more inclusive than it was previously when the term was usually assigned exclusively to professionally trained architects.  Now we recognize that many of the resources we study and preserve were designed by the craftsmen who built them and that the buildings and structures created by these largely unsung designers are as worthy of inclusion in the National Register as are the works of many more formally trained designers.  This more sophisticated view of the historic development of the built environment has resulted in a much deeper and richer understanding of our surroundings and has provided a richer context within which to view the works our most important designers.  It has also made it possible for far more buildings to be considered eligible for listing in the National Register than was possible in the past.
 
The overwhelming majority of the buildings in the Town of Perry were built and were also probably designed by local builders who either used published plans or built designs that they were accustomed to building.  No one calling himself an architect is known to have practiced in the Town or elsewhere in the vicinity in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.  Never-the-less, the Survey found one building that was the work of a professional architect in Milwaukee and this building is listed in the short architect's biography that follows.

The principal resources employed by the Town of Perry Intensive Survey to identify architects and builders who practiced in the Town were published local histories and local newspapers, and it was the newspapers that provided the great majority of the information.  Even so, the most important resources that remains to be systematically searched for relevant information are still the local newspapers.  While the survey used newspapers as one of its principal research tools, a complete search of the area newspapers available on microfilm was beyond the scope of the survey's resources.  Such work as was done, however, showed that newspapers are the single best resource for identifying the work of the designers and builders who worked and practiced in the Town and it is to be hoped that the work done by the survey will provide a starting point which others can use to undertake additional research in the future.

ARCHITECTS

The following is a summary of the information that is available on the one identified architect who is known to have designed an historic building in the Town of Perry.

John Paulu

The sole identified architect-designed work in the Town is the Holy Redeemer Roman Catholic Church located at 10070 Spring Valley Road in Section 10, and built by its congregation in 1916.  This fine Gothic Revival style building is the work of John Paulu of Milwaukee.  Paulu was born in Czechoslovakia but nothing else is known about his education or early practice until his arrival in Wisconsin.  Paulu's first and only known place of residence was in the city of Milwaukee and he is first listed as an architect in that city's directory in 1887.  By 1892, the listing is for John Paulu & Co. and this listing continues until 1895, after which Paulu practiced under his own name.  Most of Paulu's known work was designed during the John Paulu & Co. period and his earliest identified commission is the Gothic Revival style St. Lawrence Catholic Church in Stangelville, Kewaunee County, which was built in 1892 for a Czech congregation.  The following year, Paulu & Co. designed a commercial building at 1405 W. Greenville in Milwaukee and a two-flat residence at 1724 W. Mineral St., also in Milwaukee.  Paulu also designed St. Wenceslaus Catholic Church in Milwaukee located at 1404 W. Scott St. as well, but these few buildings represent all of his identified work up until 1916.(1) 

Why a Milwaukee architect such as Paulu should have been chosen to design the replacement for the old Holy Redeemer Church in the Town of Perry is not known but what is known of his work suggests that he may have been a church specialist whose name might well have been familiar to the Archdiocese in Milwaukee and perhaps it was they who recommended him.  Whatever the connection, the congregation approached him for a new design in 1915 and the church was completed late in 1916.(2) 

Endnotes:
1. Architect's Files.  Division of Historic Preservation, Wisconsin Historical Society, Madison, Wisconsin.
2. Breines, Rev. Andrew R. (pastor).  Holy Redeemer Mission, Perry, Wisconsin: 1861-1961.  Madison: Craftsman Press Corp., 1961.

BUILDERS

The great majority of the historically and architecturally significant buildings in the Town of Perry and elsewhere were designed either wholly or in part by the persons who built them.  These persons played an important role in the creation of the built environment and the best of them are now considered to be fully deserving of the term "master" as it is used in National Register Criteria C.  Consequently, an important goal of any Intensive Survey is the identification of the most important builders who lived in the area being surveyed.  Not surprisingly, such persons historically possessed widely differing skills and design capabilities but in the nineteenth century they were generally distinguished from those persons calling themselves architects by their less formal education and design training and by their greater degree of physical involvement in the building process.  The Town's first builders were probably skilled or semi-skilled carpenters and masons whose design sense developed out of the direct experience they acquired working with traditional building methods and designs.  Prior to 1850 this experience was much the same for both builders and for those persons then calling themselves architects in Wisconsin.  As a result, builders proved to be more than adequate designers for the vast majority of buildings built in this early period of Wisconsin's history, a period whose chief need was for shelter and functional utility.  Even as the needs of society became more complex and buildings became larger and much more numerous, builders were still able to satisfy the great majority of client's requests by resorting to pattern books for design ideas and to an ever-growing number of mail order catalogs which made available an endless variety of increasingly complex architectural details.  In its essentials this system continues to exist today and most residences in particular are still built "from plans" much as they were in the nineteenth century.