Near East Side Historic District

About this property

The Near East Side Historic District is a neighborhood in Beloit, Wisconsin composed of stylish homes of prominent citizens from the 1800s and the buildings of Beloit College. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1983. This district's land is part of the claim of Caleb Blodgett, Beloit's first permanent settler. The 1837 Kelsou Survey and the 1840 Hopkins Survey laid out the streets and lots. Here are some sites that the NRHP nomination considers pivotal, roughly in the order built. These buildings show the same general progression of architectural styles that is found all over southern Wisconsin. Beloit College Mound Group is a collection of mounds built by Woodland people forty feet above the Rock River, probably between 700 and 1100 A.D. About 23 of 27 mounds remain, including a turtle effigy, linear, and conical mounds. Middle College at 700 College St was originally a 4-story Greek Revival-styled building designed by a Mr. Ross and built in 1848. It had flat stone lintels and was built from red brick made by Asa Curtis in nearby Turtle township. After a series of upgrades, a 1939 remodeling removed the fourth story and added the grand front portico and the cupola. The building initially housed classrooms, dormitory, chapel and library, and was called simply "the College." Only after North and South College were added was it called Middle College. The Rasey house at 517 Prospect St is a 1.5-story house built in 1850 as a fund-raiser for Beloit College – built with donated labor and materials. The style is roughly Greek Revival, seen in the low-pitched roof, the frieze beneath the eaves, and the plain lintels. The walls are clad in small coursed cobblestones, with quoins decorating the corners. The college's first president lived in the house for a year before it was sold to Deacon Samuel Hinman. The Aaron Chapin house at 709 College Ave, a.k.a. the President's House, is a 2-story house designed by Lucas Bradley in Greek Revival style house and built in 1851. Hallmarks of the style are the symmetry and the low-pitched roof. The house already had some Italianate elements at the start, but in 1871 Chapin added the bay windows and a cupola. In 1937 Ellen Chapin gave the house to Beloit College and it was remodeled, restoring it to a more Greek Revival look, finally adding the portico in the late 1940s. Chapin was the first president of the college, a teacher and writer on economics. The Jesse McQuigg house at 635 College Ave is a 1.5-story brick home built before 1857, and is considered by some "the best preserved, example of Greek Revival architecture in Beloit." All the classic elements are intact: low-pitched roof, cornice returns, frieze, and simple lintels. Jesse McQuigg owned the house from 1857 to 1886. The house's history before that is unknown.

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Categories

Property data from the National Register of Historic Places, National Park Service (public domain).

Description adapted from Wikipedia under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

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