herr2ck: Orange Cream

June 2025.

Columbus, Wisconsin’s city hall is a smaller-scale example of Richardsonian Romanesque architecture adjusted to fit the needs of a smaller town. With an eclectic form common to the style, it still operates today.

Columbus City Hall is located at 105 North Dickason Boulevard, bordered by the community center to the north, the Farmers & Merchants Union Bank to the south, Dickason Boulevard and Victorian-era commercial buildings to the east, and the library and James Street to the west.

History

1912 postcard of City Hall, with intact rear bell tower. (Columbus, Wisconsin Wiki)

Columbus City Hall was designed by architect Truman Dudley Allen, who lived in Minneapolis at the time of its design but moved around the Midwest throughout his career. Completed in 1892, the bulk of the building is constructed of Watertown buff brick over a foundation of Waukesha stone. The vaults are of Doylestown red sandstone. When it was built, it housed the fire and police departments, the jail, the library, city government offices, and the “Auditorium Theatre” on the second floor. The latter area was very significant in the community, as it was used as a movie theater until the Rudalt Theater opened in 1917 and by several schools until 1936. Its use dwindled because of rumors that the city would demolish the building, and by the time the NRHP listing was written it had deteriorated significantly.

The only major alteration to the city hall was in 1948 after the fire department moved out. The westernmost tower was torn down to the roofline when they took their bell with them, and the original doors were replaced by new windows and brick. Minor alterations include the scrapping of an iron water fountain during World War II, removal of a fire escape, and modern glass doors on the southeast entrance.

c. 1979 photo of City Hall. Note the since-demolished frame building next door. (NRHP listing)

Between 1976 and 1978, the city hall received a major citizen-led restoration. The leaky roof was repaired, wainscoting and woodwork was stripped and sanded, four murals about Columbus were painted inside, and the exterior was sandblasted. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1979. The clock tower apparently stopped in 1992 and was repaired. An addition to the northeast side was constructed in 1998, which attempts to respond to the original design. Most recently, another new roof was added in 2023, which matches the original design’s red hue.

Photos

A good overall view of the building today:

Buff brick is a common building material in Wisconsin, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen stone that orange on the vaults and lintels here. The eclectic massing with towers is common to Richardsonian Romanesque architecture.

Rounded corner tower:

James Street facade:

Note the highly uneven fenestration here, almost chaotically so. This area is the most heavily altered across the entire building. The tower that originally held the fire station bells is gone, the fire escape leading to those white doors on the second floor has been removed, and the three doors leading to the fire station’s garage have been replaced by windows. The windows in that area gave me an inkling they weren’t original, since they are far shorter and wider than many others across this facade, but whoever did the work did a pretty good job matching the brick and stone masonry of the original building, and they even lined up the bottom of the windows with the vaulted one immediately opposite the central entrance.

As is common for smaller-scale buildings like this of the Gilded Age, ornamentation is achieved via the corbelled piers and cornice, as well as the polychromy of the vaulting:

The Dickason Boulevard facade is much more symmetrical, as two towers border a central bay:

The vaulted entrance here is much more irregular. I thought some glass window or other feature in the center above the doors was altered, but I guess it always looked like this: