Reads Landing School Building
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Reads Landing School
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Reads Landing School viewed from the north
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| Location | 70537 206th Avenue, Reads Landing, Minnesota |
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| Coordinates | 44°24′4.3″N 92°4′46.2″W / 44.401194°N 92.079500°WCoordinates: 44°24′4.3″N 92°4′46.2″W / 44.401194°N 92.079500°W |
| Area | Less than one acre |
| Built | 1870 |
| Built by | Daniel C. Hill |
| Architectural style | Italianate |
| NRHP Reference # | 88003217 |
| Designated | January 19, 1989 |
Reads Landing School is a former school building in the unincorporated community of Reads Landing, Minnesota, United States. Built in 1870, it has been converted into the Wabasha County Historical Society Museum. The building is one of the state's oldest surviving brick schools, and typifies their characteristic boxy, bracketed, Italianate style. The school was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1989 for having local significance in the themes of architecture and exploration/settlement. It was nominated for being a rare surviving example of Minnesota's early brick schools, and for its association with Reads Landing's peak as a lumber milling boomtown.
Reads Landing School is a two-story brick building on a limestone foundation. Its footprint is nearly square. A central bay projects slightly from the front façade. The building has a hip roof with a gable over the front bay. This is topped with a cupola. A wide cornice overhangs the building, supported by pairs of heavy brackets emerging from the frieze. At the base of the walls, an unusual water table is formed by a projecting course of bricks rather than material from the foundation.
The windows have segmental brick arches and limestone sills. The central front bay is distinguished by a semicircular fantail window over the main doors, semicircular arches over the second story windows, and an oculus window illuminating the attic. In the interior, both floors have two rooms with a hall across the front.
Reads Landing was platted in 1856 overlooking the confluence of the Mississippi and Chippewa Rivers. It was ideally sited for riverboat traffic and the booming lumber trade, and success as a lumber milling center swelled the population. In 1870, flush with wealth, the town replaced its 1858 frame schoolhouse with this stately brick structure. Twenty percent of the $8,200 cost was funded by liquor licenses; at its peak Reads Landing had 21 saloons.
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