Tag: rural

1850’s “mirror mansion” crafted by similar twins Argalus Isaac and Augustus Ira Foote.
Speculated underground railroad website, Al Capone moonshine still

For yrs, this aged put lie rotting away just a shorter excursion through the woods from my property. I was in it when I was young and later on in my teenagers. I knew it was there but failed to believe a great deal of it. Confident I loved previous properties – the workmanship and the historical past – but it wasn’t right up until nuts tales explained to to me captured my creativity. Stories of secret stairways, underground tunnels, and tales of moonshine and gangsters – then I was curious of the aged, boarded up building. Had been there tunnels? Was there, genuinely, rings in the basement partitions and blood spattered on them from some regrettable incident? Ended up there bars on the basement windows? There was some truth to some of it, but how a great deal? I headed to the library to request data…. and the courthouse, many, a lot of periods
It was there I acquired the tale of twin brothers, born in 1817, who shared a deep brotherly like by way of out their existence. It really is been said they experienced a double wedding day, Argalus married Adelia, and Augustus married Anna, creating a full foresome of “AF” initials. So shut they have been, following going from Massachusetts in the early 1850’s, they had created a property for two people. 1 facet of the property was the mirror image of the other facet just like the brothers themselves. It is said that they furnished their sides the same and that the inside decorating was of the greatest high-quality. Matters have been good. The brothers farmed their 300 acres (and more) of virgin land and Argalus and Adelia began creating their spouse and children with sons Andrew, William, and Frank. The spot was the delight of the countryside… but fate intervened. Anna Foote died all through childbirth just before Xmas, 1855. The minor daughter, Mary, followed her mom a several months later. As you can imagine, Augustus was devestated. Suddenly points turned unequal involving the two. Opposite to what is composed out there, the Foote brothers carried on with lifetime inspite of what was prepared to be. Augustus lived with his sister, Sara, and mom, Rebecca, right up until they both past away as nicely. Come 1870 census, Augustus no longer lived there. Also a great deal personal tragedy most likely drove him away. In his put lived farmhands and a domestic servant or two. As soon as Argalus’ spouse past absent in 1876, the determination was designed to transfer absent. Argalus’ a few sons had grown and remaining as properly. Every person moved to Oshkosh and established the Foote Brothers Milling Co. Their dwelling sat vacant and became identified as “Foote’s Folly.”
The mansion was purchased by a relatives who elevated horses and quickly there have been stables of high-quality horses and a racetrack was established up at the rear of the home. Some eleven yrs later, they moved on, and the place sat vacant. The put improved hands several moments right up until the current owner bought it in 1934. But just prior to that, the spot was a person of speculation and issue.
Tales of protected trucks coming and likely as a result of the evening and gangsters living there experienced the town of Eureka worried. The moment a place of admiration, now it was a area to prevent. Rumors soon circulated of a equipment gun, on a turret, becoming mounted in the cupola. There ended up tips of who they have been, and to this working day, Al Capone’s identify comes up. Their time passed there as perfectly.
In 1935, a community women’s group held a Halloween tour at the big area. People today came from everywhere you go for their likelihood to see the residence, some thing of a legend already. To this day, their names are published on the walls of that time as properly as other people. So a great deal admiration….
A lot of problems and deterioration arrived into enjoy soon after that. Quite a few content articles in papers were being published about it, a couple of pictures taken, but nothing to help save it from spoil. The coils and boilers from the moonshine days were lying out by a lose back again in the 60’s as evidence of it is really moonshine days.
Armed with my new found information of the home, I had a fully new perception of admiration for the position. It was the twins aspiration household. It was an huge put and currently being there, I felt like I was in another era – a further time. The framework is – was – really a location to wander up to. Quite enormous and too much to handle, yet relatively individually intimate with it truly is remaining Italianate gingerbread. It was hauntingly attractive and I was totally drawn to it…. To think about what it appeared like – to “see” it with all the shutters, home windows, and enormous entrance porch. Excellent…
Investigating it further, I discovered the continues to be of a carriage loop in the front property from all all those many years back. Inside of the 7000 sq ft house were being sagging flooring lined with slipping plaster and busted lathe. Stays of peeling wall and ceiling papers clung to twelve foot ceilings, hand-grained woodwork, ceiling medallions with stays of chandeliers in each individual of the 4 parlors, etc. There have been two kitchens connected to twin eating rooms graced by large bay home windows. Upstairs there were 9 bedrooms, every single with developed in clearly show closets, situated off a 80ft hallway. The three staircases ended up open up but the spindles were being very long absent. A concealed flight of techniques led to the cupola which was as soon as encased in 16 double hung home windows.
The fabled tunnel was no lengthier open, but located to be mortared shut in the basement and sealed off on the other stop. I spoke to a male who experimented with to dig it out when he was a kid in the 40’s. What could be in there? I ponder to this working day…. Did the Foote’s set a lantern out on the porch years in the past for those people runaway slaves to spot? Was it one more location alongside the way toward independence in Canada? It may possibly eternally keep on being a secret.
It was a area of broken desires from one more area in time. It grew to become a put riddled with rumors and speculation – a legend in itself. People who sought after to help you save it, could not come across a way. A location admired by many but now it faces a destiny of it can be possess. Even the point of becoming probably qualified for Countrywide Registry standing was not more than enough.
The brothers lived out their lives together in New London, Wi, with Argalus’ son, Andrew. It is penned in just one of their obituaries that, I quotation, “they were unattainable to convey to aside and shared almost everything by way of out everyday living. Their minds were being but one particular thought it would seem and their pleasures and sorrows were being shared together. Their pocketbooks were being merged, and neither realized what a quarrel was.That they dependable each other in techniques that couple of brothers ever could. Residing into their early ’80s, prior to the time of Augustus’ passing it was reported they were being the oldest surviving twins in the United States.” Augustus past absent in 1901 and was laid to rest beside his wife and daughter who life ended up tragically cut shorter so lots of yrs right before, and Argalus, the adhering to yr. A limited mile away, the family members is buried with each other in a household plot marked by a tall, white spire. The brothers continue to collectively just like they had been all their life.

Posted by dtrannyman on 2010-04-05 03:51:40

Tagged: , old , property , mansion , brick , deserted , Foote , WI , Eureka , haunted , twin brothers , underground railroad , exclusive , wisconsin , household , gangster hideout , pre civil war , Al Capone , unusual wisconsin , italianate , architecture , moonshine , folly , rural , decay , farmhouse , Argalus and Augustus Foote , symmetrical , omro wisconsin , pioneers , legend , landmark , Winnebago County , forgotten , tunnel , 1800’s , 19th century

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