FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Kara O’Keeffe
608-261-9596
[email protected]
June 14, 2018
Voss' Birchwood lodge Listed in National Register of Historic Places
Manitowish Waters, Wis. - The Wisconsin Historical Society has announced the listing of the Voss’ Birchwood Lodge in Manitowish Waters, Vilas County, in the National Register of Historic Places. National Register designation provides access to certain benefits, including qualification for grants and for rehabilitation income tax credits, while it does not restrict private property owners in the use of their property.
The Voss’ Birchwood Lodge, still in continuous use and operated by descendants of the founding family, is a rare survivor of the golden age of resort building in the north woods. Henry and Ruth Voss established their resort in 1910 on Spider Lake; today, Voss’ Birchwood Lodge is one of Vilas County’s finest and most intact collections of historic, “American Plan” summer resort buildings. These buildings are examples of the Rustic and Craftsman styles, and all but two were built between 1910 and 1933, the other two being examples of the Ranch style that were built in 1946.
The lodge property includes the resort’s main lodge, its 12 guest cabins, a boathouse, a fish-cleaning shack, staff living quarters, and two owner’s homes. All of the cabins and lodge buildings were originally constructed with indoor plumbing and electricity, bringing a certain level of comfort to the north woods experience. The “American Plan” means that meals were provided in the main lodge; these resorts were an important generator of tourism which was vital to the economy and social history of Vilas County. For over one hundred years, the operation of this lodge has always been a family affair, making this property a rare outlier due to its continued operation and ownership by the third and fourth generations of the resort’s founders.
We gratefully acknowledge the Fuldner Heritage Fund which paid for the preparation of this nomination. This endowed fund, created through a generous donation by the Jeffris Family Foundation and administered by the Wisconsin Historical Society, supports the nomination of historically and architecturally significant rural and small town properties.
The register is the official national list of historic properties in America deemed worthy of preservation and is maintained by the National Park Service in the U.S. Department of the Interior. The Wisconsin Historical Society administers the program within Wisconsin. It includes sites, buildings, structures, objects and districts that are significant in national, state or local history, architecture, archaeology, engineering or culture.
To learn more about the State and National Register programs in Wisconsin, visitwww.wisconsinhistory.org.
About Wisconsin Historical Society
The Wisconsin Historical Society, founded in 1846, ranks as one of the largest, most active and most diversified state historical societies in the nation. As both a state agency and a private membership organization, its mission is to help people connect to the past by collecting, preserving and sharing stories. The Wisconsin Historical Society serves millions of people every year through a wide range of sites, programs and services. For more information, visit www.wisconsinhistory.org.
###
