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Property Location
Property Features
McCormick Harvesting Machine Company was one of the two largest farm implement manufacturers by the end of the 19th Century. The original McCormick building was constructed as a regional branch house for sales and distribution of agricultural implements to the independently owned retail dealers. Few such branch houses were constructed by the company and no others are known to remain in Wisconsin.
The building adjoined the Madison and Watertown Railroad tracks, and was expanded in 1910, more than doubling the size of the building. The International Harvester Company (as it was known after a 1902 merger with several other Harvester companies) occupied the building until 1953, when the company moved to a new building.
The building is a three-story cream brick building set above a raised basement of dressed rusticated limestone. A simplified Greek key design in polychromatic brick detail runs across the top of the street and north sides of the building. Parapet walls hide a flat roof. Some of the exterior painted signs remain (2007). OIL TRACTORS is painted vertically on the brick at the front edge of the south elevation; INTERNATIONAL HARVESTER COMPANY OF AMERICA is visible on the north elevation between the second and third windows. Parts of a third sign (FARM and TRACTOR) are on the north elevation.
The building was partly remodeled for offices in the late 1970s by the owners, the Reynolds Transfer and Storage Company. Renovations included bricking in portions of the window openings on the street front and track sides of the building and installing smaller windows as well as a new storefront entrance with aluminum frames and glazing. Further remodeling in 2003 replaced the third-floor steel fire-safety windows on the south elevation with look-alike replacements and bricked in the window openings on the east elevation.
A demolition permit application has been filed on April 2, 2014.
National And State Register Of Historic Places Listings
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301 South Blount Street
10000231
Located in Madison, Dane County
Truck Parked in front of Dealership
1920
Outdoor view of a truck parked in front of a brick building. Signs painted on the truck reads: "International Harvester," "Power Farm Equipment," "McCormick-Deering," "Sales and Service," and "Rush...
McCormick Grain Binders at University of Wisconsin-Madison
1900
Two men use horse-drawn McCormick grain binders in a field in front of a dairy barn at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. A grain elevator or walkway extends from the barn's loft.
Madison McCormick Dealership
1899
McCormick Harvesting Machine Company dealership operated by general agent J.G. Coleman. Built in 1898, with a frontage on Blount Street of 40 feet and 116 feet on the side next to the Madison & Wat...
Group of Farm Implements in Field
October 12, 1928
Slightly elevated view of farm implements on display outdoors in a field. A sign in front reads: "McCormick-Deering Ball-Bearing Cream Separators." There are also agricultural implements, a truck, ...
Neuss Branch House Showroom
1935
Farm equipment on display in the showroom of International Harvester's Nuess branch house in Germany. A Deering grain drill is prominent in the foreground.
