Briggs Terrace, also known as Evergreen Lane, is a nationally recognized

historic district A historic district or heritage district is a section of a city which contains older buildings considered valuable for historical or architectural reasons. In some countries or jurisdictions, historic districts receive legal protection from c ...

located in

Nevada, Iowa Nevada ( ) is a city in, and the county seat of, Story County, Iowa, United States. The population was 6,925 in the 2020 census, an increase from 6,658 in 2000. Nevada is part of the Ames, Iowa Metropolitan Statistical Area, which is a part of ...

, United States.

History

Briggs Terrace was listed on the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic v ...

in 1998. At the time of its nomination it consisted of eight resources, which included six

contributing buildings In the law regulating historic districts in the United States, a contributing property or contributing resource is any building, object, or structure which adds to the historical integrity or architectural qualities that make the historic distric ...

, one

contributing site In the law regulating historic districts in the United States, a contributing property or contributing resource is any building, object, or structure which adds to the historical integrity or architectural qualities that make the historic distric ...

, and two non-contributing buildings. with This estate was established and built by Otis Briggs, a local banker who founded Farmers Bank in Nevada. He arrived in town in 1857 from

Des Moines Des Moines () is the capital and the most populous city in the U.S. state of Iowa. It is also the county seat of Polk County. A small part of the city extends into Warren County. It was incorporated on September 22, 1851, as Fort Des Moines, ...

, four years after Nevada and Story County were founded. He worked in a variety of commercial ventures before becoming a banker. Briggs invested heavily in real estate, and he became one of the largest land owners in the county. The two-story, brick,

Italianate The Italianate style was a distinct 19th-century phase in the history of Classical architecture. Like Palladianism and Neoclassicism, the Italianate style drew its inspiration from the models and architectural vocabulary of 16th-century Italian R ...

style house was completed in 1879. It features floor-length windows, a wraparound porch, and a

bay window A bay window is a window space projecting outward from the main walls of a building and forming a bay in a room. Types Bay window is a generic term for all protruding window constructions, regardless of whether they are curved or angular, or r ...

. It is surrounded by an planted grounds, which contribute to the historic nature of the district. The other historic building located here are the

carriage house A carriage house, also called a remise or coach house, is an outbuilding which was originally built to house horse-drawn carriages and the related tack. In Great Britain the farm building was called a cart shed. These typically were open f ...

(c. 1879), pig barn (c. 1879), and late 19th century out buildings.

Halley School 7

Halley School #7 was built in 1874, and was one of eight schools serving the nearby townships. It was used through the 1944–45 school year, before being sold to private owners. In 1975, Halley School was given to the Nevada Bicentennial Committee by Ivan and Sally Hornbacher Hansen, Dee Earl, and Lois Hornbacher, in memory of their parents, Issac and Elma Hornbacher. The school was first moved from its original location 6 miles south east of

to the Story County Fair grounds in 1976 to be fully restored in celebration of the

United States Bicentennial The United States Bicentennial was a series of celebrations and observances during the mid-1970s that paid tribute to historical events leading up to the creation of the United States of America as an independent republic. It was a central event ...

. It was moved again in 2006 from the county fairgrounds, to a new location on the Briggs Terrace property.Prairie Rivers of Iowa. ''Lincoln Highway Heritage Byway Interpretive Master Plan'', Prairie Rivers of Iowa, 2018.

References

Houses completed in 1879 Italianate architecture in Iowa Historic districts in Story County, Iowa Historic districts on the National Register of Historic Places in Iowa National Register of Historic Places in Story County, Iowa Farms on the National Register of Historic Places in Iowa {{Iowa-struct-stub