The Jefferson Street Historic District 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

Iowa City, Iowa Iowa City, offically the City of Iowa City is a city in Johnson County, Iowa, United States. It is the home of the University of Iowa and county seat of Johnson County, at the center of the Iowa City Metropolitan Statistical Area. At the time ...

, United States. It 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 2004. At the time of its nomination it consisted of 39 resources, which included 36

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 ...

and three non-contributing buildings. with This section of the city started to develop to its present form in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. During this period the neighborhood was transformed from residential to include churches and buildings associated with the

University of Iowa The University of Iowa (UI, U of I, UIowa, or simply Iowa) is a public university, public research university in Iowa City, Iowa, United States. Founded in 1847, it is the oldest and largest university in the state. The University of Iowa is org ...

and its

hospitals A hospital is a health care institution providing patient treatment with specialized health science and auxiliary healthcare staff and medical equipment. The best-known type of hospital is the general hospital, which typically has an emerge ...

. Both professionals and business owners lived here, along with working-class people. Graduate students, especially those associated with the medical professions, resided in apartment buildings here. Four architecturally significant churches, along with their attendant buildings, are located in the district. The architectural styles of both residential and institutional forms found here are representative of those built in the city from the 1850s through the 1930s. The

Gothic Revival Gothic Revival (also referred to as Victorian Gothic, neo-Gothic, or Gothick) is an architectural movement that began in the late 1740s in England. The movement gained momentum and expanded in the first half of the 19th century, as increasingly ...

, especially for the churches, and

Greek Revival The Greek Revival was an architectural movement which began in the middle of the 18th century but which particularly flourished in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, predominantly in northern Europe and the United States and Canada, but ...

styles are particularly evident. Architects of regional and local importance with buildings in the district include

Gurdon P. Randall Gurdon P. Randall (February 18, 1821– September 20, 18841884) was an architect in Chicago, Illinois. Early in his career, he studied in Boston, Massachusetts, in the office of Asher Benjamin. He moved to Chicago when he was 30, and practiced th ...

Proudfoot & Bird Proudfoot & Bird was an American architectural firm that designed many buildings throughout the Midwest region of the United States. Originally established in 1882, it remains active through its several successors, and since 2017 has been known as ...

, and Orville H. Carpenter. The William Bostick House (1851), Park House Hotel (1852), St. Mary's Catholic Church (1869) and Rectory (1891), and the Congregational United Church of Christ (1869) are individually listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

References

Historic districts in Iowa City, Iowa National Register of Historic Places in Iowa City, Iowa Historic districts on the National Register of Historic Places in Iowa Gothic Revival architecture in Iowa Greek Revival architecture in Iowa {{Iowa-struct-stub