The John Pritzlaff Hardware Company is a complex of

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 ...

-styled buildings built from 1875 to 1919, a remnant of what was for years the largest wholesale hardware business in Milwaukee and the region. In 2013 the buildings were 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 ...

. John C. Pritzlaff was an immigrant from

Pomerania Pomerania ( pl, Pomorze; german: Pommern; Kashubian: ''Pòmòrskô''; sv, Pommern) is a historical region on the southern shore of the Baltic Sea in Central Europe, split between Poland and Germany. The western part of Pomerania belongs to ...

Prussia Prussia, , Old Prussian: ''Prūsa'' or ''Prūsija'' was a German state on the southeast coast of the Baltic Sea. It formed the German Empire under Prussian rule when it united the German states in 1871. It was ''de facto'' dissolved by an ...

, who came to Milwaukee in 1841, before Wisconsin was a state. In 1850 he, August Suelflohn, and Henry Nazro opened a small hardware store on Third Street called ''John Pritzlaff and Company''. Pritzlaff became the sole owner in 1866. In 1875 Pritzlaff moved his business to the current location and shifted from retail to wholesale hardware. In that year he built the first structure. That 1875 main block is a four-story brick building. It has brick

hood mould In architecture, a hood mould, hood, label mould (from Latin ''labia'', lip), drip mould or dripstone, is an external moulded projection from a wall over an opening to throw off rainwater, historically often in form of a ''pediment''. This mouldin ...

s over the windows and a denticulated, bracketed cornice - typical of the Italianate style that was popular at that time. On one side the cornice is broken by a round-topped pediment which frames "1875 - Pritzlaff". Additions and other blocks were added in 1879, 1887, 1895, 1903, 1912, 1915 and 1919. The surviving blocks are all brick, in Italianate style. As the buildings grew, so did the staff, from 52 in 1881 to 450 in 1931. Pritzlaff's enterprise became the largest hardware company in

Milwaukee Milwaukee ( ), officially the City of Milwaukee, is both the most populous and most densely populated city in the U.S. state of Wisconsin and the county seat of Milwaukee County. With a population of 577,222 at the 2020 census, Milwaukee ...

Wisconsin Wisconsin () is a state in the upper Midwestern United States. Wisconsin is the 25th-largest state by total area and the 20th-most populous. It is bordered by Minnesota to the west, Iowa to the southwest, Illinois to the south, Lake M ...

and eventually became one of the largest wholesale hardware companies and iron supply houses in the Midwest. It was known for selling hardware, sewing machines, and toys through mail order catalogs to wholesale accounts throughout the United States. After Pritzlaff died, his son, Fred C. Pritzlaff took over until his death in 1951. When Fred died, his son took over the firm until it closed in 1958. Today the buildings have been renovated and converted into rental space for large events and high end apartments.

References

External links

A rebirth for the Pritzlaff Building
- brief history of the Pritzlaff Hardware Company Companies based in Wisconsin Companies based in Milwaukee Defunct companies based in Wisconsin Retail companies established in 1850 1850 establishments in Wisconsin Retail companies disestablished in 1958 1958 disestablishments in Wisconsin {{Wisconsin-stub