The Lathrop-Munn Cobblestone House is a 1.5-story

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 ...

-styled house built about 1848 in Beloit, Wisconsin, striking for the care with which the mason arranged the tiny

cobbles Cobblestone is a natural building material based on cobble-sized stones, and is used for pavement roads, streets, and buildings. Setts, also called Belgian blocks, are often casually referred to as "cobbles", although a sett is distinct fro ...

. In 1977 the building was placed 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 ...

. John Hackett was one of the first permanent settlers in Beloit - the first storekeeper and postmaster. He developed Hackett's Addition, the neighborhood in which the house stands, and he owned the lot on which the house was built. It's unclear if the house was there when Hackett sold the lot to Frederick A Lathrop in 1848. With Regardless, the house was striking and up-scale. The style is Greek Revival, seen in the low pitch of the roof, the frieze board beneath the

eaves The eaves are the edges of the roof which overhang the face of a wall and, normally, project beyond the side of a building. The eaves form an overhang to throw water clear of the walls and may be highly decorated as part of an architectural styl ...

, the

cornice returns In architecture, a cornice (from the Italian ''cornice'' meaning "ledge") is generally any horizontal decorative moulding that crowns a building or furniture element—for example, the cornice over a door or window, around the top edge of a ...

, and the simple straight limestone

lintels A lintel or lintol is a type of beam (a horizontal structural element) that spans openings such as portals, doors, windows and fireplaces. It can be a decorative architectural element, or a combined ornamented structural item. In the case of w ...

above the windows. This was a common style for fine houses in Wisconsin in the mid-1800s. What is unusual is the cobblestone cladding - small stones rounded by wave action - and above that the care with which these stones are set. Especially on the front, they are laid in rows, and carefully matched for size within each row. Beyond that, they are matched for color, so that four rows of light-colored stones alternate with four rows of darker stones, producing faint alternating bands - a pleasing effect. Inside, the walls are plastered. Frederick Lathrop owned the house until 1864. Around the 1870s the frame wing was added at the rear of the house. Other early owners were an inventor and a physician, and later a plumber. The NRHP nomination considers this house "one of the two best preserved cobblestone houses remaining in the city of Beloit."

References

{{reflist Houses on the National Register of Historic Places in Wisconsin National Register of Historic Places in Rock County, Wisconsin Houses in Rock County, Wisconsin Buildings and structures in Beloit, Wisconsin Greek Revival architecture in Wisconsin Cobblestone architecture Limestone buildings in the United States