The Lyon County Courthouse is located in

Rock Rapids, Iowa Rock Rapids is a city in and the county seat of Lyon County, Iowa, United States. The population was 2,611 in the 2020 census, an increase from 2,573 in the 2000 census. History A post office called Rock Rapids has been in operation since 187 ...

, 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 1979. The courthouse is the second building the county has used for court functions and county administration.

History

Lyon County was organized in 1872, and county business was done in the private homes of county officials in Beloit. In 1873 Rock Rapids was chosen as the

county seat A county seat is an administrative center, seat of government, or capital city of a county or civil parish. The term is in use in Canada, China, Hungary, Romania, Taiwan, and the United States. The equivalent term shire town is used in the US st ...

because of its central location, and the first courthouse was erected in 1875. It was a three-story frame structure with a

hipped roof A hip roof, hip-roof or hipped roof, is a type of roof where all sides slope downwards to the walls, usually with a fairly gentle slope (although a tented roof by definition is a hipped roof with steeply pitched slopes rising to a peak). Thus, ...

and bracketed

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 building was moved a few blocks away and became an apartment building after it was

stucco Stucco or render is a construction material made of aggregates, a binder, and water. Stucco is applied wet and hardens to a very dense solid. It is used as a decorative coating for walls and ceilings, exterior walls, and as a sculptural and a ...

ed and painted green. with The present courthouse was begun in 1916 and was completed the following year for $109,695.13.

Architecture

The courthouse was designed in the Beaux-Arts style by

Sioux Falls Sioux Falls () is the most populous city in the U.S. state of South Dakota and the 130th-most populous city in the United States. It is the county seat of Minnehaha County and also extends into Lincoln County to the south, which continues up t ...

architect Joseph Schwartz. The main facade has a loggia in the center that features eight columns from the second floor to the top of the third floor with recessed windows in between. The

cornice 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 ...

runs below the wide band along the roofline, which is flat. The Bedford stone clad building measures approximately and is high. A lion

couchant In heraldry, the term attitude describes the ''position'' in which a figure (animal or human) is emblazoned as a charge, a supporter, or as a crest. The attitude of an heraldic figure always precedes any reference to the tincture of the figur ...

is located above the main entrance, and is a play on the county's name Lyon. The central rotunda on the interior features an

art glass Art glass is a subset of glass art, this latter covering the whole range of art made from glass. Art glass normally refers only to pieces made since the mid-19th century, and typically to those purely made as sculpture or decorative art, with ...

skylight A skylight (sometimes called a rooflight) is a light-permitting structure or window, usually made of transparent or translucent glass, that forms all or part of the roof space of a building for daylighting and ventilation purposes. History Open ...

dome and the county seal in a

mosaic A mosaic is a pattern or image made of small regular or irregular pieces of colored stone, glass or ceramic, held in place by plaster/mortar, and covering a surface. Mosaics are often used as floor and wall decoration, and were particularly pop ...

of ceramic tile on the floor. Wainscoting in the main staircases and corridors is Italian marble. Four

mural A mural is any piece of graphic artwork that is painted or applied directly to a wall, ceiling or other permanent substrate. Mural techniques include fresco, mosaic, graffiti and marouflage. Word mural in art The word ''mural'' is a Spani ...

s on the third floor are named ''Pioneer'', ''Immigrant'', ''Rock Rapids 1873'', and ''Modern Farm 1917''. They are possibly the work of William Peaco, who has similar murals in the Greene County Courthouse in

Jefferson Jefferson may refer to: Names * Jefferson (surname) * Jefferson (given name) People * Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826), third president of the United States * Jefferson (footballer, born 1970), full name Jefferson Tomaz de Souza, Brazilian foo ...

References

{{NRHP in Lyon County, Iowa Government buildings completed in 1917 County courthouses in Iowa Courthouses on the National Register of Historic Places in Iowa National Register of Historic Places in Lyon County, Iowa Buildings and structures in Lyon County, Iowa Beaux-Arts architecture in Iowa