The Old McHenry County Courthouse, in

McHenry County, Illinois McHenry County is a county located in the U.S. state of Illinois. According to the 2020 Census, it had a population of 310,229, making it the sixth-most populous county in Illinois. Its county seat is Woodstock. McHenry County is one of the f ...

, 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 ...

on November 1, 1974. Once the courthouse in the county seat of McHenry County,

Woodstock Woodstock Music and Art Fair, commonly referred to as Woodstock, was a music festival held during August 15–18, 1969, on Max Yasgur's dairy farm in Bethel, New York, United States, southwest of the town of Woodstock, New York, Woodstock. ...

, today the courthouse is occupied by various private tenants including a restaurant and an art gallery. It is one of the key structures in the

Woodstock Square Historic District The Woodstock Square Historic District is located in the county seat of McHenry County, Illinois, which is Woodstock. The district is located in downtown Woodstock and has been listed on the National Register of Historic Places since 1982.

History

The 1857

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 ...

Old Courthouse was constructed to closely resemble the 1853

Cook County Cook County is the most populous county in the U.S. state of Illinois and the second-most-populous county in the United States, after Los Angeles County, California. More than 40% of all residents of Illinois live within Cook County. As of 20 ...

Courthouse (which was eventually destroyed during the

Great Chicago Fire The Great Chicago Fire was a conflagration that burned in the American city of Chicago during October 8–10, 1871. The fire killed approximately 300 people, destroyed roughly of the city including over 17,000 structures, and left more than 10 ...

). The structure was designed by John M. Van Osdel, the first licensed architect in Chicago. The adjoining structure, the Sheriff's House and Jail was built in 1887. It was there, in the Sheriff's House and Jail that

Eugene Debs Eugene may refer to: People and fictional characters * Eugene (given name), including a list of people and fictional characters with the given name * Eugene (actress) (born 1981), Kim Yoo-jin, South Korean actress and former member of the sin ...

was held for his refusal to comply with an

injunction An injunction is a legal and equitable remedy in the form of a special court order that compels a party to do or refrain from specific acts. ("The court of appeals ... has exclusive jurisdiction to enjoin, set aside, suspend (in whole or in pa ...

during the

Pullman Strike The Pullman Strike was two interrelated strikes in 1894 that shaped national labor policy in the United States during a period of deep economic depression. First came a strike by the American Railway Union (ARU) against the Pullman factory in Ch ...

. Until 1973 McHenry County government office were located in the Old Courthouse. When the government moved out, the building was threatened with demolition, as it stood on prime commercial property. On November 1, 1974, it was recognized by the

National Park Service The National Park Service (NPS) is an agency of the United States federal government within the U.S. Department of the Interior that manages all national parks, most national monuments, and other natural, historical, and recreational propertie ...

on the

. Eight years later it was listed as a

contributing property 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 distri ...

to the

, a corridor in downtown Woodstock. Today the two buildings house two restaurants, one in each building, and art gallery (in the courthouse), a pottery shop (in the jail building) and the Chester Gould-Dick Tracy Museum.

Chester Gould-Dick Tracy Museum

Chester Gould Chester Gould (; November 20, 1900 – May 11, 1985) was an American cartoonist, best known as the creator of the ''Dick Tracy'' comic strip, which he wrote and drew from 1931 to 1977, incorporating numerous colorful and monstrous villains. Ear ...

, creator of ''

Dick Tracy ''Dick Tracy'' is an American comic strip featuring Dick Tracy (originally Plainclothes Tracy), a tough and intelligent police detective created by Chester Gould. It made its debut on Sunday, October 4, 1931, in the ''Detroit Mirror'', and it ...

'' comic strips, was a 50-year Woodstock resident.Visitor's Guide to Historic Woodstock Square
(

PDF Portable Document Format (PDF), standardized as ISO 32000, is a file format developed by Adobe in 1992 to present documents, including text formatting and images, in a manner independent of application software, hardware, and operating systems. ...

), City of Woodstock, Tourism, Visitor's Guide, Retrieved January 13, 2007. The Chester Gould-Dick Tracy Museum features original comic strips and Dick Tracy memorabilia and collectibles including artifacts related to the character's depiction in radio, television and film. The Museum closed its doors in June 2008 and went virtual.

Architecture

The Old McHenry County Courthouse faces the Woodstock public square. The

structure was built out of brick with limestone trim. With four identical, wings around a core, the building resembles a Greek cross. The building stands two stories tall with a brick basement. A

cupola In architecture, a cupola () is a relatively small, most often dome-like, tall structure on top of a building. Often used to provide a lookout or to admit light and air, it usually crowns a larger roof or dome. The word derives, via Italian, from ...

is found at the center of the cross. A bay was later added to the southern wing, and small additions were made from the judge's chamber and a vault. The southwest corner has a one-story addition. The jail was originally found in the basement, but was moved to a new building along the north wall in the 1870s.

Notes

External links

Chester Gould-Dick Tracy Museum
- official site * . Retrieved 2008-05-04. {{DEFAULTSORT:Old Mchenry County Courthouse Government buildings completed in 1857 Former courthouses in Illinois National Register of Historic Places in McHenry County, Illinois Woodstock, Illinois County courthouses in Illinois Tourist attractions in McHenry County, Illinois Courthouses on the National Register of Historic Places in Illinois Italianate architecture in Illinois 1857 establishments in Illinois