Workingmen's Houses, Locust, South Locust & Dodge Streets & Southern Avenue, Dubuque, Dubuque County, IA

Significance: The modest frame houses that align Southern Avenue and South Locust and lower Dodge streets typify the workingmen's residences built in Dubuque, Iowa, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Although built over an eighty year period, the buildings share certain characteristics of scale, configuration, orientation and materials. Some were constructed for speculative sale by real estate developers, but most were built by their initial tenants. Historically, the three neighborhoods included in this documentation comprise the southern periphery of Dubuque, an area settled so predominantly by Irish working class families that it became known locally as "Dublin." With only a few exceptions, the neighborhoods have retained their residential character. The individual houses generally have survived with their overall profiles intact, although subsequent alterations and decades of deferred maintenance have obscured the stylistic origins of many of the structures. The area now faces serious impact from highway construction proposed by the Iowa Department of Transportation. As a result of this construction, most of the buildings will be razed and the composition of the neighborhoods altered irreparably.
Survey number: HABS IA-159
Building/structure dates: 1855
Building/structure dates: 1936