Prepping for the big move

It turns out that moving a 114-year-old brick building is fully as complicated as it sounds, and in the case of relocating the historic 1912 Saukville Firehouse, more expensive than estimated.

That is why the Ozaukee County Historical Society is stepping up its efforts to raise money to move the structure four miles from downtown Saukville to Pioneer Village at Ozaukee County’s Hawthorne Hills Park in the Town of Saukville, where this summer it will join the more than 24 other restored buildings owned and maintained by the Historical Society.

The organization acquired the firehouse from the Saukville Historical Society last year as that organization dissolved and donated its assets and collections to the Ozaukee County group, which then launched an Ignite the Fire campaign to raise $250,000 to pay for the first phase of the project.

But the cost of moving the firehouse and setting it on a new foundation is now estimated to be $270,000, Ozaukee County Historical Society President Mary Ann Velnetske said this week.

“This is getting to be a bigger project than we imagined, but it’s going to be so beautiful after it’s finished,” she said.

Some of the groundwork for the project has already been completed and the Historical Society has assembled a team of architects and engineers to lead the effort.

Point of Beginnings, a civil engineering and landscape architecture firm, has tested the soil at the future site of the firehouse on the east end of Pioneer Village near the 1912 train station and 1940s-era caboose and determined it will support the structure as well as a hose tower — a replica of one that was removed from the firehouse in the 1940s — that is to be added in a subsequent phase of the project.

The Historical Society is also working with two firms that have extensive experience in historical preservation — Kubala Washatko Architects of Cedarburg and Beane Engineering, a structural engineering company — to restore the firehouse to its original 1912 appearance while ensuring compliance with modern building codes.

Just moving the structure, which will entail moving lines owned by We Energies, Spectrum and AT&T at the expense of the Historical Society, is estimated to cost $92,000, Velnetske said.

The move is currently planned for July and will be done by DeVooght House Lifters of Valders.

To help control the moving expense, Velnetske said, the Historical Society plans to dissemble much of the lower level, which has been changed from its original design over the years, at its current site, then reconstruct it at Pioneer Village to the firehouse’s original specifications using the original bricks. The demolition work was going to be done anyway, she said, but by doing it at the current site rather than at Pioneer Village, there will be a smaller structure to move.

The back half of the firehouse, which was added to the structure and served as the Saukville Historical Society’s headquarters, was sold by the Ozaukee County group to a Saukville resident for $120,000. It will remain on the downtown site.

The Ozaukee County Historical Society’s Ignite the Fire campaign has raised $191,000 since being launched in February and is hosting a Giving Day on Saturday, April 18, when donations will be triple matched by a donor. Velnetske noted that restaurants can also participate by hosting dine-to-donate events and contributing a portion of sales.

Donations can be made through the Historical Society website at https://ochs.co.ozaukee.wi.us/endowments or by checks sent to the organization at P.O. Box 206, Cedarburg, WI 53012.