- Richard: It kinda looks like a factory from the road.
- Angela: It's designated
as one of Wisconsin's 10 most endangered buildings.
- Richard: It's unique
in the fact that it's still standing.
- Angela: And it sits
on the National Registry of Historic Buildings.
- Richard: And the size is phenomenal.
It's over 110 feet long and it's 30 feet wide.
- It is the Lutze housebarn near Centerville.
- It's one family unit,
a house and a barn together.
[gentle music]
A living quarters on one end
and the cattle living quarters on the other end.
It is convenient, especially in the northern climates
like Wisconsin has that when the winters are harsh
you just go from bed, have your breakfast,
your frühstück in the morning
and then you go, and you take care of the cattle.
- Angela: Richard Lutze's great grandparents built
this housebarn in 1849,
after immigrating from Saxony, Germany.
- They bought the land
from the lighthouse keeper in Sheboygan.
This was a land of opportunity and still it is.
- Sarah Lutze: My husband is fifth generation,
and my son is sixth generation, so it went
Gottlieb, August, Richard, Roland, Richard.
- Angela: Sarah married into the Lutze family
and it's the resident historian.
- I think they were very stout German people.
Very good German stock, as they say.
I think they both worked very, very hard.
- Angela: Besides the German work ethic, the Lutzes
envisioned a housebarn for their eight children.
- Richard: Upstairs, directly above the barn,
the small cattle and chickens were kept.
The eastern side was bedrooms.
There's at least three bedrooms
and a big hallway in the middle.
- Angela: After nearly 175 years,
the Lutzes needed a plan
to preserve this piece of German heritage.
- Richard: And that was the beginning
of Centreville Settlement.
At the time, it was in very bad repair.
- Angela: The Centreville Settlement
is a non-profit group
dedicated to restoring the housebarn
while preserving original tools and techniques.
- I'm jack of all trades and master of none.
- Angela: Chris Kuehnel is in charge
of guiding this restoration
and understands old world trades.
- Well, I've been Restoration Director
since we decided to restore it really,
and that's involved learning the different trades.
It was all new for me.
- Angela: The traditional German architecture
makes this housebarn unique.
[soft music]
- Chris: In the German style,
"fachwerk" literally translates to "framework."
So in the early design, we had opted to cut out
the most rotten portions, which was the lower part here,
and bolt in the new timbers just with a simple joint.
- Angela: The work is laborsome and time-consuming.
- Chris: But there are two 47-foot-long white oak timbers
that were hand-hewn
with broad ax,
which was primarily me.
The one had 52 joints cut into it.
That all had to be positioned properly
in order to fit in to the rest of the building.
- Richard: Everything has to fit exactly
so that it leans on itself.
It's almost indestructible.
- Angela: One of those indestructible features:
a root cellar buried beneath the housebarn.
- The hooks and the ceiling are for hanging their meat,
their pork, or their beef, which would've been salted
and hung down here to either dry or age.
It stayed about 56 degrees in here year-round.
- Angela: Year after year,
volunteers have been the weekend workforce.
- It was always something to do.
At times, it was always something to dread.
People do get dirty.
They do get sweaty.
They're called work days.
- Oh, we couldn't do anything without the volunteers.
I mean this place would've been flat years ago.
- Richard: Good morning.
- Angela: Volunteers are more than 30 years
into the renovations and estimating another 10 to go.
- Chris: Boy, it's gonna shred the cup.
- Richard: Anyway, I admit I still see a lot of tarps
and it would be nice to not seeing the tarps on the side.
- Chris: At this time of year, we're buttoning stuff up
making sure all the tarps are tight.
Okay, once we get done putting the siding on,
it'll be stable for another a hundred and some years.
- All right.
- The end game is to have it be a place
where people can walk through.
- Angela: In the spirit of their German ancestors,
the Lutzes are bringing the housebarn back to life.
- Richard: All too many people forget
where they came from, who their relatives are.
It's all right here in the buildings.
It's been my family for the entire time.
- Sarah: I think there's something really worthy here.
It's a testimony to the time
and how well things were built,
and I think it should be saved.