Goodhue County Courthouse
Goodhue County Courthouse circa 1950
Built: 1932
National Register of Historic Places: 1980
Architectural Style: WPA Moderne
Architect/Builder: Charles W. Buechner & Henry W. Orth
Currently: Goodhue County Government Center
Though the United States plummeted into the Great Depression in 1929, according to historian Madeline Angell it wasn’t until 1931 that the effects were felt in Red Wing.
Unemployment had remained fairly low in town while it ravaged the rest of the country for those first two years. But eventually the people of Red Wing began seeking work through local, state, and federal employment agencies.
The city was able to put people to work, Angell wrote, “improving city parks such as Colvill and Sorin’s Bluff.” National programs, like the Civilian Conservation Corps and Works Progress Administration gave work to many as well.
The Works Progress Administration, or WPA, was best known for its work on government buildings, including construction, and often beautifying those buildings with art, like large-scale murals. In Red Wing, Hancock and Colvill schools were WPA projects.
But the best example of WPA work in Red Wing wasn’t built by the WPA at all.
The Goodhue County Courthouse, now known as the Goodhue County Government Center, was built in the WPA Moderne style—the building’s symmetrical, vertically-oriented design is indicative of the architectural movement of the time—but was funded entirely by the city.
Inside the building, in the second floor rotunda, are murals painted by William Peaco. Peaco, while not as prolific or as famous as other muralists of the era, livened up many public buildings around the Midwest. Most notably, he painted a series of 18 murals for the South Dakota State Capitol Building that are still visible today.
The most notable element of Peaco’s works in this building are the four panels depicting four foundations of Red Wing’s economic history: Agriculture, Commerce, Industry, and Manufacture.
The four paintings primarily feature broadly recognizable images of their respective titles, but a few icons of Red Wing are included. Specifically, Manufacture depicts a pottery worker, and Commerce includes a Mississippi river boat.
Peaco likely completed the murals in the early 1930s, but by the time the new millennium came round, the murals had fallen into disrepair. The works were first examined by art conservators in 2008. The murals had a notable layer of soot and grime that made them appear much darker than before. Likewise, a small amount of water damage had affected the edges of some of the canvases, and the word “Industry” was no longer visible beneath its mural.
Between 2019 and 2022, Conrad Schmitt Studios, Inc, an art conservation firm that has also worked on the Sheldon Theatre, restored the works to their former condition and vibrancy, so they can now be enjoyed as they were intended.
