Historic Firehouse (1898)
Superior, Wisconsin

The oldest existing firehouse in Superior, Wisconsin, was built in 1898. Its original doors, designed for horse-drawn fire carriages, were ten feet wide, twelve feet high, and shaped as “half-rounds” — rounded at the top to fit two arched openings. Over time, the building had changed hands and uses, and the carriage doors had been replaced with standard overhead doors, altering the shape of the original arches. When the City of Superior repurchased the building to house the Old Firehouse and Police Museum, they stipulated that the historic renovation was to conform to the original appearance of the building. Each door was estimated to weigh at least 500 lbs. They needed to be able to swing by hand, rather than be driven by any motors or tracking system of the type that would be used for modern doors of this size. The doors also needed to be hung in such a way that would not create too much stress for the original masonry walls. To add to the challenge, the only available design and construction information was an old photograph taken of an early fire crew with their horse-drawn firetruck, in which the firehouse and doors appeared in the background.

Selected for the project because of our experience in both radius work and massive door construction, we set to work with an ambitious schedule to design and build the doors in time for the museum’s opening. Among many unique solutions generated by this project, two stand out: (1) A custom hinge was designed and steel angle metal straps were built into the walls to reinforce the original masonry around the doors. (2) To complete the unusually large radius work required for the project, the half-round rail at the top of each door was built as a lamination and strengthened by adapting an adhesive method used in modern boat-building. Constructed at the Historic Doors workshop, the doors were delivered and installed in time for the opening of the museum in the summer of 1998, the 100th anniversary of the building.