John and Kate Merkwan Rubblestone House-Barn

Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1987.

From the record

“The John and Kate Merkwan Rubblestone House-Barn is a historic house located in Tabor, South Dakota, United States. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places on July 6, 1987, as part of a "Thematic Nomination of Czech Folk Architecture of Southeastern South Dakota".”
Wikipedia article John and Kate Merkwan Rubblestone House-Barn, CC BY-SA 4.0.

One of 40 National Register listings published here for Bon Homme County · listed in 1987 · category: Building.

Sources: the Wikipedia article · the case file at the National Archives · the National Register database, National Park Service

The listing

What is counted as historic. The nomination lists 1 building as contributing to the listing.
Listed as. Merkwan, John and Kate, Rubblestone House-Barn - the National Register files a house under its owner's surname.
Address. E side of SD 25, Tabor, 57063
When was it listed? July 1987
Category. building
Also known as. Czech Folk Architecture in Southeastern South Dakota MRA
Unorganized territory. Northeast Bon Homme
National Register reference number. 87001040 - the number the National Park Service assigned this property when it was listed, and the key its nomination file is catalogued under at the National Archives.

Fires near this property

17 since 2000

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 17 fires within 5 miles of John and Kate Merkwan Rubblestone House-Barn between 2000 and 2020, burning about 178 acres in total. None started naturally. None was recorded as arson. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a fire counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.

Reported cause	Fires
Missing data/not specified/undetermined	11
Debris and open burning	3
Equipment and vehicle use	2
Recreation and ceremony	1

The most recent of them, most recent first, with the day each was reported and the service that recorded it.

Date	Cause	Size	Reported by	Name on the report
5 September 2012	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	5.0 acres	South Dakota Wildland Fire Suppression	KOCH
25 September 2011	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	3.0 acres	South Dakota Wildland Fire Suppression	PETERSEN
6 August 2012	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	2.0 acres	South Dakota Wildland Fire Suppression	KLOUCEK
3 August 2012	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	South Dakota Wildland Fire Suppression	KUBAL FIRE
22 August 2012	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	12 acres	South Dakota Wildland Fire Suppression	KOKES
3 July 2016	Recreation and ceremony	under an acre	South Dakota Wildland Fire Suppression	RING OF FIRE
16 July 2000	Debris and open burning	2.0 acres	Lesterville Fire & Rescue	WALLOCH FARMS 2
10 July 2012	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	5.0 acres	South Dakota Wildland Fire Suppression	SESTAK

Every fire recorded in Bon Homme County

Mines and quarries near this property

10 of 12 shown

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists 12 workings within 5 miles of John and Kate Merkwan Rubblestone House-Barn: 11 past producers, 1 unknown. None of them still produces. What was taken out: Sand and Gravel, Construction. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a quarry counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.

Site	Commodity	Status
Adolph Sestak Gravel Pit	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer
Clarence Bower Gravel Pit	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer
George Vyborny Gravel Pit	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer
Gravel Pit	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer
Gravel Pit	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer
Gravel Pit	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer
Gravel Pit	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer
Gravel Pit	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer
Gravel Pit	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer
Gravel Pit	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer

Every working recorded in Bon Homme County

Storms near this property

32 since 1997

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Tabor, the town this property stands in, in 32 storm reports between 1997 and 2023: 24 hail, 7 thunderstorm wind, 1 tornado. No death or injury is recorded in these reports. Each account below is quoted exactly as the forecast office filed it, from the NOAA Storm Events Database, and each date opens the federal record of that event.

When	Event	Place named	Harm	What the report says
June 2006	Hail	Tabor	$5,000	no account filed
June 2023	Thunderstorm Wind	Tabor	-	Thunderstorm wind gusts up to 61 mph were measured at a personal weather station in Tabor.
July 2023	Tornado (EF0)	Tabor	-	A tornado spun up quickly at 1504 CST beneath a rapidly intensifying storm just north of 302nd Street in an open field between 425th and 426th Avenue. The tornado crawled through open country toward the north-northwest for several minutes and crossed Beaver Creek before damaging several trees on a farmstead along 425th Avenue. The tornado also ripped tin off an abandoned outbuilding. At this point, the tornado track veered to the north as it moved through soybean fields and across 301st Street before it lifted around a tenth of a mile north of 301st Street. The average path width for the tornado was 30 yards. The tornado was rated an EF-0 with a maximum estimated wind gust of 74 mph.
June 2013	Hail	Tabor	-	Large hail caused an unknown amount of damage to vehicles and crops.
August 2010	Thunderstorm Wind	Tabor	-	Thunderstorm winds caused tree damage, including numerous branches blown down.
June 2008	Thunderstorm Wind	Tabor	-	Thunderstorm winds caused tree damage, including some trees uprooted. The winds also damaged power lines with a resulting power outage.
June 2006	Thunderstorm Wind	Tabor	-	Thunderstorm winds caused tree damage, including small branches blown down.
August 2000	Thunderstorm Wind	Tabor	-	Thunderstorm winds caused tree damage. The amount of damage was not determined.
July 2014	Hail	Tabor	-	no account filed
July 2014	Hail	Tabor	-	no account filed
July 2014	Hail	Tabor	-	no account filed
July 2013	Thunderstorm Wind	Tabor	-	no account filed
June 2013	Hail	Tabor	-	no account filed
August 2009	Hail	Tabor	-	no account filed
May 2008	Hail	Tabor	-	no account filed
May 2008	Hail	Tabor	-	no account filed
May 2007	Hail	Tabor	-	no account filed
June 2006	Hail	Tabor	-	no account filed
June 2005	Hail	Tabor	-	no account filed
May 2004	Hail	Tabor	-	no account filed
May 2004	Hail	Tabor	-	no account filed
July 2004	Hail	Tabor	-	no account filed
October 2002	Hail	Tabor	-	no account filed
July 2002	Hail	Tabor	-	no account filed
August 2002	Hail	Tabor	-	no account filed
July 2002	Hail	Tabor	-	no account filed
August 2002	Hail	Tabor	-	no account filed
October 2001	Hail	Tabor	-	no account filed
May 1999	Hail	Tabor	-	no account filed
June 1999	Hail	Tabor	-	no account filed
July 1998	Thunderstorm Wind	Tabor	-	no account filed
July 1997	Hail	Tabor	-	no account filed

Every storm recorded in Bon Homme County

Map coverage status

No historic map-sheet match is published for this property yet. That does not mean no map exists. This record needs a coordinate-quality review before it can be joined to a sheet boundary. Browse the county's mapped places while that work is pending.

Listed places nearby

6 within 8 miles

Other National Register properties close enough to walk or drive between, ordered by distance from this one. Both positions come from the same geocoding pass that matched these properties to their map sheets.

Property	Distance	Listed
John and Kate Merkwan Log and Rubblestone House	under 500 feet	1987
John Merkwan Jr. Rubblestone House	0.4 miles	1987
Teibel-Sykora Rubblestone Barn	1.2 miles	1987
Joseph Herman Rubblestone Barn	2.7 miles	1987
Joseph Herman Log Stable	2.8 miles	1987
Joseph Herman Chalkrock House	2.8 miles	1987

Sources for this property

National Archives record	The nomination case file for reference 87001040 in Record Group 79.
Wikipedia article	Community-written account of this property, licensed CC BY-SA.
Bon Homme County	All 40 listed properties in this county.

Provenance

Listing record. National Park Service National Register of Historic Places, listed-properties dataset, current to 2026-05-22.
Map join. Address geocoded through the United States Census geocoder, then tested against the published boundary of every sheet in the USGS Historical Topographic Map Collection.
How this page is made. Listing fields come from federal records; map-sheet coverage is a labelled coordinate-to-boundary calculation, not a source-field claim.
Wildfire. Short, Karen C. 2022. Spatial wildfire occurrence data for the United States, 1992-2020 [FPA_FOD_20221014]. 6th Edition. Fort Collins, CO: Forest Service Research Data Archive. https://doi.org/10.2737/RDS-2013-0009.6 Collected with United States Government funding and usable without additional permissions or fees.
Mines and quarries. USGS Mineral Resources Data System (MRDS) https://mrdata.usgs.gov/mrds/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.
Storms. NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/stormevents/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105. Narratives are quoted verbatim from the National Weather Service report and are not edited or summarised.