BlockFrom the record
One of 141 National Register listings published here for Rock County · listed in 1980 · category: District.
Sources: the case file at the National Archives · the National Register database, National Park Service
Cooksville Historic District (Boundary Increase)
Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1980.
The listing
- Address. Roughly Tolles Rd., Church St., Rock St., Dane St., and Main St., Cooksville, 53536
- When was it listed? September 1980
- Category. district
- Also known as. Cooksville MRA
- Town. Porter town
- National Register reference number. 02000090 - 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.
The ground it stands on
2,525 wordsThe chapter on Porter Town in The History of Rock County, Wisconsin; Its Early Settlement, Growth, Development, Resources, Etc., published 1879 names Cooksville. This is what it says, exactly as the scans read.
EDWARD (wIIiliEY, retired farmer. Sec. 4; P. 0. Cooksville ; born in Northumberland, England, Feb. 11, 1811 ; he came to America in 1843, locating in Porter Township, Rock Co., Wis., in May of that year, and purchased of the Government 200 acres of land, on which he has since remained. He married in Porter Township, Rock Co., Wis.. April 1, 1854, and his wife died May 28, 1875,
Passage source: The History of Rock County, Wisconsin; Its Early Settlement, Growth, Development, Resources, Etc., published 1879.
BENJAMIN S. HOXIE, farmer. Sec. 6; P.O. Cooksville; born in Maine August 6, 1827. Came to Wisconsin in 1846, locating at Cooksville, Porter Township, Rock Co., and engaged in house-building. In 1875, he began to manufacture cheese, being the proprietor of the Cooksville Cheei-e Factory, which has a capacity for using the milk of 600 cows. He was elected Justice of the Peace, which office he held for two terms, and was re-elected in 1879. He has been Notary Public for a number of years. He was Grand Worthy Patriarch of the Sons qf Temperance, and, in 1862, attended the National Convention of that Order at London, Canada. Married in Union Township, Rock Co., Jan. 22, 1851, Miss Ellen A. Woodbury, a native of Vermont, who was born Nov.' 7, 1827. He has three chiU dren - Eva J., born Nov. 15, 1852 ; Mary A., born May 30, 1856 ; Cora B., born May 6, 1864.
Passage source: The History of Rock County, Wisconsin; Its Early Settlement, Growth, Development, Resources, Etc., published 1879.
Machine-read from a century-old scan, so expect the errors a machine makes: misspelled names, dropped words, stray characters.
Read the whole chapter on Porter Town - 2,525 words on its settlement, mills, schools and churches.
Fires near this property
13 since 2006Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 13 fires within 5 miles of Cooksville Historic District (Boundary Increase) between 2006 and 2020, burning about 100 acres in total. None started naturally. 2 were 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 |
|---|---|
| Debris and open burning | 5 |
| Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 3 |
| Arson/incendiarism | 2 |
| Recreation and ceremony | 2 |
| Equipment and vehicle use | 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 14 July 2012 | Arson/incendiarism | 26 acres | Leopold Wetland Management District | BIGLOW RD |
| 5 May 2013 | Equipment and vehicle use | under an acre | Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources | TRAILER DRAGGING |
| 3 May 2020 | Recreation and ceremony | 1.0 acres | Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources | 55 |
| 1 May 2020 | Recreation and ceremony | under an acre | Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources | 54 |
| 9 April 2019 | Debris and open burning | under an acre | Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources | 2019076 |
| 8 April 2019 | Arson/incendiarism | under an acre | Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources | BADFISH |
| 5 April 2006 | Debris and open burning | 41 acres | Leopold Wetland Management District | LUND CONVERSION |
| 29 April 2018 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | under an acre | Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources | 136 |
Mines and quarries near this property
8 within 5 milesRegional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists 8 workings within 5 miles of Cooksville Historic District (Boundary Increase): 6 past producers, 2 producers. 2 still produce. What was taken out: Sand and Gravel, Construction, Stone, Crushed/Broken. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a quarry counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.
| Where | Site | Commodity | Status | Recorded |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Halverson Quarry | Stone, Crushed/Broken | Past Producer | ||
| Reindahl Quarries | Stone, Crushed/Broken | Producer | ||
| Rock County Highway Department | Stone, Crushed/Broken | Past Producer | ||
| Brunsell Pit | Sand and Gravel, Construction | Past Producer | ||
| Brunsell Pit | Sand and Gravel, Construction | Past Producer | ||
| Knutson Pit | Sand and Gravel, Construction | Past Producer | ||
| Stearns Pit | Sand and Gravel, Construction | Past Producer | ||
| Union Pit | Sand and Gravel, Construction | Producer |
Storms near this property
4 since 1996Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Cooksville, the town this property stands in, in 4 storm reports between 1996 and 2023: 1 flash flood, 1 thunderstorm wind, 1 flood, 1 hail. 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 1996 | Flash Flood | Cooksville | $150,000 | no account filed |
| June 2013 | Flood | Cooksville | $8,000 | The river gauge on the Yahara River near Fulton remained above flood stage from the morning of June 26th to the early morning of June 27th. The river experienced major flooding, cresting at 12.06 feet at 3:30 PM CDT on June 26th, which is 2.06 feet above flood stage. |
| May 2012 | Thunderstorm Wind | Cooksville | $5,000 | The Rock County Emergency Manager reported trees were downed by severe thunderstorm winds in the village of Cooksville. |
| April 2023 | Hail | Cooksville | - | no account filed |
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 milesOther 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.
| Photograph | Property | Distance | Listed |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cooksville Historic District | under 500 feet | 1973 | |
 | Cooksville Cheese Factory | 0.2 miles | 1980 |
| Cooksville Mill and Mill Pond Site | 0.3 miles | 1980 | |
 | John T. Dow House | 0.4 miles | 1980 |
 | Miller House | 0.5 miles | 1980 |
 | J. K. Porter Farmstead | 0.7 miles | 1980 |
Sources for this property
| National Archives record | The nomination case file for reference 02000090 in Record Group 79. |
| Rock County | All 141 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.