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Photograph of Bass Island Brownstone Company Quarry
Photograph by Royalbroil, CC BY-SA 3.0. Via Wikimedia Commons.

Bass Island Brownstone Company Quarry

Built in 1868. Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1978.

From the record

“The Bass Island Brownstone Company Quarry, also known as the Basswood Island Quarry, on Basswood Island in Lake Superior was operational from 1868 to 1893. The brownstone was first used for construction of the second Milwaukee County Courthouse, now demolished.”

Wikipedia article Bass Island Brownstone Company Quarry, CC BY-SA 4.0.

One of 32 National Register listings published here for Ashland County · listed in 1978 · category: Site · built in 1868.

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 site as contributing to the listing.
  • Address. N of La Pointe on Basswood Island, La Pointe
  • When was it listed? March 1978
  • Category. site
  • When was it built? 1868
  • National Register reference number. 78000075 - 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

55 since 1992

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 55 fires within 5 miles of Bass Island Brownstone Company Quarry between 1992 and 2020, burning about 36 acres in total. 1 started naturally. 3 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 burning21
Equipment and vehicle use17
Missing data/not specified/undetermined5
Arson/incendiarism3
Smoking3
Recreation and ceremony2
Natural1
Other causes1
Misuse of fire by a minor1
Power generation/transmission/distribution1

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

DateCause SizeReported by Name on the report
2 September 2007Naturalunder an acreWisconsin Department of Natural Resourcesnot named
13 September 2012Power generation/transmission/distributionunder an acreGreat Lakes AgencyBLUEBERRY RD POWERLI
5 August 1992Debris and open burningunder an acreWisconsin Department of Natural Resourcesnot named
26 August 2001Debris and open burningunder an acreWisconsin Department of Natural Resourcesnot named
23 August 2008Arson/incendiarism3.1 acresWisconsin Department of Natural Resourcesnot named
16 August 2008Debris and open burningunder an acreWisconsin Department of Natural Resourcesnot named
7 July 2006Debris and open burningunder an acreWisconsin Department of Natural Resourcesnot named
7 July 2006Debris and open burningunder an acreWisconsin Department of Natural Resourcesnot named

Every fire recorded in Ashland County

Mines and quarries near this property

2 within 5 miles

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists 2 workings within 5 miles of Bass Island Brownstone Company Quarry: 1 past producer, 1 occurrence. 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.

Where SiteCommodity StatusRecorded
F. L. Wolfe Gravel PitSand and Gravel, ConstructionPast Producer
Red Cliff Gravel DepositSand and Gravel, ConstructionOccurrence

Every working recorded in Ashland County

Storms near this property

4 since 2001

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names La Pointe, the town this property stands in, in 4 storm reports between 2001 and 2020: 3 hail, 1 thunderstorm wind. 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.

WhenEvent Place namedHarm What the report says
August 2001Thunderstorm WindLa Pointe-Numerous trees were blown down on Madeline Island.
June 2020HailLa Pointe-no account filed
June 2018HailLa Pointe-no account filed
October 2004HailLa Pointe-no account filed

Every storm recorded in Ashland 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

4 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.

Photograph PropertyDistance Listed
Bass Island Brownstone Company Quarry (Boundary Increase)under 500 feet2016
La Pointe Light Station4.0 miles1983
La Pointe Indian Cemetery4.3 miles1977
Coole Park Manor4.8 miles2005

Sources for this property

National Archives recordThe nomination case file for reference 78000075 in Record Group 79.
Wikipedia articleCommunity-written account of this property, licensed CC BY-SA.
Ashland CountyAll 32 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.