'Mississippi House' & Alex. McGregor home razed, 1930

MCGREGOR, FOX

Posted By: S. Ferrall - IAGenWeb volunteer
Date: 3/2/2015 at 02:07:33

McGregor Landmarks To Fall

McGregor, Ia. - The old McGregor home at McGregor, oldest residence on the west bank of the Mississippi north of Dubuqe, is being wrecked this week to give way to the demands of Iowa's mounting miles of paving.

The turn is too sharp and narrow, too near the railroad tracks that run along the river bank. So McGregor's first house is being wrecked by the Iowa highway commission, so that the corner can be rounded off and made safe for the stream of traffic that flows over state road No. 13 between McGregor and Marquette.

Something less than a hundred years ago a young Scotchman by the name of Alexander McGregor did some trading in Chicago that belies the fable of the canny Scot.

For this Scot., who gave McGregor its name, traded lots in Chicago where the Wells street station now stands for land opposite Prairie du Chien, Wis., on the Iowa side of the Mississippi.

Evidently this young Scot thought he had selected a more promising location for the growth of a city.

He put on a ferry from Prairie du Chien to his Iowa land in 1836. Then he built a shack and aferry warehouse, at McGregor's Landing, as it was called. In 1848 he built a home near the ferry house and there lived with his family. Finally he rebuilt his home of brick, which is now being town down.

Another of McGregor's historic spots also is toll to the demands of modern traffic, for the old "Mississippi House" of early days, is also to be wrecked. It has stood for years by the side of the old McGregor home, a reminder of the days when the Mississippi was the traffic artery of the Midwest.

~Telegraph-Herald and Times-Journal, Dubuque, Iowa, Thursday evening edition, November 20, 1930

Note: the proprietor of the Mississippi House in 1865 was Christian Fox and in 1881 Capt. Charles Fox (unknown if these are 2 different men)