Restoration-preservation work on the 1830s log cabin in the Garnavillo Park has begun. Gary Goyette of Guttenberg is applying a preservative to the cabin logs and then will replace chinking. Work is also planned for the windows and the doors. Weather plays a big part in completing the work. Too much heat causes the preservative solution to evaporate too quickly so it doesn’t do the work it should on the logs. And, the chinking isn’t done till all the preservative is applied so its a drawn out process. Mr. Goyette has also identified logs that will need to be totally replaced in the near future. That is an even more complex process. The cabin, said to have been built about 1831 in Butternut Hollow, near Frenchtown north of Guttenberg, was dismantled and moved to the Garnavillo Park in 1976, a donation from Keith & Janet Elwick. The cabin’s history of residents from the Peter Mahowald family in 1879 to the Carl Tuecke family in 1939, is on file in the cabin as recorded by Ruth Tuecke (wife of Carl). Additional research has been done to identify the source of the Bibles found in the cabin walls when it was dismantled (one belonging to John Krauth in 1844). 1886 plat maps note the owners of the lots of land in section 20 of Clayton township around where the cabin stood as being Aaron Kraut and Jacob Kraut. Grants from Aureon, the Clayton County Foundation for the Future and a private donation from Daryl Wille, current owner of the land of the cabin’s original location, are funding the cabin preservation project.
