You are here

Alaska » South-Central Region » Matanuska-Susitna Valleys » Wasilla » Birchwood Station

Birchwood Station

-A A +A
1916. Mile 50 Parks Hwy.

Now on its fourth site, the Birchwood Station has been removed from the railroad it used to serve. Built as the railroad station in Birchwood, near Anchorage, this building was moved to Willow in 1931 to serve as the station there. In the 1960s it was acquired by the State Highway Commission, which moved it about a mile to serve as a maintenance facility. In 1963, it was moved to its present site where it now houses a craft shop.

The hip-roofed building has an unusual second-story dormer, repeating the form of the bay window above which it sits. The hip roof has exposed rafter ends and brackets at its broad eaves. The wood-framed building is covered with novelty siding, placed vertically up to window-sill level, and horizontally above. The building has been doubled in size by an addition to the rear, and the porch across half of the front is not original, but the station retains its railroad-building appearance.

Writing Credits

Author: 
Alison K. Hoagland
×

Data

What's Nearby

Alaska Railroad Depot
Teeland's
Dorothy Page Museum (Wasilla Community Hall)
Frontier Village
Wasilla Elementary School

Citation

Alison K. Hoagland, "Birchwood Station", [Wasilla, Alaska], SAH Archipedia, eds. Gabrielle Esperdy and Karen Kingsley, Charlottesville: UVaP, 2012—, http://sah-archipedia.org/buildings/AK-01-SC084.

Print Source

Buildings of Alaska, Alison K. Hoagland. New York: Oxford University Press, 1993, 129-130.

If SAH Archipedia has been useful to you, please consider supporting it.

SAH Archipedia tells the story of the United States through its buildings, landscapes, and cities. This freely available resource empowers the public with authoritative knowledge that deepens their understanding and appreciation of the built environment. But the Society of Architectural Historians, which created SAH Archipedia with University of Virginia Press, needs your support to maintain the high-caliber research, writing, photography, cartography, editing, design, and programming that make SAH Archipedia a trusted online resource available to all who value the history of place, heritage tourism, and learning.

,