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Lenox

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Situated in an open field at the corner of Van Buren Street East and Oak Street North in Lenox is a substantial two-story brick dwelling (c. 1870) which does not fit comfortably into any of the normal stylistic categories of the mid-nineteenth century. Essentially the house mirrors the late Italianate mode in the heavy stone lintels over the windows and doors and in the wide overhanging hipped roof with paired brackets as supports. But the roof is high and double pitched, and there is a dominant gabled dormer at the front. Both the dormer and the main roof boast a narrow monitor decorated with cut-out sawed work and small brackets.

Nearer the center of town, at the northeast corner of Main and Michigan streets, is a Queen Anne house (c. 1890), now the Larkin-Bender Funeral Home. A round bay tower at the corner rises one full floor above the two-story body of the house. Matching the tower in plan and projecting from the ground floor is a semi-circular veranda.

Four-and-a-half miles south of Lenox along Iowa 49 is one of Iowa's famed round barns, the Cameron True-Round Barn (c. 1899), possibly the earliest round barn still standing in the state. The barn measures 100 feet in diameter; its walls are sheathed in board-and-batten and the roof is topped by a monitor section with walls punctured by louvered vents.

Writing Credits

Author: 
David Gebhard and Gerald Mansheim

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