The Murray House, Sears Roebuck Rockfaced Wizard No. 52, Sheridan County, Nebraska, 2013

Karl Tuchenhagen, a German immigrant who is said to have attended the same school as Kaiser Wilhelm, came to America in 1875 and married a Norwegian, although the marriage didn't last long.  A bit eccentric, he never abandoned his German accent, habits or traditions; he grew his own tobacco and had a wonderful garden each year.  His best-known house is the one he made for the Metzger family (also see plate 31).  Today, all the concrete-block homes in the Sandhills, whether he built them or not, are commonly called "Tuchenhagens."  This house is situated in open country just south of Rushville.  Modestly incised up on the door lintel is the name T.P. Murray and the year 1911; the foursquare design of the house is remarkably similar to style no. 52 in the Sears Modern Homes catalogue of that same year, but the Murrays supposedly overspent and went belly-up soon after its completion.  Sears promoted concrete-block construction as being more sanitary and comfortable than wood-framed homes, not to mention the fact that their appearance was nearly identical to hand-finished stone.  The rusticated surface -- known as "rockfaced," one of several treatments offered by Sears -- was thought to resemble the stone blocks used on the lower floors of Italian palazzi, an architectural feature brought to this country during the Renaissance revival in the 1890s and later watered down by the designers employed by Sears.  As the 1912 catalogue proclaimed:  "Build a dream castle -- a home of your own."