Decorah: A Walk into the Past

Decorah’s mercantile trade began soon after the Days and the Painters founded the town in 1849, when the Pioneer Store opened in the Days’ smokehouse and William Painter also ran an early mercantile alongside his mills. Before stores specialized, mercantiles sought to supply both necessities and wants. Among Decorah’s most successful merchants was Klemet Iver Haugen, who emigrated from Norway to the United States in 1867 at age 17, worked four years as a farm hand near Spring Grove, Minnesota, then moved to Decorah at 21 and spent six years as a clerk in Christian Severson’s grocery store on West Water Street. Haugen later bought the store, first operating it with his cousin Gunder Rierson and then alone after buying out Rierson’s interest when his health failed. Hard times followed the wheat crop failures of 1877 and the next four years, affecting businesses across Decorah, but Haugen endured heavy losses and assisted his farm customers as much as possible. He replaced Severson’s original 20 x 60 frame building with a single-front brick structure, and in 1890 built the larger double-lot building at 311 W. Water that still stands with his name on its pediment. Designed in the Italianate style, it features ornate cast iron trim, an elaborate pediment, decorative brick corbeling, roof brackets, and second-story window lintels etched with acanthus decoration. Haugen’s store sold groceries, shoes for men, women, and children, women’s ready-to-wear, and dry goods such as fabric, thread, fancy work, and supplies for decorative wood-burning. Its sizable staff included department managers, salespeople, and a bookkeeper, and department heads bought merchandise from drummers or traveling salesmen who brought samples in trunks and containers for inspection. Suppliers included the Marshall Field Company of Chicago and I. and S. Bing of Cincinnati, Ohio.

Decorah, Iowa · United States