Hanlon-Osbakken House

Built about 1895 and later listed on the National Register of Historic Places, this Victorian Queen Anne style home in Sitka belonged to three generations of the Hanlon-Osbakken family, whose roots there reached back to early Russian American days. The property was held from 1873 to 1991, beginning when Frederick Richter bought the lot in 1873 and soon married 16-year-old Anna Smackoff. After Frederick died a few years later, leaving Anna with two small sons, she married John Hanlon, and about 1895 her brother-in-law William Sherigan built the house for the family. Local folklore holds that the home's yellow cedar planks originally came from a local brewery once owned by Frederick Richter. Indoor plumbing and electric wiring were added after the original construction. After Anna's death, her daughter Margaret continued to live there and raised her own family in the house. In the late 1940s, Margaret's husband John Osbakken built the long rear addition, which served as a boat-building shop. The Osbakkens sold the house to the Breedlove family in 1991, and it was restored in 1992-93.

Sitka, Alaska · United States