On this site, Eduard Muehl and his brother-in-law Carl Procopius Strehly published the important radical journal Licht-Freund, or friend of light. Muehl, a freidenker, or free-thinker, opposed slavery, and his influential voice among Germans statewide helped Missouri stay with the Union during the Civil War. The dwelling housed Strehly and Muehl's printing business, which produced the first German newspaper west of the Mississippi in 1843. The Strehly House is notable for its attached commercial building. In 1855, Carl Strehly entered the wine business, which the city council had actively encouraged since 1844, and built an addition with a wine cellar, production area, tavern, and dance hall. In the 19th century, the winery's upper floor served as a dance hall and erholung, or entertainment center. Vineyards were interspersed among the houses in this part of Hermann, and vines still growing behind the house date from the 1850s. The last known carved wine cask in Missouri, signed and dated 1875, depicts Bacchus, god of wine. The house combines European half timber construction with the local brick tradition and represents less-affluent Germans who emigrated to Missouri in the early 19th century, survived frontier hardships, and prospered in the New World. Carl Strehly prospered enough to add two rooms to his house, completing it in the 1860s.