The Russian-American Building No. 29 (), also known as Tilson Building or Building No. 29, Sitka, is a historic commercial building at 202-206 Lincoln Street in

Sitka, Alaska Sitka (; ) is a municipal home rule, unified Consolidated city-county, city-borough in the southeast portion of the U.S. state of Alaska. It was under Russian America, Russian rule from 1799 to 1867. The city is situated on the west side of Ba ...

. A

National Historic Landmark A National Historic Landmark (NHL) is a National Register of Historic Places property types, building, district, object, site, or structure that is officially recognized by the Federal government of the United States, United States government f ...

, it is the only Russian colonial commercial structure standing in Sitka, and one of only two Russian colonial buildings in the city (the other is the

Russian Bishop's House The Russian Bishop's House (), once the Russian Mission Orphanage (), is a historic house museum and National Historic Landmark at Lincoln and Monastery Streets in Sitka, Alaska. Built in 1841–43, this log structure is one of the oldest survivi ...

, also a National Historic Landmark.)

Description

The original portion of the building is a square log structure, 2-1/2 stories tall, measuring about (four

sazhen Historical Russian units of measurement were standardized and used in the Russian Empire and after the Russian Revolution, but were abandoned after 21 July 1925, when the Soviet Union adopted the metric system. The Tatar system is very similar t ...

) square, and resting on a raised stone foundation. A two-story gallery, sheltered by a shed roof, extended to the east. The outside logs from which it is built were squared off to . The interior walls are built from dimensionally smaller logs, and the floors were made of half-logs secured into joists and sills by tenons. The structure is estimated to have been built in the 1840s, at a time when many buildings were built by

Finnish Finnish may refer to: * Something or someone from, or related to Finland * Culture of Finland * Finnish people or Finns, the primary ethnic group in Finland * Finnish language, the national language of the Finnish people * Finnish cuisine See also ...

laborers brought in by Russian administrators, and was first used as for residential purposes. The building has undergone a number of alterations in the intervening time, but these have managed to preserve much of its historic fabric. It is unknown if it was sided at the time of its construction, but early images depict it with the same type of shiplap siding it has today. Early images also show a two-story ell to its rear. The building was originally built with its back directly on the waterfront; infill has created new land in this area. In the 1880s the building underwent significant alterations. An addition extended the gallery area further to the east, and a new roof fully incorporated this space into the structure. Window spacing on this addition was made to match that of the main block, and the new roof was augmented by four equally-spaced gable-roof dormers. The building underwent further modernizing work in the 1960s, some of which was in response to deterioration of the log structure. It was the subject of a major rehabilitative effort in the mid-1980s. The building was declared a

and listed on the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government's official United States National Register of Historic Places listings, list of sites, buildings, structures, Hist ...

in 1987. and

References

External links

* {{National Register of Historic Places Commercial buildings on the National Register of Historic Places in Alaska Historic American Buildings Survey in Alaska National Historic Landmarks in Alaska Buildings and structures on the National Register of Historic Places in Sitka, Alaska Residential buildings completed in 1867 Retail buildings in Alaska Russian-American culture in Alaska