Wade House receives rare Abbot-Downing Concord Stagecoach from Wells Fargo collection
GREENBUSH – The Wade House Historic Site Wesley W. Jung Carriage Museum received a donation of a rare Abbot-Downing Company Concord stagecoach No. 433 on Wednesday.
The vintage 1875 stagecoach, built in a "hotel" style, has arrived from the Wells Fargo collection in Oakland, California.
Last January, while Wade House Site Director Bridgitt Zielke was visiting her college student daughter in the San Francisco area, Zielke decided to check out the Stagecoach Museum there. The collection featured an assortment of original and reproduction stagecoaches.
As she was leaving the museum, she talked to the person at the front desk who happened to be the director of the museum. He said that the museum was going to be liquidating its collection because Wells Fargo is no longer going to use the stagecoach as part of its branding.
"So, all last spring I had communications back-and-forth with a woman by the name of Leslie Martin. I created a presentation that told her about the Wade House historic site," Zielke said, with hopes the Wade House could secure an original stagecoach.
"So, later she called me in June and said, 'Yay, Bridgitt! You and the Wade House have been chosen as a location to be getting an original Abbott and Downing Concord stagecoach built in 1875."
Wells Fargo donated the stagecoach and paid for the shipping to the Greenbush museum.
"We are thrilled to have a new acquisition to our collections at the Wade House historic site," Zielke said.
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Wade House Curator Jim Willaert added: "We have not had an original stagecoach in the life of the museum. The ones we have been using all these years is a lovely reproduction, but it is a reproduction."
The museum opened in the 1950s when the Kohler Foundation restored the Wade House.
With the crisp air of late fall, the tractor trailer arrived at the Wade House with the stagecoach, which took more than an hour to unload, unwrap and move into the museum.
After a short ride around the grounds of the Wade House with a two-horse team from the Bulitz farm, the stagecoach was carefully rolled into the museum with help from Kohler High School students.
During the 19th century, stagecoaches were the main source of transportation before the full arrival of railroads. The Wade House Stagecoach Inn is the central point of the storyline at the Wade House Historic Site. Until today, however, the site did not have an all-original stagecoach.
Zielke said the donated stagecoach is a Abbot-Downing stagecoach No. 433 built by the Abbot-Downing Company of Concord, New Hampshire. The horse-drawn vehicle was built on May 7, 1875, when it was ordered for production at a price of more than $1,200. Today, that is equal to about $35,000.
The new acquisition is known as a nine-passenger Concord-style coach. Ornate and rugged, it is also so large that it would always draw attention when they passed through a town. At 2,500 pounds and 13 feet, 6 inches long, it also required up to six horses, depending upon the load.
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This stagecoach is also considered an eastern-style stage that features additional seating on top of the body. It is estimated only 160 of these stagecoaches are around today out of the 1,800 originally produced.
The stagecoach's body is made of oak, hickory and ash. The red and yellow exterior features decorated gold leaf designs and the Wells Fargo & Company name.
Concord-style coaches were available in three sizes: six-, nine- and 12-passenger. With the the driver and the shotgun messenger riding outside, the people count would edge toward 18 people, according to the Wade House. People riding shotgun were armed guards who were there to protect mining and railroad payrolls transported during those early years.
The new stagecoach can be seen by visitors arriving for the Wade House Christmas with a more formal event being held in spring in honor of the new acquisition, said Zielke.
Gary C. Klein has written Throwback Thursdays since 2017, covering dozens of businesses, people, sports and events from the early days of the area to recent history. He has been a photographer for the Press since 1993. He can be reached at 920-453-5149 or gklein@gannett.com . Follow him on X (formerly Twitter) at @leicaman99 . Check out his other work at www.sheboyganpress.com/staff/4383066002/gary-c-klein/ .
This article originally appeared on Sheboygan Press: Wade House receives 1875 stagecoach from Wells Fargo collection
