Thordarson Estate Boathouse (Rock Island)

The first thing you see arriving from Washington Island is limestone — a boathouse completed in 1929 or 1930 (sources differ by a year) that Chester Thordarson, Icelandic-born inventor and transformer manufacturer, built after purchasing Rock Island in 1910. Large enough to shelter two fifty-foot yachts, its walls carry old Icelandic runes. The architect was Frederick P. Dinkelberg. Wisconsin bought the island from Thordarson's heirs in 1965; the boathouse is now part of Rock Island State Park and contributing to the Thordarson Estate Historic District on the National Register.