{"nrhp_refnum":"94000030","name":"University of Illinois Experimental Dairy Farm Historic District","other_names":[],"category":"district","location":{"address":"1201 W. St. Mary's Rd.","address_restricted":false,"city":"Urbana","county":"Champaign County","state":"IL","lat":40.09381755450005,"lon":-88.22450580209961,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"1994-02-04","is_nhl":false,"nhl_designated_date":null,"areas_of_significance":["Architecture","Agriculture"],"significance_levels":["state"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"A historic district of three round dairy barns, a farm manager's house and a storage building at 1201 West St. Mary's Road in Urbana, Illinois, on the University of Illinois South Farms. The barns were built in 1908, 1910 and 1912.","why_significant":"The district is significant at the state level as the University of Illinois's Experimental Dairy Farm, where dairy methods and feed crops were tested and the results were published for Illinois farmers. It also contributed to studies of milk quality and contamination in Chicago's milk supply. The round barns illustrate early twentieth-century efforts to apply scientific principles to efficient dairy farming.","narrative":"Three round dairy barns, a manager's house and a small storage building make up the University of Illinois Experimental Dairy Farm on a ridge in southwest Urbana. The barns, built in 1908, 1910 and 1912, stand within about 500 feet of one another. Two are 60 feet in diameter and the third is 70 feet, with a brick wing. The brick-founded barns have wood-shingled or wood-sided walls and gambrel or triple-slope roofs. The 1908 manager's house has Craftsman and Tudor Revival influences. The farm was a working laboratory for dairy science. Professor Fraser compared hay varieties and found timothy hay held far less digestible protein than alfalfa. Results were circulated to farmers through experiment station bulletins. Staff also studied contamination in the milk shipped to Chicago and later tested how long milk stayed good. The state recognized the district for this role in Illinois dairy research and for its round-barn design. A garage, a brick laboratory and a cattle shed are later additions.","period_of_significance":null,"architect_builder":null,"architectural_style":"Round Barn; Craftsman (Manager's House has Craftsman/Tudor Revival influence)","criteria":[],"status_note":"Still used for agriculture, storage and research; Barn #2 has a modern workroom enclosure and two historic buildings have been lost.","vacant_flag":false,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-sonnet-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.0-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 02:55:37.204626-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/opastorage/live/33/8907/28890733/content/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_IL/94000030.pdf"},"photo":{"url_800":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/94000030/cef45e9d54-800.webp","url_1600":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/94000030/cef45e9d54-1600.webp","licence":"CC BY-SA 3.0 us","author":"Dori","credit_html":"<a href=\"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Dairy_farm_4390.jpg\" rel=\"noopener\">Dori</a>, <a href=\"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/us/deed.en\" rel=\"license noopener\">CC BY-SA 3.0 us</a>, via Wikimedia Commons","source_page":"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Dairy_farm_4390.jpg"},"district":null,"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/28890733","wikipedia":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_Illinois_Experimental_Dairy_Farm_Historic_District","wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q7895522"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/illinois/champaign-county/university-of-illinois-experimental-dairy-farm-historic-district-94000030/"}