R. Bruce and May W. Louden House
Historic house in Iowa, United States / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The R. Bruce and May W. Louden House is an historic building located in Fairfield, Iowa, United States. Original construction is in a colonial revival style and the interior was remodeled in an art deco style in 1928. Louden sold the property in 1948, and it was broken into apartments in the 1960s. The house was built in 1905 and was the residence of R. Bruce and May W. Louden until 1948.
R. Bruce and May W. Louden House | |
Location | 501 W. Adams Ave. Fairfield, Iowa |
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Coordinates | 41°0′18″N 91°58′9″W |
Built | 1905 |
Architectural style | Colonial Revival |
MPS | Louden Machinery Company, Fairfield Iowa MPS |
NRHP reference No. | 99000124[1] |
Added to NRHP | September 12, 2003 |
The house is within walking distance of the Louden Machinery Company, as it was the custom at the time for factory owners to be close to their properties. He was the third president of the company in Fairfield from 1940 to 1951, when he was killed in an auto accident. .[2] During that period the company produced overhead handling equipment for American industries during World War II. The house was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2003.[1]
R. Bruce Louden was president of Louden Machinery Company when the firm was contracted to build the assembly line for the world's first [atom bomb], and also the [B-29 bomber], during World War II. The atom bomb assembly line project was so secret that Louden was never told of it during construction, and liaison with the Manhattan Project was through Louden Vice President R. R. Louden, as per one of Louden's grandchildren.
In its heyday, Louden Machinery Company was one of the world's largest farm equipment manufacturers and was the largest shipper on the Rock Island Railroad. The founder, William Louden, was a prolific inventor with many inventions to his credit. His hay handling system (the first major invention)was a pulley system on a monorail used to move hay in the mow of the barn, and was the first commercially successful monorail system in the world.