The first leg of our honeymoon was spent at a bed and breakfast in my hometown of Dubuque. Charles Hancock who ran the largest wholesale grocer/distribution business in the Midwest built the Hancock House in 1891. Interestingly he was also a key figure at Nutwood Park, a horseracing track that was once considered one of the premier tracks in the country. The Sisters of the Presentation own the land today and the track is long submerged under a pond that my siblings and I would walk to with old bread for feeding the ducks. Legend has it that one of the tracks owners buried his most famous horse in the center of the old track.
The Hancock House sits on top of the bluff at 11th street. Back in Charles Hancock’s day there would have been an elevator that transported people to and from their homes to the downtown businesses they owned. The elevator was gone by the 1920’s, replaced by a step set of stairs. The people who lived atop the city in those days were professionals. They owned big beautiful homes that overlooked the city and the river. Even today with the damage left by the latter half of the 20th century, it is still a beautiful view.
When I was a kid, I always wanted to climb the stairs on 11th street up to the bluff to see what was there and to look out over Dubuque. I saw the stairs every time I went to the library. Dubuque was the beneficiary of Carnegie money and built a temple style building with huge archways and columns at the top of the steps leading up from the sidewalk. It looked more like a government building than a library. Inside on the main floor the ceilings were high and had those old hanging fans that spun so slowly that you wondered if they gave off air at all. It was always quiet. Not like libraries today, which are more like community centers than places where the printed word, thoughts, dreams, and hopes are stored.
After checking out my books I would often wait for my mom and siblings on the front steps. Those stairs beckoned always. I pestered my mom to let me climb up and she never granted permission though once she let me go across the street to peer up them. The stairs were in miserable repair back in the 70’s and not safe. I never saw anyone walking them, but I wished I knew what was at the top. The unknown. A mystery in my boring little hometown.
Today the stairs are climbable though I doubt many would want to undertake them on a whim. They are step and pass under a stone archway that gives pause. At the top is a small circular drive and the Hancock House sits just to the right. It is a three-story building with turrets and a large friendly looking front porch right out of a movie.
Chuck and Susan are the proprietors. Married for 39 years and B&B managers for the last 13 of them, they have only hosted 3 guests they wouldn’t have back. Two were smokers who holed overnight with a cooler and their smokes and snuck away before breakfast leaving them to deal with a smoky room and new guests due that same day.
The rooms are named for the original occupants. We stayed in Florence’s room on the second floor. It is a turret room with a view of the city below. The bathroom looks vintage with a clawed tub and a toilet with a pull chain flush.
Breakfasts on both mornings were delicious. Easter Sunday was vanilla pancakes. We dined with two other couples, a software developer and his wife who worked as a biller for an insurance company, and an Asian couple who worked for a Taiwanese plumbing fixture manufacture in Chicago. They met on the job, hiding their relationship for two years by commuting together. Our hosts sat and chatted with us as we ate, refilling plates and cups as needed. The next day was baked croissants with an orange custard filling that was heavenly. Normally I shy away from bakes goods because of my peanut and citrus allergies but I couldn’t resist and paid a bit for it later. We enjoyed Chuck and Susan’s company again and Chuck and Rob discussed engineering and Montana, a place where they hope to retire in the next year or two.
The Hancock House is one of four B&B’s in the area that work together to promote the practice of these types of inns. It’s hard now that the casino businesses are moving into the harbor area in full force. So few people these days enjoy staying in small B&B’s, preferring the amenities of the big hotels like Hilton, which has set up recently near the river walk.
Hancock House is within driving (and walking distance if you aren’t too much of a 21st century wuss) of the downtown and the riverboat/casinos). There is parking, an accessible beverage and snack area and free wireless Internet that enabled me to get my blogging fix. We enjoyed our stay very much.
anniegirl1138 