Wisconsin’s first German settlement began in 1839 in the township of Mequon, when Heinrich von Rohr and a group of Old Lutherans established the community of “Freye Stätte” (Freistadt) and formed the state’s first Lutheran congregation. These religious conservatives had fled Pomerania because they objected to Prussian king Frederick William III’s decision to merge the Lutheran Church with the Prussian Reformed Church. That same year, Adolph Zimmerman and William Opitz settled nearby and opened the Mequon Brewery. Soon a wave of German immigrants swept into Ozaukee County.
Among the Lutheran settlers were John Peuschel, a native of Saxony, and his Prussian-born wife, Henriette. In 1855, the couple established this farm on 80 acres, which they later expanded to 120 acres. Along with the land, the Peuschels acquired a stone house, built in 1844, and a wooden hay barn and wooden granary, both constructed around 1850. The house is a fine example of fieldstone construction with a mortar matrix. Several features evoke the formality of Greek Revival, especially the dressed stone quoins, the side-gabled roof with prominent cornice returns, the broad frieze below the eaves and the prominent entrance framed by sidelights and a transom. In 1870, the Peuschels added a one-story fieldstone wing to the rear. Four years later they built a fieldstone barn behind the residence. The well house, outhouse, concrete silo, and corncrib were constructed sometime around 1900.