Taychopera Foundation

Records of the Taychopera Foundation, a Madison, Wisconsin non-profit organization devoted to preservation of buildings of architectural and historical significance. It was successful in preserving the Gates of Heaven Synagogue and in creating the Madison City Landmarks Commission. Included are corporate records, membership lists, financial records, correspondence, and a subject file.

The Taychopera Foundation was incorporated in 1968 as a non-profit organization to encourage and assist in the preservation of structures of architectural and historical significance in Madison and the surrounding area. (Taychopera means “region of the four lakes” in the Winnebago language.) Initially Taychopera sponsored the sale of a booklet on historic Madison houses and note paper with sketches of historic houses. Late in the fall of 1968 the Foundation began its first project to directly assist in preservation with an effort to save the (Abel) Dunning House (Mapleside), a pre-Civil War farmhouse on University Avenue. Attempts to move the house or to preserve it on its original site failed despite a public fund raising campaign, and Mapleside was razed to make way for a Burger King franchise.