The Mukwa Motel/Farmers Retirement Home is a vernacular art environment on Wisconsin Highway 54 west of New London. It’s on the northern edge of the Mukwa State Wildlife Area and was photographed before 1995. An artful bit of rural humor built by farmer John Kraske shortly before his retirement.
According to the Post-Crescent newspaper, he assembled the site in 1991, two years before he retired from farming. Kraske, who died at 96 in 2016, told the paper in 2001, “It’s just something some crazy farmer did who didn’t have anything better to do with his time.”
“Every year or so we add something to it,” he said at the time. “I generally make a tour of all the garbage cans in town and see what people have thrown out. You’d be amazed. I think half my house is furnished with stuff somebody threw out. Don’t tell my wife, though.”
Kraske said he originally planed to call it the Northport Motel after the neighboring town. “But I thought that wouldn’t be right, disparaging the name of Northport.”
He claimed to have run afoul of neighbors only once, over the poor condition of an American flag. And based on the paper’s coverage, the site seems to be viewed favorably.
Google street view shows the place still extant in 2016, although somewhat deteriorated.
Sad to see it has fallen in disrepair as of 10/22/21.