The two-story house was built circa 1873 by carpenter William Dierks.

Dierks gave the house a Second Empire design featuring a front porch supported by classical columns, multiple bay windows, a sunroom in the rear, a bracketed cornice, and a mansard roof with small arched dormers.

Longtime owner Abner L. Harris bought the house in 1874.

Harris served as both mayor and postmaster of Reedsburg, operated a large general store, and funded or was a partner in many of Reedsburg's early commercial and industrial endeavors.

After Harris died in 1908, Mary Meyer Rudd and her descendants lived in the house for several decades.