The district was the commercial center of Rockford's substantial Swedish American community.

Swedish settlement in Rockford began in 1852, and Swedes accounted for a third of the city's population by the 1890s; while the first Swedish American community formed around a railroad station on Kishwaukee Street, it shifted to Seventh Street in the late 1860s and 1870s.

The buildings in the district exhibit many popular architectural styles of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, including Italianate, Romanesque Revival, and Commercial.

[2] The district was added to the National Register of Historic Places on March 23, 2005.

This article about a property in Winnebago County, Illinois on the National Register of Historic Places is a stub.