Wisconsin Hometown Stories

>> When glaciers moved into Wisconsin during the last ice age, ice blocked the flow of the Wisconsin River, forming what is known as Glacial Lake Wisconsin. For thousands of years, most of Juneau County lay deep underwater. As the climate warmed, the wall of ice gave way, and the lake drained in a catastrophic rush of water. The surging cascade carved out the formations of the Wisconsin Dells in a matter of days. >> The cliff that we see ahead and to the left marks the beginning of Juneau County. It was just a cataclysmic flow and just drained the lake in a matter of a few days. So, it was that outflow that carved through these rocks, shaping and forming, and sculpturing the rock formations that we see today. >> Jutting up from the lake bottom, rock formations, once islands in the glacial lake, carved by the waves and currents of a thousand feet of water. As the glaciers retreated, the land opened up once again to Native Americans, who left a legacy of effigy mounds around the county. In the 1830s and '40s, the federal government took possession of Menominee lands in Juneau County, and the US Army removed the Ho Chunk from their Wisconsin lands. >> We were forcibly removed five different times. Reservations were established for our people in Iowa. There were two reservations in Minnesota, a reservation established out in South Dakota. And then finally, our people moved down the river to part of the Omaha Indian Reservation. But with each removal, there was a group, our Ho Chunk people, that would always come back to Wisconsin, always come back to our homeland. We believe that the Creator placed us here. This is the area that he intended for us to inhabit. So, they came back to the homelands to be where the Creator intended for us to be. This is home. Yellow Thunder was one of our great leaders. Yellow Thunder encouraged non-Native people to pressure Congress to include the Winnebago people, or Ho Chunk people in the Homestead Act. So, 1874, they were included in the Homestead Act. And many of our tribal people took 40-acre properties in areas where some of our old villages used to be. That's why today we have large communities here in Baraboo, Wisconsin Dells, La Crosse, Tomah, Mauston, Reedsburg, Wittenberg. Black River Falls, of course, is our larger community. But those were some of the old homestead sites. >> European homesteaders began settling the area in the 1840s, which, until 1858, was part of a larger Adams County. >> It offered government land, low-priced land. It was the place to come. >> A lot of free land was being sold, a lot of immigrants were moving in. There was a lot of land speculation going on in Juneau County at the time. We began to just see that flux of Irish and Germans coming into Wisconsin. That's what's interesting, because you have this social war underway. >> My great grandfather Thomas came over from Ireland, and got a job on the Erie Canal. When his job finished up, he was in the Chicago area and came north to Wisconsin. He got up in this area, and he said this looks just like home, like Ireland. He got that warrant from the government to have 60 acres of land, and he started farming. >> The town of Necedah formed around a mill pond and a sawmill, with the Yellow River supplying both the water power for the mill, and the white pine logs. >> It was a mini pinery. Yellow had enough pine upstream to really foster a pioneer lumber industry. >> In the south, wheat became the crop of choice for pioneer farmers. And harnessing the power of falling water on the Baraboo, Yellow, and Lemonweir Rivers, towns began to grow up around gristmills, that ground wheat and other grains. >> This is a picture of Ben Boorman. He purchased the rights to the power on the dam on the Lemonweir River from the founder of Mauston, Milton Maughs. Then Boorman had a huge flour mill, sold flour all over the Midwest. He had a lumber mill and a wool carding mill. Ben Boorman built this 13-room home in 1876. It is now owned by the Juneau County Historical Society. It's our museum and archives. >> In 1858, the arrival of the La Crosse and Milwaukee Railroad fueled the growing settlement of Juneau County. >> One of the first railroads to cross Wisconsin came west from Milwaukee to Portage, crossed the Wisconsin River at what was then known as Kilborn Wisconsin Dells, and that stimulated the population all the way up and down its length. >> Tracks were laid from Lyndon Station to Mauston, and then on to New Lisbon and Camp Douglas. Soon, a railroad called the "Baraboo Air Line" ran tracks from Baraboo to Wonewoc, and then on to Elroy. >> The day it got to Elroy, there was a stampede of animals, because they weren't used to that type of noise. >> Next, the Western Wisconsin, decided to run tracks from Camp Douglas south, tunneling through the hills to Hustler, and then on to Elroy, where eventually two roundhouses, and other operations, provided many railroad jobs. The railroads opened up the world to the rural county, and settlers began to pour in. Towns like Union Center built up around the railroad depot, and the rhythm of the trains became the heartbeat of the area. For farmers, the rails opened up new markets in Milwaukee and Chicago. Staples like wheat, flour, and potatoes were shipped alongside fruit and other specialty crops from Juneau County's varied terrain. >> When you come to this county, there's a little bit of everything. When we look at Juneau County, it represents a lot of things that you can find in this state. When we get to the southwestern corner of the county, it's the unglaciated area, much like you see the western edge of Wisconsin, lots of hills, beautiful valleys. Then when you get to the southern area, where we are right now, we're standing in what probably would've been the tail end of Glacial Lake Wisconsin. We've got more of the prairies. Maybe not as heavy a prairie as you might see in Dane County, but still beautiful prairies. If you go farther north into Juneau County, then you get into what was once known as the Great Swamp. We get into some beautiful sand country that you would see in central Wisconsin, and also wetlands that you might see in central Wisconsin. So, it's very diverse. >> Juneau County's expanse of wetlands provided the resources for a number of specialty crops, like wiregrass. >> It was a particular variety of grass that is wound and fairly seamless, and extensive acreage up in northern Juneau County. It was harvested and baled up. Oshkosh was the center of industry in Wisconsin, and mats and rugs, and wrappings and other things were made out of this. That industry lasted until the 1950s, when they switched to plastic. Another one is cranberries. The cranberry industry grew out of the fact that wild cranberries grow in wetlands, and did grow in those wetlands up there. >> In the 1860s, an insect called the hop louse wiped out hop production in New York State. The price of hops skyrocketed, opening up a new opportunity for another specialty crop. >> It was discovered that the land in Juneau and Sauk, and some of Adams County was just perfect for growing hops. >> It went from five cents a pound to 50 cents a pound. So you can imagine the craze that they created for people putting in hops, or people growing hops. Hops is a perennial vine. It'll grow up a stake that you put in, about 25' tall. It produces a walnut sized fruit, and that's what's harvested. That is dried down, and that produces the flavor in beer. So the hops harvest was very labor intensive. So, to harvest that crop, they would bring in as many workers as they could by rail. >> Isaac Alsbacher delved into hops in Mauston. He bought the hops from the smaller farmers and he also had a hop yard. Mr. Alsbacher hired ladies and children from the cities that would come on the trains to pick the hops. He would have a wagon or two that he would pick these workers up at the tracks. They would be singing all the way through town. Mr. Alsbacher built a very, very large mansion, and he would have rooms for the workers to stay in. >> The early settlers here were subsistence farmers. First of all, they were just making enough money to feed the family, or they were raising enough food to feed the family. When the hops craze came in, that changed. So, barns were built, houses were put up, pianos were bought. But when it got to that 50-cent market, guess what, New York figured out how to get rid of the hop louse. So now, we have double the production and the price dropped well below five cents, down to three cents a pound. And the people that probably borrowed the farm went to the banker and bought a fancy piano because they were going to make money at 50 cents, went bankrupt. Now, of course, if you put up a barn, that didn't go away. That added to the long term infrastructure of this area. So some of that investment in infrastructure stayed. >> As fortunes in hops rose and fell, Juneau County would soon be touched by a bitter conflict brewing a thousand miles away.