| Wisconsin (Columbia County), Columbus — Governor James Taylor Lewis / Governor Lewis: Civil War Era |
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Governor James Taylor Lewis · 1819 – 1904
Governor James T. Lewis, the ninth Governor of Wisconsin (1864-66), led the state through the tumultuous conclusion of the Civil War. He was born in New Your State and in 1845 settled in Columbus where he practiced law. In 1854-56 he built this house in the Italianate style of architecture. Lewis began his political career as a Democrat, serving in the Assembly, state Senate and as lieutenant governor. He joined the new Republican party . . . — Map (db m22918) |
| Wisconsin (Columbia County), Merrimac — 187 — The Merrimac Ferry |
| | Merrimac’s first permanent settler, Chester Mattson, obtained a territorial charter in 1848 to provide ferry service across the Wisconsin River. The State Legislature of 1851 authorized a road, subsequently to become State Trunk Highway 113, to connect settlements at Madison and Baraboo via Matt’s Ferry. Today, the Merrimac Ferry is the lone survivor of upwards of 500 ferries chartered by territorial and state legislatures before the turn of the century.
The fee charged by early ferrymen . . . — Map (db m1932) |
| Wisconsin (Columbia County), Pardeeville — Angie Williams Cox Public Library |
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Angie Williams Cox
Public Library
1934
is listed in the
State Register of
Historic Places — Map (db m22869) |
| Wisconsin (Columbia County), Pardeeville — Historic Pardeeville / Belmont Hotel |
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Historic Pardeeville
In 1848, New York native and Milwaukee merchant, John S. Pardee hired agents to oversee his Fox River land holdings and to establish business operations from this location. Yates Ashley, the most notable of Pardee's agents, managed the on-site operations and surveyed and platted the town in 1850. Although railroad tracks were laid here 1857, real growth did not begin until after the 1870s. By 1899, Pardeeville boasted of two hotels, a flour mill, a grain elevator, . . . — Map (db m22896) |
| Wisconsin (Columbia County), Portage — 61 — Fort Winnebago |
| | In the autumn of 1828 a permanent fort was built on this site by the First Regiment of the United States Infantry under the command of Maj. David E. Twiggs, later a general in the Confederate Army. The fort was constructed primarily to control the important Fox-Wisconsin portage and to protect American traders from interference by the Winnebago Indians. Lieut. Jefferson Davis, later president of the Confederacy, served here after graduating from West Point. The fort was garrisoned until 1845 . . . — Map (db m2364) |
| Wisconsin (Columbia County), Portage — Frederick Jackson Turner — 1861 – 1932 |
| | Considered the most important historian of the United States in the twentieth century, Frederick Jackson Turner brought a new understanding to the meaning of the American experience. He was born in Portage; his father was Andrew Jackson Turner, a longtime local newspaper editor and activist. Young Turner left Portage to study at the University of Wisconsin in Madison (B.A. 1884, M.A. 1888) and John Hopkins University in Baltimore (Ph. D 1890). He taught at the University of Wisconsin . . . — Map (db m20029) |
| Wisconsin (Columbia County), Portage — Jacques Marquette and Louis Joliet |
| | This tablet marks the place near which Jacques Marquette and Louis Joliet entered the Wisconsin River June 14, 1673
Erected by Wau-Bun Chapter D. A. R. 1905 — Map (db m2342) |
| Wisconsin (Columbia County), Portage — Ketchum’s Point |
| | Ketchum’s Point, named for a local family, stands above the low, marshy Portage connecting the Fox River and Great Lakes with the Wisconsin and Mississippi rivers. This waterway served as a vital thoroughfare for supplies and furs during the fur trade era. Used in times of flooding, the fork in the portage trail began at this landmark. The trail ascended this bluff, following the Cook Street ridge to the Wisconsin River. The 1827 Ho-Chunk Uprising, begun by the rapid expansion of the lead . . . — Map (db m2407) |
| Wisconsin (Columbia County), Portage — 63 — Marquette |
| | On June 14, 1673 Jacques Marquette and Louis Jolliet started the portage (1.28 miles) from here to the Wisconsin River, which led to their discovery of the Upper Mississippi June 17, 1673 at Prairie du Chien. The expedition, in two birch bark canoes, traveled south to the mouth of the Arkansas River and returned to St. Ignace, a trip of nearly 3000 miles. Thus a new era of exploration, settlement and commerce began for the Great Lakes region, the Mississippi Valley and the Far West. . . . — Map (db m2341) |
| Wisconsin (Columbia County), Portage — 106 — Potters' Emigration Society |
| | Near here in 1849 Thomas Twiggs began a settlement of unemployed potters from Staffordshire, England. To help farmers on both sides of the Fox River reach his store and blacksmith shop at Twiggs' Landing, he operated Emancipation Ferry, named to express his hope that here they would find freedom from the poverty of the Old World. — Map (db m20084) |
| Wisconsin (Columbia County), Portage — Site of Fort Winnebago |
| | 1828 — 1845
Surrender of Red Bird
Noted Winnebago Chief
1827
Erected by Wau-Bun Chapter Daughters of the American Revolution 1924 — Map (db m4609) |
| Wisconsin (Columbia County), Portage — Society Hill Historic District |
| | This 137 building district is bounded, in part, by Emmett, Cass, Wisconsin and MacFarlane streets. Most of the houses were constructed between 1870 and 1910 and are in the Italianate and Queen Anne architectural styles.
Society Hill reflects the wealth and prestige of Portage's early prominent families who lived here because of its convenience to the downtown and the railroad. Located just south of the large Chicago, Milwaukee, and St. Paul Railroad complex, the district housed many . . . — Map (db m20042) |
| Wisconsin (Columbia County), Portage — Zona Gale |
| | Zona Gale was born August 26, 1874, in Portage. She graduated in 1899 from the University of Wisconsin-Madison with a Masters in Literature. Gale then spent six years as a journalist in Milwaukee and New York.
Her visits to Portge proved a turning point, when Gale discovered that the people of her hometown were a source of literary material. She traveled frequently, returning to Portage and living with her parents in a home at 506 W. Edgewater that included a study of her own . . . — Map (db m20009) |
| Wisconsin (Columbia County), Poynette — John Muir View |
| | John Muir (1838-1914), world famous naturalist and "father of the national park system," often stopped to rest and admire this view as he walked from his home in Marquette County to the University of Wisconsin. Muir loved the wilderness from which his parents carved a farm and home, first at Fountain Lake, later at Hickory Hill, about 20 miles north from here (south of Montello). When he left Hickory Hill to enroll at the University, Muir's love for nature was matched only by his genius for . . . — Map (db m20148) |
| Wisconsin (Columbia County), Poynette — Rest Areas on the I-Roads |
| | Early roadside rest areas were rural school grounds and country churchyards with their two little houses in back.
In Wisconsin, by 1920, curves were built to eliminate sharp road corners. Local garden clubs, with the American Legion and Auxiliary, began to beautify many of the resulting triangles with flowers and shrubs. Motorists used these places to relax and picnic.
In 1931 the Wisconsin Legislature authorized highway beautification, and later the familiar waysides - small . . . — Map (db m22690) |
| Wisconsin (Columbia County), Rio — Samuel & Chloe Leonard Doud — 1793 – 1860 · 1791 – 1874 |
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In memory of
Samuel & Chloe Leonard Doud
1793 – 1860 · 1791 – 1874
Donors of Ohio Cemetery
First burial their grandson
Winfield Doud 1848
– 1955 – — Map (db m25656) |
| Wisconsin (Columbia County), Wisconsin Dells — Bailey’s Eddy – Municipal Dock — Kilbourn Landmark |
| | This natural harbor is named for Gen. Joseph Bailey, original owner of the property. It has been the gateway to the magnificent dells of Wisconsin for millions of visitors for over 100 years. Sight-seeing boats have developed from spoon-oared rowboats of the 1850’s, through steamboats, wooden naptha, and gasoline launches to the present steel fleet. — Map (db m7757) |
| Wisconsin (Columbia County), Wisconsin Dells — Bailey's Landing — (A Landmark Store) |
| | This building was constructed on the home site of General Joseph Bailey Civil War hero and a founder of Kilbourn City (now Wisconsin Dells) in 1856. Bailey became a national Civil War hero in 1864 when Porter's Red River Fleet was stranded in low water. Using raftsmen's techniques learned in this area, Bailey freed the fleet, saving the Union two million dollars and shortening the war by two years.
This property was leased from Jack and Ben Olson by Arnold Borcher Co. in 1978, remodeled . . . — Map (db m7966) |
| Wisconsin (Columbia County), Wisconsin Dells — Belle Boyd — Kilbourn Landmark |
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Born May 9, 1844 in Martinsburg, VA.
Died June 11, 1900 at Kilbourn, WI.
On May 23, 1862 at the Battle of Front Royal, VA., Belle Boyd, then 18, ran across the battlefield between the firing lines with information for Gen. Stonewall Jackson on the disposition of Union troops. With this information Jackson broke through and captured Front Royal, Union forces under Gen. Banks were driven from the Shenandoah Valley.
"One God, One Flag, One People – Forever" – Belle Boyd — Map (db m8023) |
| Wisconsin (Columbia County), Wisconsin Dells — First Evangelical Lutheran Church |
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This marks the site of the
First Evangelical Lutheran Church
in Moe Settlement
1863 — 1892 — Map (db m8172) |
| Wisconsin (Columbia County), Wisconsin Dells — H. H. Bennett Studio — Kilbourn Landmark — America’s Oldest Photographic Studio · Established in 1865 |
| | This building was constructed in 1875 by Henry Hamilton Bennett, pioneer landscape photographer, nationally known for his artistry, technical excellence and inventive genius. His views of this area brought the earliest tourists to his beloved Dells of Wisconsin. Generations of Bennetts have continued his work. — Map (db m7851) |
| Wisconsin (Columbia County), Wisconsin Dells — Kilbourn City — Kilbourn Landmark |
| | The first bridge on this site, a wooden structure, was completed in 1857. Byron Kilbourn, land speculator and politician promoted the site. Through his influence the LaCrosse and Milwaukee Railroad crossed the river here instead of at Newport, 2 miles downstream. Newport quickly became a ghost town.
Not a modest man, Kilbourn had the city named after him. Kilbourn City retained that name until 1931 when the townspeople renamed it Wisconsin Dells, more in keeping with the scenic river . . . — Map (db m8047) |
| Wisconsin (Columbia County), Wisconsin Dells — 177 — Kingsley Bend Indian Mounds |
| | The mounds of this group are a fairly representative sample of those built by the people of the Effigy Mound Culture between A.D. 700-1000. It has been through excavation of other burial mounds quite similar to these that archeologists have learned most of what they know about the people who built them. These people lived by hunting, fishing and gathering wild vegetable foods. They practiced little if any agriculture.
There was usually only a single burial in mounds such as these, but in . . . — Map (db m7731) |
| Wisconsin (Columbia County), Wisconsin Dells — Stroud Bank |
| | Perry G. Stroud, a young attorney from New York, established this early bank in Kilbourn City, now Wisconsin Dells, in ca. 1870. Over his thirty-year career as the town's first attorney, Stroud preserved much of the city's early documentary history. Here, his bank still stands with its original brick front and vault. — Map (db m7850) |
| Wisconsin (Columbia County), Wyocena — Major Elbert Dickason / Dickason's "Hotel" |
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Major Elbert Dickason
Major Elbert Dickason founder of Wyocena, was born in Virginia in 1799. He moved to Illinois where he joined their militia during the Black Hawk War. Representing a Milwaukee land investor, he founded Columbus in 1839. When his ventures failed in 1843, he moved with his wife Obedience and family to Wyocena. He purchased land for $1.25 per acre, built a cabin, and surveyed, platted, and named the future settlement.
Dickason's "Hotel"
Major Elbert . . . — Map (db m22839) |
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