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Showing 641-660 of 683 Entries

Washington Heights

Author: James Marten
Long shot of Craftsman bungalow facade facing slightly to the left against a blue sky. The one-and-a-half-story building features a roofed and covered front porch and rectangular windows on the ground floor. A dormer window appears under the iconic Jerkinhead roof. Potted plants and Halloween pumpkins ornament the front stairs. The building's side and a driveway are visible on the right. Trees branches appear in the center back and right of the building. The trunk of a tall tree can be seen on the left, in the front yard. Rays of sunshine bathe the bungalow and its surrounding.
Although the neighborhood that is now Washington Heights has not always been called such, it has long been a distinctive part of the Milwaukee area. Bounded by Wisconsin Highway 175 (formerly U. S. Highway 41) on the east, North Avenue on the North, 60th street on the west, and Vliet Street on the South, this… Read More

Washington Park

Author: Jenniffer Ammerman
A painted postcard depicts groups of people around the green landscape of Washington Park. Some traverse a bridge over the park's artificial lake, which appears in the center. Some sit on boats floating on the water body. Other groups walk on a pathway that stretches down in the right foreground. Text at the top center reads, "In Beautiful Washington Park, Milwaukee, Wis."
Washington Park is a residential NEIGHBORHOOD on Milwaukee’s West Side. Its landscape is dominated by the park that provides the neighborhood with its name. The neighborhood’s boundaries are North Avenue (north), West Vliet Street (south), Wisconsin Highway 175 (west), and North 35th Street (east). The neighborhood’s history is one of transition from AGRICULTURAL farmland to… Read More

Water

Author: John Gurda
Sepia-colored long shot of a Union Steamboat Company vessel in an open water body around Milwaukee Harbor. The boat is in the image's center and points to the right foreground. Two smoking chimneys stand on the back of the boat. Text beneath the image reads "Instantaneous View From Mouth of Harbor."
The history of Milwaukee is anything but dry. Water, in fact, runs through it like a river, constituting an element so critical that imagining the community without it is virtually impossible. Whether for transportation, industry, recreation, sanitation, or simply as the backdrop for daily life, water is the fluid medium in which Milwaukee evolved from… Read More

Water Policy

Author: Kathleen Foss
A painted postcard illustrates a bird's eye view of the grand building of Milwaukee's 1939 Water Purification Plant with Lake Michigan behind. The building has two wings. The central part is elaborate and features an entrance. Vehicles traverse a u-shape driveway around the entrance. Extensive green lawns appear in front of the building. Green trees span the foreground. Blue sky is above. Text at the top center reads "Water Purification Plant, Lake Park, Milwaukee, Wis."
Water policy in Milwaukee has evolved with both changes in scientific knowledge and federal law; as understanding of the ecological role of water systems and legal acknowledgement of hierarchical structures in the use of those systems has changed, so has the focus of Milwaukee’s water policy. Like other cities in the nineteenth century, whether extant… Read More

Water System

Author: Kathleen Foss
Sepia-colored long shot of the North Point Water Works building facing slightly to the left. The building's facade and side are visible in the distance. A series of arched structures compose the facade and side. A lofty structure stands next to it. The North Point Water Tower sits atop the hill on the right, in the far background. A winding road appears in the foreground. Text beneath the image reads "Water Works."
Cities supply water for domestic, industrial, and agricultural uses in response to concerns about quality and quantity. Milwaukee first implemented water supply for both domestic and industrial reasons; since then, quality and quantity demands have alternately dominated changes in the water system’s infrastructure. Water in Milwaukee was available from a private vendor as early as… Read More

Water Transportation

Author: Cody Schreck
Sepia-colored long shot of a tugboat pulling a sailing ship in Lake Michigan to the left. Text beneath the image reads "Instantaneous View From Mouth of Harbor."
Native Americans, as the first inhabitants of the Greater Milwaukee area, were the first to use the lakes, rivers, and streams that dominate the landscape as a means of transportation. In Milwaukee in particular, they used the three connecting rivers and lakeshore as major thoroughfares for canoe travel and harvesting water-based food. Native peoples of… Read More

Watermills

Author: Michael Gonzales
Grayscale long shot of a watermill, bridge, and waterfall in the distance. Plants and trees' branches covered with snow appear in the foreground.
Watermills, structures that rely upon water power to drive mechanical processes, were common features in 19th century Wisconsin settler communities. The earliest of these mills were often sawmills. In addition to processing wood for export, sawmills produced lumber for local use, allowing more ambitious structures to rise alongside the early log cabins. In 1834, Dr.… Read More

Waukesha County

Authors: Pilar Melero and Cody Schreck
Aerial view of a portion of Waukesha County showcasing its extensive farmland and green landscape. A road stretches from the right background to the left foreground. Several houses sit on either side of the street. The blue sky is above.
Beginning in the 1600s, France, Virginia, New York, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Indiana, Michigan, Ohio, and Illinois all claimed portions of what is now Waukesha County. Not until 1818, when the Michigan Legislature organized Brown County, did one of the most prosperous counties in Wisconsin begin to take shape. In 1834, it became part of the newly-formed… Read More

Waukesha County Technical College

Author: Joseph B. Walzer
A student at Waukesha County Technical College works at a small drafting table in this photograph from 1950.
Waukesha County Technical College (WCTC) is a vocational training and general education school headquartered in Pewaukee. It is part of the Wisconsin Technical College System. WCTC emerged out of the vocational education movement of the 1910s. In 1911, Wisconsin passed pioneering legislation requiring fourteen and fifteen-year-olds to attend school at least part-time (a stipulation extended… Read More

Waukesha Freeman

Author: Brian Mueller
A clipping showing the Waukesha Freeman Masthead. The newspaper's title is in the top center written in large font size. The published date, September 16, 1880, is in the center beneath the title. The edition's volume and number are visible. Text below includes writings about Waukesha County's history and an obituary.
During its more than 155 years in print, the Waukesha Freeman has been the principal newspaper for Waukesha County and has a long career of journalistic innovation. Founded by Martin Cullaton, the first issue of the weekly Waukesha Freeman appeared on March 29, 1859 and was published in an office above the Waukesha County Bank.… Read More

We Energies

Author: William I. Tchakirides
Elevated view of the interior of Lakeside Power Plant's turbine room in grayscale tone. A row of turbine machines appears in the center of the room, from the foreground to the background. Light emanates from the ceiling. The steel structure on the ceiling and the wall lining the left side of the room are visible. Some workers stand on the floor in the right foreground.
Headquartered in downtown Milwaukee’s PUBLIC SERVICE BUILDING, We Energies is Wisconsin’s largest electric and natural gas utility. The publicly-traded company serves eastern Wisconsin and Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. A subsidiary of parent company WEC Energy Group, We Energies’ 21st-century portfolio includes coal, natural gas, nuclear, oil, and renewable energies. The firm dates back to THE MILWAUKEE… Read More

Weather

Author: C. J. Hribal
Grayscale full-shot of someone in a winter coat shovelling the sidewalk. Snow piles appear along the sidewalk in the foreground to the background. Snows cover the street that stretches down on the far right. A bus with lights on runs on the street. The streetlights glow in the background.
Milwaukeeans love to boast about their weather almost as much as they love to complain about it. I’m reminded of an old song by John Martyn, “Bless the Weather.” It’s a love song of lament—the refrain noting that what the weather giveth, the weather taketh away: “Bless the weather that brought you to me//Curse the… Read More

Welsh

Author: Bill Reck
Grayscale long shot of North Presbyterian Church facade sitting across a street in the background. Its central tower and entrance are visible in the distance. A fence surrounds the front yard. Trees grow next to the church and on the road verge in the image's foreground. A fence can be seen in the foreground.
The Milwaukee area’s Welsh population generally left their homes in Wales in southwestern Great Britain in the mid-nineteenth century due to the paucity of available land for farming. There is evidence that many people in Wales were aware of the 1841 American preemption laws, which allowed for the purchase of 160 acres for $1.25 per… Read More

West Bend

Author: Niles Niemuth
Bird's eye view of West Bend downtown, filled with buildings separated by streets in winter. The Milwaukee River, covered by ice and snow, can be seen in the background.
The city of West Bend, the seat of Washington County, is located at the point where the Milwaukee River turns due east and flows into Ozaukee County. The area was settled by Euopean and American migrants in the 1840s and was incorporated as city in 1885. After its incorporation, West Bend transformed from a local… Read More

West Milwaukee

Author: Karen Hayward
Low-angle shot of St. Florian Parish's facade against the blue sky. Square towers flank the facade's central section. This section features two rectangular windows flanking an arched entry door. Two potted plants are set below each window. A rose window is above the entrance in the center. The red-colored door is adorned with two red-colored crosses and a fanlight atop. The same kind of door appears on each of the towers.
The Village of West Milwaukee occupies about one square mile, roughly between 38th and 56th Street and from National to Lincoln Avenue. It is surrounded by the CLEMENT J. ZABLOCKI VA MEDICAL CENTER grounds on the north, MILWAUKEE on the south and east, and West Allis to the west. Potawatomi lived in the area until… Read More

Whig Party

Author: Karalee Surface
Front page of a leaflet entitled "Democratic Whig Meeting!" Names are listed in the leaflet's bottom portion.
This political party’s influence in Milwaukee, first apparent in the late 1830s, was circumscribed because of the city’s substantial foreign-born population. German and Irish voters tended to align themselves with the Democratic Party against the Yankee-dominated Whigs, who were seen as nativists and temperance advocates. Over the course of the 1840s and 1850s, Milwaukee Whigs… Read More

Whitefish Bay

Author: Thomas H. Fehring
A painted postcard illustrates a bird's eye view of Whitefish Bay Resort and its vicinity. A building appears on the left. A crowd of people walk in a walkway in the center. A water body can be seen on the right. Text at the top left reads, "Whitefish Bay Resort, Near Milwaukee, Wis."
The Village of Whitefish Bay is located about five miles north of downtown Milwaukee on the bluffs above Lake Michigan. It is primarily residential, with a retail shopping area along Silver Spring Drive. When settlers began moving into the area in the mid-nineteenth century, the area was much different. Like other early Milwaukee settlements, it… Read More

Wiccans

Author: Jenna Jacobs
Milwaukee's pagan community members perform a Maypole dance in a gazebo during a Beltane celebration. They surround a pole while holding their own ribbon that is attached to the pole. Someone on the left wears a crown of flowers. The gazebo's ceiling and floor are visible. Trees and green lawns are seen in the background.
Wiccans, some of whom self-identify as witches, and other Pagans are a small but growing presence within the United States. Many Wiccans practice their faith individually or in small groups. Although estimates of the number of Wiccans are unreliable, a 2014 Pew Research Center survey found that roughly 0.3% of Americans identified as Wiccans or… Read More

Wild Rice

Author: Marlo Buser
A drawing illustrates several Indigenous people harvesting wild rice by canoe in a body of water. Three people sit on a canoe. One on the left holds a paddle's shaft with its tip in the water. Two on the right knock the grain into the canoe with smaller paddles. Lush and tall wild rice plants with feathery flowers on its top grows next to them. Other people harvesting in canoes are visible in the far distance.
Wild rice was and is a staple food crop for the Native American tribes of Wisconsin. Indeed, the Menominee, one of the major tribes in the Milwaukee area, were called “the Wild Rice People” by Europeans. Traditionally grown in shallows at the edges of lakes and ponds, wild rice is harvested in the fall by… Read More

Wildlife

Author: Michael Pulido
Long shot of three whitetail deer on a green lawn in Whitnall Park. Lush green trees are visible in the background.
The history of wildlife in the Milwaukee region is the story of the complex relationships between animals, humans, and the built and natural environments. The region is defined here by the four human-defined counties that encompass the Milwaukee River Basin and its three rivers, the Milwaukee, Menomonee, and Kinnickinnic. To the east is the shoreline… Read More
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