History of Wisconsin

[ 282 pages of print,
5 photos, 4 maps, 7 other images
presented in 18 webpages ]

Bruce Mahan's Old Fort Crawford and the Frontier is a history of the fort at Prairie du Chien, but also much more than that, covering the early French exploration of the area and much of the history of Wisconsin, Iowa, Minnesota, and Illinois in the early 19c: the people of the area among which especially of course the native American tribes — Sac and Fox, Menominee, Chippewa, Sioux; the War of 1812, the Black Hawk War, the European settlement and the consequent relocation of those tribes.

[ 11 pages of print
presented in 1 webpage ]

In 1836, U. S. Army officer Albert Miller Lea, fresh from a tour of duty exploring the wilds of what is now Iowa, wrote a little book on that area, titling it Notes on the Wisconsin Territory particularly with reference to the Iowa District — and indeed his classic of American pioneer literature is almost exclusively about Iowa; but in it he includes an Appendix in which he provides a complete transcription of "An Act For establishing the Territorial Government of Wisconsin".

[ 3/7/12: 143 pages of print presented in 11 webpages ]

Squirreled away in the American History Notes section of the site, a growing amount of Wisconsin material will be making this page increasingly useful; for now, just 9 items, listed here in roughly chronological order of their subjects:

Early French Forts and Footprints of the Valley of the Upper Mississippi

The Movement of American Settlers into Wisconsin and Minnesota

The Northwestern Career of Jefferson Davis

Lieutenant Jefferson Davis (anecdotes of his early army career)

The Services of the Menominee in Black Hawk War

The Dutch Settlements of Sheboygan County

Rufus King: Soldier, Editor, and Statesman

The Journey of an Immigrant Family from The Netherlands to Milwaukee in 1854 (primary source)

Reminiscences of Arend Jan Brusse on Early Dutch Settlement in Milwaukee

The First Dutch Settlers in Milwaukee

The Founding of New Amsterdam in La Crosse County