MILWAUKEE.
Rapid Development of the Northwest.--The "West" Forty Years
Ago.--Milwaukee and its Commerce and Manufactures.--Grain
Elevators.--Harbor.--Divisions of the City.--Public
Buildings.--Northwestern National Asylum for Disabled
Soldiers.--German Population.--Influence and Results of German
Immigration.--Bank Riot in 1862.--Ancient Tumuli.--Mound
Builders.--Mounds Near Milwaukee.--Significance of Same.--Early
Traders.--Foundation of the City in 1835.--Excelling Chicago in
1870.--Population and Commerce in 1880.
There is no more astonishing fact connected with the history of our
country than the rapid settlement of the Northwest, the development of
its vast agricultural and mineral resources, and the almost magical
growth of towns and cities along the margins of its lakes and rivers. A
person who has not passed middle age can remember when the "West"
indicated Indiana and Illinois, which were reached by the emigrant after
many days of weary travel in his own rude-covered wagon, and before
starting on his journey to which he bade kindred and friends a solemn
adieu, scarcely hoping to meet them again in this world. Then the
present great trade centres of the west were mere villages, with
ambitious aspirations, it is true, but contending for a successful
future against fearful odds. A man who has reached threescore and ten
can remember when most of these towns and cities had no existence save
as Indian trading posts, and when most of the country west of the
Mississippi was as yet unexplored and regarded either as a desert waste
or a howling wilderness. Only the brave Jesuit missionaries had at that
period dared the perils of something even more dangerous than a frontier
life, and established missions throughout the Northwest, on the sites of
what are to-day thriving towns.
But the genius and daring of the Anglo-Saxon race have changed all this.
Civilization has impressed itself so deeply on our Northwestern
territory, that were it, by any unfortunate contingency, destroyed or
removed to-day, it would take longer time to obliterate its footprints
than it has required to make them.
Among the cities of the West remarkable for rapid growth, Milwaukee, on
the western bank of Lake Michigan, is especially prominent. First
settled in 1835, and not chartered as a city until 1846, she has made
such rapid strides in both population and commerce, that in 1880 her
inhabitants numbered 115,578, and in 1870 she claimed the rank of the
fourth city in the Union in marine commerce, a rank which she has since
lost, not by any backward steps on her own part, but because of the
sudden and astonishing development of other cities.
A rival of Chicago, Milwaukee shares with that city the commerce of the
lakes, and is connected by steamboats with many points on the opposite
side of Lake Michigan and with more distant ports. She is the lake
terminus of a large number of railroads which drain an agricultural
region of great extent and fertility; while her nearness to the copper
mines of Lake Superior and the inexhaustible iron mines distant but from
forty to fifty miles to the northward, contribute to make her a
manufacturing centre. A single establishment for the manufacture of
railroad iron was established, at a cost of a million of dollars. She
has other iron works, and manufactures machinery, agricultural
implements, car wheels and steam boilers, large quantities of tobacco
and cigars; furnishes the Northwest with furniture, and has extensive
pork packing establishments, while the products of her flouring mills
and lager beer breweries find markets in every quarter of the United
States, and have a reputation all their own. The rolling mill of the
North Chicago Rolling Mill Company is one of the most extensive in the
West.
As a grain depot, Milwaukee takes high rank. There are six immense
elevators within the limits of the city, with a united capacity of
3,450,000 bushels; the largest one, the grain elevator of the Milwaukee
and St. Paul Railroad, being one of the largest on the continent, and
having a storage capacity of 1,500,000 bushels. The flour mills of E.
Sanderson & Company have a daily capacity of one thousand barrels of
flour.
The harbor of Milwaukee is the best on the south or west shore of Lake
Michigan. It is formed by the mouth of the Milwaukee River, and the
largest lake boat can ascend it for two miles, to the heart of the city,
at which point the Menomonee River unites with the Milwaukee. The course
of the Milwaukee River is nearly due south, while that of the Menomonee
is nearly due west; and by these two rivers and their united stream
after their junction, the city is divided into three very nearly equal
districts, which are severally known as the East, being that portion of
the city between the Milwaukee River and Lake Michigan; the West, that
portion included between the two rivers; and the South, or the territory
south of them both. The city embraces an area of seventeen square miles,
and is laid out with the regularity characteristic of western cities.
The business quarter lies in a sort of hollow in the neighborhood of the
two rivers, whose shores are lined with wharves. The East and West
portions of the city are chiefly occupied by residences, the former
being upon a high bluff, overlooking the lake, and the latter upon a
still higher bluff west of the river.
Milwaukee is known as the "Cream City of the Lakes," this name being
derived from the cream-colored brick of which many of the buildings are
constructed. It gives to the streets a peculiarly light and cheerful
aspect. The whole architectural appearance of the city is one of
primness rather than of grandeur, which might not inappropriately
suggest for it the name of the "Quaker City of the West." The residence
streets are shaded by avenues of trees, which add to the cheerful beauty
of the town. The principal hotels and retail stores are found upon East
Water street, Wisconsin street and Second avenue, which are all three
wide and handsome thoroughfares. The United States Custom House stands
on the corner of Wisconsin and Milwaukee streets, and is the finest
public building in the city. It is of Athens stone, and contains the
Post Office and United States Courts. The County Court House is also a
striking edifice. The Opera House, used for theatrical purposes, is
worthy of mention; while the Academy of Music, which was erected in
1864, by the German Musical Society, at a cost of $65,000, has an
elegant auditorium, seating two thousand three hundred persons. The
Roman Catholic Cathedral of St. John, and the new Baptist Church, are
fine church edifices, but the finest which the city contains is the
Immanual Presbyterian Church. A Free Public Library possesses a
collection of fourteen thousand volumes, and a well-supplied reading
room. Several banking houses have imposing buildings. The most prominent
among the educational institutions of the city is the Milwaukee Female
College, which was finished in 1873. There are three Orphan Asylums, a
Home for the Friendless, and two Hospitals. One of the chief points of
interest to the visitor is the Northwestern National Asylum for disabled
soldiers, which furnishes excellent accommodation for from seven hundred
to eight hundred inmates. It is an immense brick edifice, located three
miles from the city, in the midst of grounds four hundred and
twenty-five acres in extent, more than half of which is under
cultivation, and the remainder laid out as a park. The institution has a
reading room, and a library of two thousand five hundred volumes, for
the use and benefit of its patriot guests.
No one who visits Milwaukee can fail to be struck with the semi-foreign
appearance of the city. Breweries are multiplied throughout its streets,
lager beer saloons abound, beer gardens, with their flowers and music
and cleanly arbor-shaded tables, attract the tired and thirsty in
various quarters. German music halls, gasthausen, and restaurants are
found everywhere, and German signs are manifest over many doors. One
hears German spoken upon the streets quite as often as English, and
Teuton influence upon the political and social life of the city is
everywhere seen and felt. Germans constitute nearly one-half the entire
population of Milwaukee, and have impressed their character upon the
people and the city itself in other ways than socially. Steady-going
plodders, with their love for music and flowers, they have yet no keen
taste for display, and every time choose the substantial rather than the
ornamental. Milwaukee is a sort of rendezvous for the Scandinavian
emigrants, who are pouring in like a mighty tide to fill up the States
of Wisconsin and Minnesota. Danes and Swedes, and especially Norwegians,
stop here, and it may be, linger for a longer or shorter period, before
they strike out into the, to them, unknown country which is to be their
future home. Domestic service is largely supplied by the Norwegians, who
prove themselves honest, industrious and capable.
This mighty influx of the Germanic and Scandinavian races into our
Northwest is certain to produce a permanent impression upon the social
condition of those States. Yet our system of government is adapted to
the successful management of such immigration. It cannot, perhaps, do so
much with the immigrants themselves. Many of them intelligent, but more
of them ignorant and stupid, they remain foreign in their habits and
ideas to the end of their lives. But it makes citizens of their sons,
trains them up with an understanding of democratic institutions, gives
them an education, for the most part, forces them to acquire our
language, and instead of making them a separate class, recognizes them
as an undivided part of the whole population. In brief, it Americanizes
them, and though habits and traits of character and race still cling to
them in some degree, their original nationality is soon lost in the
great cosmopolitan tide of civilized humanity which swells and surges
around them. Different races intermarry and blend, and form a composite
of personnel and character which is fast becoming individualized and
recognized as the type of the true American. After a few generations but
little remains save the patronymic to remind the descendants of these
immigrants of their original descent.
Wherever the German race has settled it has taken substantial prosperity
with it. The members of that race have proved themselves honest,
industrious, and preeminently loyal. To the "Dutch" St. Louis owed her
own modified loyalty during the late civil war. The German element of
Cincinnati also turned the tide of popular sentiment in favor of the
North, and secured for that city, during war times, an immunity from
disturbance, and a prosperity unexampled during her previous history.
They bring with them not only thrift, but an appreciation for the
refining arts which is not found in any other class of immigrants. The
German quarter of a city may nearly always be discovered by the
abundance of flowers in windows and balconies, and growing thriftily in
secluded courts. The German better appreciates his beer when sipped in
the midst of natural beauties, and to the sound of music. To this
music-loving characteristic of her German population Milwaukee owes her
finest music hall, the Academy of Music already described. They are not
quick of thought, but even their stolidity, when it is offset and
modified by the almost supernatural sharpness and quickness of wit of
other nationalities which also look to America as a refuge from
oppression, produces a useful counter-balance, and the offspring of the
two will be apt to possess stability of character with intellectual
alertness. The Germans have their faults, undoubtedly, but they are less
obnoxious than those of some other classes of immigrants, and when
modified often become virtues.
Milwaukee, since her existence as a city, has had a comparatively
uneventful history. She has not been ravaged by flood, like Cincinnati,
nor by fire, like Chicago, nor by pestilence, like Memphis, nor by
famine, like many cities in the old world. She has moved on in the even
tenor of her way, increasing her commerce and adding to her industries,
perfecting her school system and enlarging her own domain. The only
disturbance which is recorded against her in the chronicles of her
existence, occurred in June, 1862, when there was a riot, in consequence
of the rejection, by the bankers of Milwaukee, of the notes of most of
the banks of the State. The banks of Wisconsin being governed, at that
time, by a free banking law, modeled, in a great measure, after that of
New York, had purchased largely the bonds of different Southern States,
and deposited them with the State Comptroller as a security for their
issues, the bonds of said States usually being lower than those of the
Northern States. When the Southern States withdrew from the Union there
was, in consequence, a rapid reduction of the value of these securities,
and an equally rapid depreciation of the value of the bank notes based
upon them. Their issues were finally curtailed, occasioning severe loss
and great bitterness of feeling on the part of those who held them. The
riot consequent on this state of affairs resulted in a considerable
destruction of property, though no lives were lost. It was finally
quelled by the State authorities.
Of the original inhabitants of Wisconsin, we have no knowledge whatever.
The only traces they have left of their existence are numerous ancient
mounds or tumuli, which are scattered at various points all over the
State. Their antiquity is attested by the fact that trees of four
hundred years' growth are found standing upon them. Discoveries in the
Lake Superior copper regions, of mines which had once been worked, over
which trees of a like age were growing, seem to indicate that the same
people raised the mounds and worked the mines. In all probability their
antiquity extends further backward than this. The Indians, improperly
called the aborigines, have no traditions concerning the construction of
these mounds, which are evidently none of their handiwork, but belong to
a race which has been supplanted and disappeared from the globe. The
similarity of these mounds to those discovered in Central America leads
to the conclusion that they were both the work of one and the same race;
but whether they were constructed as tombs or as places for altars,
there is a division of opinion. Those in Central America were evidently
once surmounted by temples or places of worship and sacrifice.
These mounds vary in size, shape and height. At Prairie du Chien one of
the largest of these tumuli was leveled to furnish a site for Fort
Crawford. It was circular in form, having a base of some two hundred
feet, and was twenty feet high. The circular form is the most common in
those mounds, although there are many different shapes. Some appear like
wells, inclosing an open space; others like breastworks with angles;
still others have a space through them, as if they formed a sort of
gateway. On the dividing ridge between the Mississippi and Wisconsin
rivers mounds are found in the form of birds with their wings and tails
spread; of deer, rabbits and other animals. One even bears a marked
resemblance to an elephant. There are also a few mounds representing a
man lying on his face. They are three or four feet high at the highest
points, rounding over the sides.
One of the most singular characteristics of these mounds is that they
seem invariably to be composed of earth brought from a greater or less
distance. The surface of the surrounding ground usually comes up to the
base of the mound in a smooth level, when it does not already possess a
natural elevation; but there is no evidence of the ground anywhere in
the neighborhood having been disturbed to furnish the earth for their
construction. In some instances the soil of these tumuli is of an
actually different character, the like of which has not been discovered
within several miles of the mounds.
These antiquities constitute the only mementos and annals transmitted to
us, of the mysterious race which once peopled our western territory, and
extended as far east as the shores of the Ohio, as far north as the
great lakes, and westward and southward to Central America. It seems a
pity that no systematic effort has been made to perpetuate them, if not
for the benefit of future generations whose interest and curiosity
should be excited at beholding them, at least out of a consideration for
the unknown race whose work they are, and as enduring monuments to whose
numbers and industry they have remained up to the present time, when all
else has perished. The plow, the hoe and the spade, those iconoclastic
weapons of civilization, are fast effacing them from the surface of the
country. When the plow once breaks the sod which has covered them and
preserved their form, the wind and rain each lend speedy assistance to
the work of destruction, and but a few years will elapse before most of
them will have disappeared altogether, and the places which have known
them for untold centuries will know them no more forever.
It is a fact worthy of mention that these mounds have most frequently
been found on sites selected for modern towns and cities, as though
ancients and moderns alike had instinctively chosen for their abiding
places those localities most favored by nature for the uses of man.
Numerous earthworks about Milwaukee attest the favor in which the
locality of that city was held by this pre-historic race. These works
extend from Kinnickinnic Creek, near the "Indian Fields," where they are
most abundant, to a point six miles above the city. They occupy high
grounds near but not in immediate proximity to the lake and streams, and
are most varied in their form, while many are of large extent. They are
chiefly from one hundred to four hundred feet in diameter, and represent
turtles, lizards, birds, the otter and buffalo, while a number have the
form of a war club. Occasionally, a mound is elevated so as to overlook
or command many others, as though it was a sort of high or superior
altar for the observance of religious or sacrificial rites. Milwaukee is
to be commended for her failure to manifest that spirit of modern
vandalism which, in other sections, has sacrificed the relics of a
by-gone age and people to the fancied utility of civilization. The
Forest Home Cemetery incloses a number of these mounds, and so they are
preserved for the benefit of the antiquary and curiosity seeker. We
trust she will continue to cherish sacredly these few monuments left as
the sole legacy of the ancient inhabitants of the West.
The early Indian name of the river upon which the city of Milwaukee now
stands was Mellcoki. So says one tradition. Another gives the name as
Man-a-wau-kee, from the name of a valuable medicinal root known as
Man-wau; hence, the land or place of the Man-wau. Still another gives
the Indian name as Me-ne-wau-kee---a rich or beautiful land. The Indians
had a village on the site of the present city. The Milwaukee tribe were
troublesome and difficult to manage. About the first trader who ventured
to establish a post among them was Alexander Laframboise, who came from
Mackinaw and located on the spot previous to or about 1785. This trading
post, having been mismanaged, was discontinued about 1800, and another
soon took its place. A succession of trading posts and fur stations
followed, until about 1818, when Solomon Juneau, a Frenchman,
established himself there permanently, with a little colony of
half-breeds, who built themselves log cabins on the banks of the stream,
two miles from the lake, near the junction of the Menomonee. Below them,
on the river flats, where now extend the business streets of the city,
the low marshy ground was overgrown by tall reeds and rushes, while away
back from the river stretched the boundless prairie. The place was
known, thenceforth, as Juneau's Settlement. This settlement gradually
attracted, first, other traders, and finally immigrants. In 1825 it was
still nothing more than a trading station, but ten years later it had
become a settlement and called itself a town, taking the name of
Milwaukee, from the river upon which it was built.
Chicago had already begun her marvelous growth, and was at that very
time extending herself to extraordinary dimensions--on paper. The little
town of Milwaukee had then no thought of rivalry, but was content to
plod along for eleven years more before it received its city charter. By
1850 its growth had been remarkable, and it numbered more than twenty
thousand inhabitants. In 1860 it had more than doubled this population,
recording over forty-five thousand inhabitants, and in 1870 it had
almost doubled again, the census reporting more than seventy-one
thousand persons for that year. In the same year Milwaukee received
18,466,167 bushels of wheat, actually exceeding Chicago by about a
million of bushels. The shipments of wheat the same year were 16,027,780
bushels, and of flour 1,225,340 barrels. Her exports for that year also
included butter, hops, lumber, wool and shingles, of all which
commodities she shipped immense quantities. From 1870 to 1880 the
increase of population and commerce was equally astonishing, while her
manufactures had grown in like proportion.
The vast lumber regions to the northwest help to build up her business;
new towns which spring up throughout the State become tributary to her;
and the farms which are multiplying in that fertile region send a share
of their products to find a gateway through her to the eastern markets
and to Europe. She divides with Chicago the trade which, by means of the
great lakes and the great railway trunk lines, is busy going to and fro
in the land, from east to west and from west to east. When the Northern
Pacific Railway furnishes a continuous route of travel and freight
between Lake Superior and the Northern Pacific States, the business of
Milwaukee will be naturally augmented. But her future prosperity depends
largely upon the prosperity of the agricultural population which
surrounds her, which fills her elevators and warehouses, and furnishes
freight for her boats with its products, and has need of her
manufactures in return. And thus we see illustrated the fundamental
principle of political economy, that that which concerns one must
concern all; that one class or section of people cannot suffer without
affecting in some degree all classes and sections. All are
interdependent, and all must stand or fall together.