WISCONSIN

Settlement of Wisconsin dates back to the early Stone Age, but for our purposes, we date to the first explorer.  Wisconsin was explored in 1634 by French Explorer, Jean Nicolet, who made his arrival on the Green Bay Shore.  in 1673, Louis Jolliet and Father Jacque Marquette explored the upper Mississippi River Valley.  and a settlement was established at Green Bay.  The English took control of this area after the French and Indian War but the area was regained as part of the Northwest Territory in 1783 and Britain gained control.  After the Revolutionary War, in 1763, The United States gained control of Wisconsin as part of the great Northwest Territory.  

Europeans came to the area in search of furs. With the discovery of  huge outcroppings of lead in 1822, settlement began in earnest.  Miners were so eager to stake out a claim that they dug shelters into the sides of the hills as protection from the winter and thus the nickname "badgers" came about.  The Blackhawk Indians declared war in resistance to the settlement of their territory and fought fiercely to protect their lands.  This war ended in 1832.

Wisconsin was established as a territory in 1836.  Twelve years later, on 29 May 1848, it became the 30th state of the union.  In 1854, when citizens were faced with the possibility of being declared a slave state, a new political party was organized at Ripon and became known as the Republican Party.  

Wisconsin gained its reputation as the Dairyland of the nation back in the 1870s when the lead mines finally played out.  Wheat farming was attempted, but soon devastated the fragile topsoil of the area.  As an alternative crop, a newspaperman named William Demster Hoard recommended growing clover and grass, which was better suited to the area and that cows be raised for dairy farming.  Wisconsin thrived on the results and European cheese makers moved to settle in Wisconsin.  Wisconsin also produces more snap beans and sweet corn than those of any other state as well as a third of the nations cranberries.  

Anyone seeking information on people who were known to have worked for the circus would do well to check the Wisconsin records.  Baraboo, Wisconsin, has long been the training field of the nations clowns and has perhaps one of the few official clown schools in existence.  You will also want to check the cities of the great lakes as points of entry for your emigrant ancestors as many later arrivals came in through the great canals and by steamer across these Great Lakes before embarking to points west and south into the farmlands.

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