Babcock Butterfat Tester
The Babcock butterfat test, developed at the University of Wisconsin, provided a simple, accurate, and inexpensive way to assess milk quality and to pay farmers accordingly. By improving standards and rewarding the best milk producers, the Babcock butterfat test transformed the dairy industry in the United States and set Wisconsin firmly on the path to…
James D. Williams’ Windlass
This is a machine used to lower and raise miners and materials through mine shafts in the lead mining region around Platteville, Wisconsin. Made from wooden supports with a wooden barrel shaft and crank attached to a rope with a bucket, a windlass like this is deceptively simple. Cheap to build and easy to…
Yerkes Telescope
The 40-inch refracting telescope at Yerkes Observatory in Williams Bay, Wisconsin, contains the world’s largest refracting lenses. Built in 1895, the telescope contains two lenses, one made of crown glass, and one made of flint glass. The lenses are each 40 inches in diameter, weigh 500 pounds, and have a 62-foot focal length. The telescope and observatory…
Cherryland T-Shirt
In 1927, Marilyn Färdig’s grandparents, Andrew and Esther Färdig, purchased twenty acres of land in Ephraim, Image courtesy of the Wisconsin Historical Society. Image ID: 79142. Wisconsin, and started a cherry orchard. With the help of their seven children and workers from a variety of locations, including the southern United States, Mexico, and Jamaica, Andrew…
Fromm Fox Fur Coat
This coat was made from the fur of foxes raised on the Fromm Fur Farm in Hamburg, Wisconsin. The jacket is covered in light-silver fox fur and lined with a taupe fabric. Straps allow the coat to also be worn as a cape. In the early decades of the 20th century, it was fashionable to use…
Migrant Worker’s Cabin
This cabin, once occupied by a family of migrant workers employed by the Bond Pickle Company, is located at the property of Thomas and Jamie Sobush of Pensaukee, Wisconsin. The cabin was originally one of many other small cabins, clustered together at the Bond Village Migrant Camp on Van Hecke Avenue in Oconto, Wisconsin. The…
Vulcan Bowling Pin
This bowling pin was produced by the Vulcan Corporation in Antigo, Wisconsin, sometime in the late 1950s after Vulcan had introduced its patented “Nyl-Tuf Supreme” plastic coating (as indicated by the pin’s red label). The pin complies with American Bowling Congress (ABC) standards, and is currently owned by the Langlade County Historical Society. The Vulcan…
A Dam Tower in the Kickapoo Valley Reserve
The concrete obelisk stands near the Kickapoo River and is located a mile north of the village of La Farge. It rises nearly a hundred feet above the river valley floor. The tower was constructed more than forty years ago as part of a federal flood control project. Today, it stands as a visual reminder…
A Duck Decoy
This is a fake duck. With its painted black bill, brown head, and white and black body, it is likely obvious to humans that this object is made out of wood. This object is called a duck decoy, and was intended to fool other ducks into settling into the water near where the decoy floats.…
The Hefty-Blum White Barn
Barns are a defining feature of the Wisconsin landscape, and hold a special place in the history of Wisconsin. Among the many barns that contributed to Wisconsin’s place as a major dairy producing state is a Swiss barn that was built in 1878 in Green County. This barn, the Hefty-Blum White Barn, was used to…
Penguin Server
A penguin-themed serving bowl dishes out stories about the aluminum industry, postwar consumer culture, and home entertainment in mid-twentieth century Wisconsin.
Mepps Fishing Lure
The classic Mepps fishing lure the Aglia, was invented in France in the 1930s and patented in 1938. (Mepps is a French acronym for Manufacturier d’ Engins de Precision pour Peches Sportives, translated as “Manufacture of Precision Equipment for Sport Fishing”.) It was introduced to northern Wisconsin, and to the U.S., by a G.I. returning from France.…
Paramount Records 78
Created by the management of the Wisconsin Chair Company, a furniture making business based in Port Washington, Wisconsin, Paramount Records was initially incorporated to help sell phonographic cabinets in the late 1910s. Relying on resourceful talent recruiters and a relatively cheap production process, Paramount Records became one of the leading blues music record producers in the 1920s, and is today recognized by…
A Twenty-sided Die
Dice are used in games around the world to generate a random number. Traditionally the die is cubical; however there are multiple forms of non-cubicle die, such as, the 20-sided die. Ancient die were typically made from bones, wood, or rock. Today, die of all shapes are usually made from resin. The 20-sided die can…
Sterling Safety Bicycle
What did a bicycle rider in 1890 look for in a new bike? Safety and comfort, of course, but also beautiful construction—many of the same qualities that contemporary bicycle riders also seek. Sterling Bicycle advertisement featuring Annie Oakley on the safety bicycle, 1890s. The bicycle pictured here was donated to the Wisconsin Historical Museum, where it…
Wilson Place Door
The Wilson Place Mansion front door was crafted at the turn of the twentieth century, likely by a well-known Arts and Crafts Movement blacksmith named Thomas F. Googerty. Wilson Place Mansion was the home of James Huff Stout, a lumber baron, longtime state senator, and philanthropist. Area tradition has it that the door was fashioned to honor Stout,…
Piano and Song Recital Poster
Mr. Raphael Baez, a well-respected violinist, pianist, composer, and music professor, and his wife Mrs. Mary Schoen Baez, a noted vocalist, had performed together in various music halls in the city of Milwaukee since 1889. The Athenaeum, home of the Women’s Club of Wisconsin, had hosted Mr. Baez and his students throughout the late nineteenth and early twentieth…
CCC Pillow Sham
Created in 1933, this commemorative pillow sham was just one of a number of textiles created by second-generation Hungarian immigrant Rose Mary Drab to honor her brother Edward’s service in the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC). Rose Mary appliquéd the black cotton sateen sham with a small cotton tent, a blue eagle and two small stars, and hills, pine…
Employers Mutual Audiometer
This Maico Audiometer was one of many devices used by health and safety consultants of the Employers Mutual Liability Insurance Company of Wisconsin throughout the mid-to-late 1960s. Employers Mutual was the very first workers compensation insurance company in the United States. The company was founded in Wausau, Wisconsin, in 1911 shortly after the nation’s first workers compensation law was…
A Hudson’s Bay Company Point Blanket Coat
This wool coat was constructed from a ‘point blanket’ made by the Hudson’s Bay Company, likely during the early 1920s. A Wausau businessman wore it at one of the town’s early Winter Frolics, an annual winter sports festival that attracted tourists from as far as Chicago. The businessman belonged to a group of local business…
Door County Bookmobile
The Door County Bookmobile was the rural public library. In 1950 when the Door-Kewaunee Regional Library Demonstration first brought bookmobiles to the Door Peninsula, nearly 23% of Wisconsinites did not have access to a free library. With many remote towns and islands, a low overall population, poor transportation, and low literacy rates, the Door Peninsula offered an opportunity…
Settlement Cook Book
The first edition of The Settlement Cook Book was published on April 1, 1901 with an original printing of 1,000 copies. Copies not distributed to the settlement’s cooking school students were sold at the Boston Store in Milwaukee for 50 cents each and sold out within the first year. Kander made notes on the recipe for Mocha…
Hmong Baby Carrier and Baby Sash
We have two related posts about baby carriers and the history of the Hmong community in Wisconsin. Enjoy!
Horlick’s Malted Milk
Invented in 1873 by British food manufacturer William Horlick, malted milk is made from wheat and malted barley extract mixed with reduced, dry whole milk.
Cassel Soda Bottle
This soda bottle was sold by the Cassel Soda Company in Whitefish Bay, Wisconsin, in the early 1900s. Conrad Cassel owned and managed the company from 1897-1917. The company, along with other Wisconsin soda companies during that time, made carbonated water, a beverage that would gain special significance during Prohibition. The Cassel Soda Company sold its soda to Whitefish…
Draft Drum
The hollow metal cylinder sits on the rusted, triangular metal base. A latch and a small hinged door are open, exposing a small square hole where the names of potential draftees could be placed. A thin metal crank protrudes from the center of the cylinder ready to be turned at any moment. This is a…
Old Abe, the Live War Eagle
A bald eagle stands guard over the State Assembly Chamber in Wisconsin’s Capitol building. Between two and three feet tall, the raptor has the characteristic white head and tail feathers, a brown body, and a yellow beak and talons. He sits atop a tree stump in front of a large mural called Wisconsin that represents the state’s…
Cupping Kit
Cupping therapy is a medical treatment in which local suction is created on the skin in an effort to increase blood flow to promote healing or restore humoral health balance. It was practiced as early as the Hippocratics and persisted in high medical popularity until the late nineteenth century. This particular kit belonged to Dr. James T. Reeve a physician…
Le Maire Sundial
The Le Maire Sundial is a rare example of a mid-18th century French sundial (cadran solaire) compass (boussole). It was found near Green Bay in 1902 by a local antiquities collector, Frank Duchateau. The sundial is broken, missing its glass compass cover as well as the back of its gnomon holder. Located on the front surface,…
The SS Meteor
The SS Meteor was launched as the SS Frank Rockefeller in Superior, Wisconsin by the American Steel Barge Company in 1896. The last remaining of only 44 “whaleback” ships ever built, she was designed by a Scottish immigrant named Alexander McDougall. She is 380 feet long, 45 feet wide and 26 feet deep. You may notice that the SS Meteor looks somewhat different…
Lifesaving Medal
All along Wisconsin’s 820 miles of Great Lakes shoreline, storms could mean the difference between profit and financial ruin, survival and terrifying death. This lifesaving medal reminds us of the risks that sailors and Wisconsin’s maritime communities have routinely faced since the early 19th century, and it documents the personal bravery, dedication, and ingenuity of those who would rescue their fellows…
Galena
Galena, the official state mineral of Wisconsin, is the raw material used to produce lead. During the Wisconsin “lead rush” of the 1820s-40s, lead was more valuable than gold. That is because just about everybody, rich or poor, used objects made of lead in their daily lives – products that ranged from plumbing to toothpaste!…
Nash Car
By the beginning of the twentieth century, horses and wagons were quickly giving way to new horseless carriages, or automobiles—and the landscape of Wisconsin’s towns and roadways began to change as well. Wagon shops, once part of one of the largest industries in Wisconsin, began making automobile parts instead. By 1925, motor vehicle manufacture had…
Vacuum
People in the early 20th century witnessed the invention of all kinds of household tools we take for granted today, such as the vacuum cleaner, laundry machine, and refrigerator. This is a manual vacuum cleaner from 1911 at the Wisconsin Historical Museum. This small upright vacuum was designed to be operated by hand and easy…
Aztalan Fishing Weir
Fishing can take a lot of patience. A person could sit with their fishing pole for hours before they get a bite! Fishing weirs are time-saving technologies built in the water to trap fish. This fishing weir was created by the people who lived in the Early Mississippian settlement, Aztalan, sometime between the 10th and…
Babcock Ice Cream Carton
Ice cream has been a delicacy for hundreds of years, but in the last century, Wisconsin has come to be considered home to some of the world’s best ice cream. Babcock Hall, established in 1951, has contributed to this reputation, establishing ice cream as a symbol both of Wisconsin’s dairy farming past and its appeal…
Fiddle
As the lumber industry flourished in Wisconsin beginning in the 1840s, immigrants from all over Europe and Canada came to live and work in the Northwoods of Wisconsin. All winter, men called lumberjacks would cut down pine trees, preparing the timber to be used as building material, or sometimes to be turned into pulp or…
Trade Blanket
This blanket, ordinary though it may seem, tells the story of an important meeting of cultures that occurred in Wisconsin between 1634 and 1763. Not long after the explorer Jean Nicolet first set foot in Wisconsin, French traders saw an opportunity to make money by sending beaver furs back to Europe for use in stylish…
Pasty
The lead mining industry of the 1830s and 1840s brought miners from Cornwall, England to southwestern Wisconsin. The miners brought Cornish traditions like the pasty, a filling food for hungry miners. The availability of pasties today demonstrates the lasting traditions of early European immigrants in Wisconsin. Pasties are folded pastries filled with meat and vegetables.…
The Hefty-Blum White Barn
Barns are a defining feature of the Wisconsin landscape, and hold a special place in the history of Wisconsin. Among the many barns that contributed to Wisconsin’s place as a major dairy producing state is a Swiss barn that was built in 1878 in Green County. This barn, the Hefty-Blum White Barn, was used to…