Wisconsin 101

Marathon City Brewing and the Wee Willy Basketball Team

The Marathon City Brewery sponsored local sports teams like the Wee Willy basketball team, originally known as the Catholic Youth Organization Team, which organized in 1936. Though the team temporarily disbanded during World War II, in the mid-1940s, young men from the…

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September 14, 2021

Industry / Marathon / Related Stories / Marathon County / Manufacturing & Trade / 1877-1900 / 1900-1918 / 1918-1945 / Region 4 - Center / 1945-1965 / Marathon Brewing Company "Superfine" Beer Bottle

The Marathon Brewery’s Chain of Calamities

In the early 1880s, Franz Sindermann, who was trained as a brewer in Germany, formed a brewery in Marathon, Wisconsin with his brother, August, along with a third partner, Charles Klein. The brewery got off to a good start, producing 300 barrels…

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September 14, 2021

Industry / Object Histories / Food & Cooking / Marathon / Everyday Life / Marathon County / Manufacturing & Trade / Region 4 - Center / 1945-1965 / Marathon Brewing Company "Superfine" Beer Bottle

OBJECT HISTORY: Marathon Brewing Company “Superfine” Beer bottle

The "Superfine" beer bottle is from the 1940/1950s from the Marathon City Brewing Company. Superfine was one of the many labels produced by Marathon City Brewery over eight decades from 1881 to 1966, featuring names such as Tannenbaum, Marathon Holiday, Marathon Bock,…

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August 31, 2021

Read more about the article James Duane Doty

William Cogswell’s Portrait of Doty ca. 1858. Image courtesy of the Wisconsin Historical Society.

Doty Island / Dane County / Madison / Related Stories / 1787-1848 / Politics & Government / Winnebago County / Region 4 - Center / Region 5 - Center East / Region 7 - South Center / Ojibwe Presentation Pipe

James Duane Doty

As settlers continued moving westward during the nineteenth century, the United States was a mix of states and large territories. From 1805-1837, Wisconsin was part of the Michigan territory. James Duane Doty spearheaded the movement to create partitions in the Michigan territory, …

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December 18, 2020

Sports & Games / Wausau / Art, Sport & Entertainment / Object Histories / Clothing, Apparel & Fashion / Everyday Life / Marathon County / 1918-1945 / Region 4 - Center / A Hudson's Bay Company Point Blanket Coat

OBJECT HISTORY: 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…

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September 9, 2020

Agriculture / Arpin / Related Stories / Ethnicity & Identity / 1900-1918 / Society & Religion / Wood County / Region 4 - Center / Synagogue Window

The Arpin Settlement of Jewish Farmers

Today the largest Jewish communities in Wisconsin exist in the cities with the highest populations. This, however, was not always the case. Around 1900, there were many new and budding Jewish communities across the state in places like Sheboygan, La Crosse, and Eau Claire. There were also smaller, rural communities emerging like the Arpin Settlement in Wood County.

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July 7, 2020