Wisconsin 101 is proud to collaborate with Wisconsin Public Radio’s Wisconsin Life, an award-winning radio show that celebrates what makes Wisconsin unique. Every few weeks, Wisconsin Life will feature a new object from the Wisconsin 101 collection. Enjoy those radio segments below, ordered by most recent air date.
Wisconsin Life/Wisconsin 101 Broadcasts:
Essay by Kaylee Bittner, Wisconsin State Historical Society
Produced for Wisconsin Life by Heewone Lim
In the Wisconsin Historical Society collection, there’s a dark, surreal black and red banner. It’s painted with a chaotic collection of eyes and mouths seemingly calling out to the bold word above them: SMART. This banner served as a backdrop in the legendary Smart Studios in Madison beginning in the early 1980s. It’s a space that recorded iconic Wisconsin bands, like Killdozer and Die Kreuzen, and eventually rock n’ roll legends like Nirvana and Smashing Pumpkins.
Listen below to the segment from Wisconsin Public Radio’s Wisconsin Life.
Produced for Wisconsin Life by Heewone Lim
In the early 1940s, many women stepped up to the plate to become professional baseball players after most men were drafted to serve in the military in World War II. They became players in the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League.
Heewone Lim brings us the story of the players on the Racine Belles and specifically their uniform — which was a dress. It was made famous in the 1992 film, “A League of Their Own.”
Listen below to the segment from Wisconsin Public Radio’s Wisconsin Life.
Essay by David Driscoll, Wisconsin State Historical Society
Produced for Wisconsin Life by Molly Hunken
In the early 20th century, millions of Jewish people fled Russia due to persecution and poor quality of life. Some of them ended up in Wisconsin. In Sheboygan, a former synagogue with an historic stained glass window acts as a testament to the area’s once thriving Jewish community.
Listen below to the segment from Wisconsin Public Radio’s Wisconsin Life.
Essay by Bella Roberts
Produced for Wisconsin Life by Molly Hunken
On the western coast of Lake Michigan sits the city of Manitowoc, Wisconsin, a place known for its deep connection with the water. And along its shore, a lighthouse essential to the area’s maritime history stands tall, watching over the city. Molly Hunken climbs inside to take us on a tour of the Manitowoc Breakwater Lighthouse.
Listen below to the segment from Wisconsin Public Radio’s Wisconsin Life.
Essay by Keeley Flynn
Produced for Wisconsin Life by Molly Hunken
The 1970s were the height of the second wave of feminism, where women were advocating for equal rights and opportunities to men in the US. In 1971, one woman expressed her feminist views through art made out of a unique medium: bras.
Listen below to the segment from Wisconsin Public Radio’s Wisconsin Life.
Essay by Anastasia Welnetz and Trase Tracanna
Produced for Wisconsin Life by Rachael Vasquez
What would a Southeastern Wisconsinite grab on a hot summer day in the 1970s and 80s? Jolly Good soda of course! This local brand was celebrated as the cornerstone of cookouts, family reunions, and get-togethers.
Listen below to the segment from Wisconsin Public Radio’s Wisconsin Life.
Essay by Nick Ostrem
Produced for Wisconsin Life by Jane Genske
Imagine this: It’s early morning in a small Wisconsin town about a century ago. The sun hasn’t risen, but parents bustle around the kitchen. They’re making pasties.
One’s for dad, who’s preparing for a day in the mines.
Some are for the children, who are about to head to their one-room schoolhouse.
The extras are for mom, who will warm them up for dinner tonight.
Listen below to the segment from Wisconsin Public Radio’s Wisconsin Life.
Essay by Julie Hein
Produced for Wisconsin Life by Jane Genske
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 to test the bookmobile model for extending rural library services.
Listen below to the segment from Wisconsin Public Radio’s Wisconsin Life.
Essay by Sam Gee
Produced for Wisconsin Life by Jane Genske
They don’t call Wisconsin “America’s Dairyland” for nothing. The Babcock ice cream carton symbolizes both Wisconsin’s dairy farming past and its appeal as a summer destination for tourists from around the world.
Listen below to the segment from Wisconsin Public Radio’s Wisconsin Life.
Essay by Elizabeth Matelski
Produced for Wisconsin Life by Erika Janik
Practical, economical, reliable: the unlikely origins of a hundred-year-old cookbook that still graces kitchens across America.
Listen below to the segment from Wisconsin Public Radio’s Wisconsin Life.
Essay by Ben Clark
Produced for Wisconsin Life by Erika Janik
Five brothers from Hamburg, Wisconsin, built a fox-fur empire that transformed the fur industry and played a major role in the development of a canine distemper vaccine.
Listen below to the segment from Wisconsin Public Radio’s Wisconsin Life.
Essay by Joe Hermolin
Hewn from Northwoods maple, this Vulcan Corporation pin reminds us that Milwaukee was once the bowling capital of America. From Wisconsin’s lumbering heyday, to Japan’s abandoned alleys, explore history in the bowling lane.
Listen below to the segment from Wisconsin Public Radio’s Wisconsin Life.
Essay by Thomas Rademacher
Wisconsin went crazy for bicycling in the late 19th century. Hailed as “the most independent, healthful, rapid, and convenient mode of travel” in the 1890s, Wisconsinites not only rode bikes, they made them.
Listen below to the segment from Wisconsin Public Radio’s Wisconsin Life.
Essay by David Driscoll
Awarded to six Milwaukee rescue boat volunteers in 1875, this medal is a reminder of the history of risk and heroism along Wisconsin’s shores.
Listen below to the segment from Wisconsin Public Radio’s Wisconsin Life.
Essay by Maria Serrano
Produced for Wisconsin Life by Gil Halsted
On April 5, 1860, as tensions over slavery grew, Wisconsin Congressman John F. Potter was challenged to a duel by a pro-slavery colleague from Virginia. The argument led to a 31-pound, 6-foot-long folding knife and a story that made Potter famous.
Listen below to the segment from Wisconsin Public Radio’s Wisconsin Life.
Employers Mutual Audiometer
Founded in Wausau, WI, in 1911, America’s first workers compensation insurance company started using equipment like the Employers Mutual Audiometer to develop new standards of workplace safety.
Listen below to the segment on Wisconsin Public Radio’s Wisconsin Life:
Le Maire Sundial
The mid-eighteenth century equivalent of today’s GPS, this Le Maire Sundial, would have guided French officers along maritime highways.
Listen below to the segment on Wisconsin Public Radio’s Wisconsin Life:
Paramount Records 78
An old 78 record spins a tune about Port Washington’s Paramount Records, one of the leading blues music production studios of the 1920s.
Listen below to the segment on Wisconsin Public Radio’s Wisconsin Life:
Yerkes Telescope
Built in 1895, the 40-inch refracting Yerkes Telescope in Williams Bay marks one of the birthplaces of modern astrophysics.
Listen below to the segment on Wisconsin Public Radio’s Wisconsin Life:
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.
Listen below to the segment on Wisconsin Public Radio’s Wisconsin Life:
Migrant Workers' Cabin
What can this tiny migrant workers’ cabin tell us about the history of Wisconsin’s pickle industry?
Listen below to the segment on Wisconsin Public Radio’s Wisconsin Life:
The Wilson Place Door
Open the front door at Menomonie’s Wilson Place Mansion to discover a world of educational innovation and an artistic movement devoted to social responsibility and quality craftsmanship.
Listen below to the segment on Wisconsin Public Radio’s Wisconsin Life:
CCC Pillow Sham
Memories of European immigration, the Depression, and the New Deal’s Civilian Conservation Corps are woven into the fabric of this commemorative pillow sham.
Listen below to the segment on Wisconsin Public Radio’s Wisconsin Life:
Babcock Butterfat Tester
The Babcock Butterfat Tester, developed at the University of Wisconsin in 1890, transformed the US dairy industry and helped Wisconsin become the Dairy State.
Listen below to the segment on Wisconsin Public Radio’s Wisconsin Life:
Cassel Soda Bottle
Pop open a bottle from the old Cassel Soda Company and you’ll find surprising stories about Prohibition, Milwaukee’s resort towns, and urbanization in early-1900s Wisconsin.
Listen below to the segment on Wisconsin Public Radio’s Wisconsin Life:
Piano and Song Recital Poster
A tattered music recital poster sings songs of Milwaukee’s late-nineteenth century music scene, the women’s movement, and early Mexican immigration to Wisconsin.
Listen to the poster’s segment on Wisconsin Public Radio’s Wisconsin Life: