Highlights Archives
H.H. Bennett Photos Document the Dells
An exhibit of photographs of the magnificent Wisconsin Dells taken between 1865 and the 1980s showcases more than a century of Wisconsin Dells history on the occasion of the tourism haven's sesquicentennial celebration. The exhibit, "150 Years of Kilbourn/Wisconsin Dells Through the Lens of the Bennett Studio," comprises 48 11-by-14-inch photos selected to represent some of the community's century and a half of history. The exhibit is open to the public free of charge at the H.H. Bennett Studio & History Center through 2007.
The images were captured by Henry Hamilton Bennett, his daughter Miriam Bennett, and by Oliver Reese, the late husband of H.H. Bennett's granddaughter Jean Dyer Reese. Other family members may have taken some of the photos. The Reeses donated the studio and its voluminous collections of 19th-century Wisconsin and Midwestern scenes to the Wisconsin Historical Society in 2000.
The bustling tourism center that we know as Wisconsin Dells today began life as Kilbourn City. Though the rugged beauty of the area's distinctive rock formations along the Wisconsin River drew the attention of naturalists such as Increase Lapham even before the mid-19th century, it was only after H.H. Bennett began publishing his remarkable photos of the Wisconsin River dells nationwide in the 1860s and '70s that travelers set their sites on the area as a tourism destination.
During H.H. Bennett's remarkable career, he traveled throughout Wisconsin, capturing its rustic beauty through the lenses of his handmade cameras, as well as making forays to Milwaukee, Minneapolis and Chicago. By so doing, Bennett became one of the most prolific and highly regarded photographers of his era. But the magnificent Wisconsin Dells forever remained his favorite haunt, where he would return time and again to record its beauty over more than three decades. The photographic record he left us remains one of the 19th century's most significant photographic collections.
:: Posted August 7, 2006
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