The 19th-century logging industry reshaped the landscape of central and northern Wisconsin, provided a livelihood for thousands of workers, and formed the roots of today's thriving paper industry. By the late nineteenth century, Wisconsin was one of the premier lumber producing states in the U.S., and from 1890 to 1910 forest products led Wisconsin's developing industrial economy.
Despite its obvious potential, logging was only a minor activity for the first white settlers, who actually brought lumber with them from the East at great expense. Throughout most of the 1830s, logging was carried out on a small scale around Prairie du... more...
| The development of the lumber industry in Western Wisconsin |
|
| More than 100 articles on logging and the lumber industry |
|
| Recollections of logging the Chippewa Valley, 1844-1916. |
|
| An 1886 visit to the Menominee community of Keshena |
|
| A Made-to-Order Farm to lure settlers northward, 1921 |
|
| Recollections of Old Superior |
|
| Lumberjack tales of Paul Bunyan |
|
| Peshtigo's priest recalls surviving the fire |
|
| Community-building in the northern forest in the 1880s. |
|
| A lumberjack recalls an 1898 forest fire |
|
| A rafting trip down the Wisconsin River in 1868 |
|
| Rafting lumber down the Wisconsin River in 1849 |
|
| Peshtigo residents look back, 50 years after the Great Fire |
|
| A lumberjack describes living conditions in lumber camps in the 1850s |
| A mid-1800s birchbark maple sugar container |
| The wild animals of Paul Bunyan's Northwoods |
|
| Wisconsin's earliest forest conservation plea, 1867 |
|
| Proceedings of the Forest History Association of Wisconsin (1996-2006) |
|
| A guide to the Great Lakes lumber industry, 1886 |
|
| Proceedings of the Forest History Association of Wisconsin (1986-1995) |
|
| The marvelous exploits of Paul Bunyan |
|
| Report on the Menominee at Termination, 1958 |
|
| Memoirs of an Interpreter among the Ojibwe, 1840-1900 |
|
| Folklore and folktales collected by Charles E. Brown |
|
| A Guide to CCC Camps in Wisconsin, 1937 |
|
| Descriptions of Wisconsin disasters and catastrophes, 1848-1948 |
|
| The history and traditions of the Chippewa Valley |
|
| Stockbridge and Munsee Testimony, 1892 |
|
| Proceedings of the Forest History Association of Wisconsin (1976-1985) |
|
| An 1875 history of the Chippewa Valley |
| Pictures of the cutover lands in northern Wisconsin |
|
| An advertisement tries to attract settlers to the cutover region. |
|
| Increase Lapham examining a meteorite, ca. 1868 |
|
| Prairie du Chien merchant and judge James H. Lockwood, 1856. |
|
| Life in the logging camps, as shown in historic photographs. |
| The lumber company makes its case against Deitz, 1906 |
|
| John Deitz makes his case, 1906 |
| "The Island of Happy Days" in Cedar Lake |
|
| Lumber riches fund a Menomonie theater |
|
| A model community takes shape in the cutover |
|
| Paine Lumber Company in Oshkosh |
|
| Four-star accommodations in 19th century Sheboygan County |
|
| Forest Lodge in Namekagon |
