I like Wisconsin, and as far as I know, I’ve never been there. But something seems appealing to me about that state. Maybe it is all the cheese. Maybe it is the fact that various Native American tribes first inhabited the area known as Wisconsin. Oh, wait. That was all of America until the White man took it all away.
But there in Wisconsin, for a while, the Chippewa, Menominee, Oneida, Potawatomi, and Ho-Chunk (Winnebago) tribes lived in the area until the late 1800s. I don’t know much about the different tribes, but I especially like the Potawatomi because I like to say it out loud.
Anyway, the first European explorer to reach Wisconsin was Jean Nicolet. Now. This dude needed a map. Because he was there in Wisconsin searching for the Northwest Passage to China. Of course, the maps back then were all crazy-go-nuts. But Jean Nicolet arrived in the Wisconsin region in 1634. Some years later, good old France said Wisconsin was theirs and claimed it as part of its territory in the New World in 1672.
Eventually, more people from overseas came on boats and found Wisconsin. About nine-tenths of Wisconsin’s population is of northern European origin. Germans are the most numerous. Then it goes Irish, Polish, Scandinavian (primarily Norwegian), and British.
But it was the Swiss who started the whole cheese thing. Swiss immigrants opened a farmstead cheese factory in New Glarus (a small community in southwest Wisconsin) in 1846. They brought cows in from Ohio for their excellent milk to make the cheese. And back then, all that cheese was manufactured by the women on the farm. No wonder it was so good.
Here’s another thing I like about Wisconsin. Throughout the 1850s, Wisconsin was a leader in the abolition of slavery. Slaves passed through the Underground Railroad on their way to Canada. I bet the residents fed their guests from the South cheese while staying there.
But I’m writing all of this because I root for the University of Wisconsin whenever they play anything. Yet. I’ve always thought the whole “badger” nickname didn’t quite fit Wisconsin.
It turns out that Wisconsin is known as the Badger State, not because of the animal. It was because Wisconsin was huge back in the early 1800s in lead mining. And. The area’s lead miners used to spend winters in tunnels burrowed into hills. Like badgers. Hence the nickname.
Lead brought thousands of miners into Wisconsin in the 1820s and 1830s. And little did I know, but the lead industry was the biggest foundation for the state’s 19th-century settlement and growth.
The Indians there were pushed out due to the strong demand for lead. That lead went into making pewter, pipes, weights, paint, and ammunition, and on.
Lead mining peaked in Wisconsin in the 1840s. Then by 1844, a third of the region’s residents left for copper and iron mines elsewhere.
These days, the largest lead mines are located in Australia.
And, even though the state is named for the badger-like lead miners, some actual badgers are living in Wisconsin. However, most badgers spend their time in the Great Plains region.
So, just a little Wisconsin knowledge to smarten your day.
And in honor of everything Wisconsin — which cheese is the smartest?
Cheese Whiz, of course.
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“Poets have been mysteriously silent on the subject of cheese.”
― G.K. Chesterton, Alarms and Discursions
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“What happens to the hole when the cheese is gone?”
― Bertolt Brecht
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“The early bird gets the worm, but the second mouse gets the cheese.”
― Willie Nelson
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The badgers? Lead diggers. That’s all.
