loganville meeting

A Summary of the

2001 Southwestern Regional Convention of the

Wisconsin Council for Local History

What is the Wisconsin Council for Local History? The mission of the WCLH is to promote communication and cooperation among local history groups. The WCLH is affiliated with State Historical Society of Wisconsin. In 1961, the board of curators of the SHSW authorized the establishment of the WCLH. Any local history group can become a member of the Council by becoming an affiliate of the SHSW. There are more than 300 local history groups. The state society offers organizational and educational assistance to local affiliates. The local organizations, in turn, share the mission and responsibility of preserving Wisconsin’s heritage—photos, documents, buildings, etc.

The Council holds regional & statewide conventions. The Southwestern Regional convention this year was in Loganville and was hosted by the Historical Society, which was formed to preserve the school.

The Amish use the Friendship Rural School in exchange for doing maintenance/repairs. The Amish presentation given by Daniel Hershberger was interesting and his answers to the group’s many questions were very informative. The following are highlights from this presentation:

Why are the Amish here? The availability of farm land and sales of older farming equipment in this part of the country is attractive to the Amish. They can use fuel-powered generators, but are not directly hooked up to electrical power lines. They cannot use a tractor as a tractor—but they can use it as a source of power. They know how to take proper care of their horses, since their livelihood depends on their horses. They can't own a car and use horses when they can for transportation, but are willing to ride with somebody else. Their teachers are one of the Amish. The Amish’s education is through the 8^th grade and consists of the basics—reading, writing and arithmetic. They can continue to self-educate through books they buy or borrow from the library system.

There was a showing of the film "Loganville in 1907", with believable props and a lighthearted narration by a "kid" of what it was like to live in the town. This well-made film can be gotten through an interlibrary loan.

Check out the Wisconsin State Historical Society’s website. http://www.shsw.wisc.edu/localhistory/index.html. There’s lots of info available if you do some exploring. Examples are: (1) Listing of historical societies in Wisconsin, with contact person listed for each; (2) names/phone # of Council reps for each district in the State; (3) possible materials contained in antiques that can be harmful to your health.

We received free copies of "Restoring the Vision—The First Century of Wisconsin's Capitol", soft-cover book, 90-pages, color printed on high quality paper.

Many interesting individuals were there, over 60 people in attendance. Between presentations there were opportunities to mingle and share conversations. I met a woman who's grandmother gave birth in a cave shortly after arriving in this area, a man with two ancestors that arrived on the Mayflower, and another woman, a former curator at the Sauk Co. Historical Society Museum had a very interesting experience with a civil war cannonball. These people are great resources.