NEWSLETTER: MAY 2009
Previous
issues of the newsletter are posted on our website at
http://my.core.com/~riponhistsoc.
Website and Newsletter Editor: Jean Woolley,
riponhistsoc@yahoo.com
Memories of a 1952 Newcomer to Ripon, Part 1 By
Mary Brandt
Imagine two New Yorkers, a librarian and an occupational
therapist, fresh from working in the City and living in a 7th floor
apartment on Manhattan’s East 20th Street. They are driving from
Fond du Lac to Ripon on March 7, 1952, in their
first car. With their combined salaries of under $6,000, a car had not been
affordable or needed in the City. Fares on frequent buses and subways, both
day and night, were only 5 and 10 cents. A recent major snow storm has left
snow piled so high on the shoulders of Highway 23 that only the upper parts of
barns and silos are visible. The flat prairie land is new to these two from a
state of hills and mountains. The husband is coming to be the Director of Lane
Library at Ripon College. The couple are in their early 30s and childless.
Fifty-six years later, as the widow of the Librarian and
mother of three daughters born and raised in Ripon, I am still living in
Ripon. Following Jean Woolley’s lead in the
September 2008 Newsletter, I offer my Ripon memories with some then and now
comparisons.
The car we drove to Ripon was a 1952 Ford sedan. It cost
well under $1,000. The Ford Focus I am now driving was bought new in 2000 for
$15,806.
As we entered Ripon, we saw twin spires rising above all
else in the distance: First Congregational Church and Grace Lutheran Church,
located side by side on Ransom Street. Ripon is no longer the City of Twin
Spires. The Grace Lutheran Church building was torn down in 1984, though the
church continues today on Griswold Street.
Our instructions were to go first to meet Dr. Clark
Kuebler, Ripon College President, in his East Hall
office. To our surprise, East Hall proved to be immediately south of the two
churches with spires. We had to climb a steep flight of stairs to get to Dr.
Kuebler’s office on the second floor. After a
brief welcome he gave us keys and sent us off to our ground floor faculty
apartment at 517 Lincoln Street, one of two buildings adjacent to each other
on Lincoln and Oak Streets, which the College no longer owns. Our moving van
had beat us and had already unloaded our
possessions into a smaller apartment than the one we had just left. A new
neighbor commented, “You have wall-to-wall furniture.” Wanting a telephone
immediately, we went the next day to the local independent North-West
Telephone Company. What a surprise it was to find that dial phones had not yet
come to Ripon and only party lines were available. Ripon’s three-digit numbers
started with Black, Red, Blue, and Green. Our number was Black 145 and would
remain so until 1962 when we were given dial phones and new seven-digit
numbers. I still have that number.
Our first year here 488 students were enrolled at Ripon
College. In September 2008 the enrollment was 1059. Many of the younger
faculty and their families were carless. Several
instructors and professors supplemented meager salaries that summer in the
Green Giant cannery’s pea and/or corn pack. They drove tractors and worked on
the production line--dirty, strenuous work with long hours—to complete
processing the day’s harvest.
Some, including my Bill, were World War II veterans. Eager
for more living space, Bill and I got a $9,000 GI loan for 15 years at 4% and
bought our first home at 709 Thorne Street. The house plus land cost $12,000.
Water, but no sewer or curb and gutter, reached our house, which is now owned
by Elizabeth Olson and Kent Gallaway. The sidewalk
ended at 611 Thorne Street, now owned by Brian and Mary Kay Smith. On the
college-owned land between these two houses were three World War II Army
barracks called “Siberia” for male veterans who were students. Within a year
or two the buildings were removed and the students moved into dorms. The
College built the tennis courts, which are still on the land. Before we moved
in 1967 they began flooding the area now occupied by Kemper Hall for winter
skating. Directly across the street from us were two old houses. The College
property on that side of the street ended, I believe, just west of where
Bovay Hall is today. The nearest dorm was Scott
Hall at the top of the hill. Below it was an athletic field. Privately owned
farms occupied the land west of Union Street where the College now has
athletic fields, the Storzer Physical Education
Center, Rodman Center for the Arts, the Physical Plant, the College
President’s home, and the Ceresco Prairie Conservancy.
As a railroad fan all my life, I close with this vivid
memory. The Chicago and Northwestern Railroad had a station on Blackburn
Street where Condon Total Comfort is now located.
Chicago
& Northwestern Train #10, June 15, 1954
The first year I lived here I took a one or two car train
to Fond du Lac. In Fond du
Lac I changed to a train with both coach and Pullman cars. It took me through
Milwaukee and on to Chicago in time to have lunch with a friend and do some
shopping before returning on a late afternoon train. I had supper in the diner
before reaching Fond du Lac and changing to the
little train to Ripon. I was home before bedtime. I will have more to say
about Ripon transportation in Part 3 of my story.
Steve
Barg Outlines History of TIF Districts in Ripon
By Bill Woolley
Steve
Barg, Ripon’s City Administrator, provided an
overview of the use of Tax Incremental Financing (TIF) in Ripon over the past
twenty years at our Society’s monthly meeting on March 19th. The
TIF program, which allows the city to finance new development with money
expected to be repaid by increased revenues resulting from that development,
has been a remarkable success in Ripon. To date, the city has developed
projects in eight TIF districts resulting in an increase in property value of
over $40,000,000. Barg then discussed the
developments in each of the TIF districts while answering a number of
questions along the way.
Society
Shows Historical Films of Ripon By Bill Woolley
Our Society’s program at its April 16th meeting consisted of two
films focused on Ripon’s past. The first was a film by a commercial filmmaker
at the end of the 1930s and was focused chiefly on Ripon businesses and
business associations and the people working in them. Schools and school
children as well as some clubs were also in the film. Long-time Ripon
residents in the capacity crowd had a good time naming many of the citizens
featured in the film. The second feature was a promotional film made to
support the 1969 fund raising campaign for Ripon Memorial Hospital, which
provided a lot of information about the history of our hospital.
Wanted:
Your Stories About Life in Ripon By Bill
Woolley
We hope you enjoyed Mary Brandt’s recollections of her first years in Ripon
featured in this Newsletter. The Society is trying to collect materials about
Ripon in the twentieth century and is particularly interested in stories about
everyday life in our city. For a variety of reasons, we have very little
material about life in Ripon since the Second World War, so we are especially
hoping to gather stories dealing with school experiences, neighborhood and
family life, various businesses, social organizations and churches, and
anything else about life in Ripon after about 1945. Since readers of this
Newsletter have indicated that they enjoy these stories, we will try to print
as many as we can with, of course, the permission of the authors. If you have
photographs associated with your story they will be particularly appreciated.
We will scan them and then return the unharmed originals to you.
Historical
Society to Participate in “Hay Days” By Bill Woolley
The Society has been invited to participate in this year’s “Hay Days”
celebration being held at Cedar Ridge Ranch on the week end of June 19th
to 21st. Billed as one of the largest living history encampments in
Wisconsin, Hay Days celebrates Wisconsin’s frontier history of the 19th
century with reenactors, exhibits, games, and a
barn dance. The Society’s exhibit will be a recreation of a general store of
the 19th century using artifacts from the store in the Lawson house
as well as costumes and games from our collections.
Society
Gardens to be Part of Garden Walk By Bill Woolley
The Society’s gardens are to be part of Ripon’s Garden Walk this year being
held from 4:00 in the afternoon until 8:00 in the evening on Saturday, July 11th.
The Garden Walk in Ripon is an annual affair which features six gardens.
Refreshments will be served at each of the gardens, including ours. The
Society’s gardens are special because they are historical, featuring flowers
that would have been in household gardens in the early part of the 20th
Century. As an added attraction, the Society will also open the Lawson House
for visits during the Garden Walk.
May
Program to feature Rush Lake Stone Age Artifacts By
John Steinbring
May is Archeology month in Wisconsin and the Society is recognizing this fact
with a special program on our Rush Lake Native American artifacts at the May
meeting on Thursday, May 21st, at the Pickard House, 508 Watson
Street, at 7:00 P.M. The speaker will be Jack Steinbring
who, in collaboration with Frank Farvour, worked
for years in the Rush Lake area locating and organizing the collection that we
now hold. The collection contains over 7500 stone artifacts, which were
classified and catalogued by Frank Farvour and
Karin Hanisch, who completed the project alone
after Frank’s death. Karin has created a computer database, which the Society
hopes to eventually make available online.
The great density of prehistoric remains at Rush Lake has been known since
1846. In that year James G. Pickett wrote to Increase
Lapham stating that “nowhere in the state has a greater harvest of
aboriginal implements of stone and copper been obtained, and certainly no site
could have been better chosen for the location of an aboriginal village.”
Through the years this density has been fully confirmed by many collectors and
archeologists from several institutions, including Ripon College, the
University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh, and the Oshkosh Public Museum. At the meeting
an illustrated review of this richness and the scientific significance of the
findings will be presented. Exhibits from the largest collections made at Rush
Lake will be available to view. All of the archaeological sites around Rush
Lake are on private land and are not open to the public without the owner’s
permission.
Society
to Hold “Summer Sundays” Again By Bill Woolley
Our Society plans to continue its program of “Summer Sundays” this summer with
the Society being open on the fourth Sunday
of each month in June, July, and August from 2:00 P.M. to 4:00 P.M. In
addition, we plan to have special programs related to our collections at each
of these Summer Sundays. On June 28th we will feature the Lawson
House, which is rarely open to the public. On July 26th we will
feature the barn with all of its agricultural artifacts, which is, again,
rarely open to the public. On August 23rd we will feature the
archives, with emphasis on how you can use the archives to find the history of
your family, home, club, church, or business. Summer Sundays were designed
especially for individuals and families who would like an opportunity for an
extended and personalized tour of our facilities and collections without the
crowds that attend our regular open houses. They are open to any visitor and
could also be an excellent way to introduce out-of-town guests to what is
special about our community.
Audrey
Wesner to be Society’s Garden Coordinator
By Bill Woolley
Audrey Wesner, assisted by Sue
Loomer, has agreed to be our Garden Coordinator
this year. The Society has always been proud of its extensive gardens, which
reflect home gardens of the early 20th Century. The gardens are
maintained by a corps of volunteers: Barbara Birmingham, Lyn
Herriot, Lisa Vossekuil,
Bets and Emma Olson, Don Amsden, Barbara Scott,
Katie Wild, Sue Loomer, and Audrey
Wesner. Each gardener is responsible for a small
plot. New gardeners are always welcome.
Audrey
and Sue take a break and enjoy the spring flowers