St. Croix County Wisconsin
History of St. Croix County Wisconsin
The French were the first white people to step foot on the land which is now St. Croix County. In 1687 Daniel Greysolon du Luth, a French explorer and adventurer, used the Brule-St. Croix waterway as a short route from Lake Superior to the Mississippi River. A year later, Father Louis Hennepin, a priest of the Order of St. Francis, was brought into the St. Croix Territory as a prisoner of the Sioux Indians. It was not, however, until 1689 that Nicolas Perrot took possession of the lands of the present Upper Mississippi, St. Croix and St. Peter Valleys in the name of France.
French rule ended in the Upper Mississippi Valley with the Treaty of Paris of 1763. With the signing of the Peace of Paris in 1783, the land east of the Mississippi became part of the United States. In 1793, Laurient Barth, Jacques Porlier, and Charles Reaume established a fur-trading station on the St. Croix River, land which is now St. Croix County. It was not until peace was fully established with the Indians that this region could be fully settled. In 1837 the Dakota or Sioux Indians ceded to the United States Government all their lands east of the Mississippi River. In the same year a treaty was made at Fort Snelling with the Chippewa or Ojibway Indians whereby they ceded to the United States all their lands east of the Mississippi to near the headwaters of the St. Croix and Chippewa Rivers.
The first settlement was made at the mouth of the Willow River in 1840 by Louis Massey and Peter Bouchea. In the spring of 1839 the steamer Palmyra opened the St. Croix River to trade and travel. The pine forests between the St. Croix River and Minnesota attracted interest in lumbering, and many lumber mills were built in this vicinity in the 1840's. By 1847 frame houses began to appear, and in 1849 Moses Perrin opened a boarding house in what is now the City of Hudson. With the establishment of the United States Land Office at Hudson in 1849, great advances were made in population. As a result the population of St. Croix County, 624 in 1850, had increased to 2,040 by 1855 and 5,388 in 1860. In 1840 the Legislature of Wisconsin created the county of St. Croix, carrying the same name as the bordering river, named from Monsieur St. Croix, an explorer who drowned at the mouth of the river late in the seventeenth century. Another account said Father Hennepin gave this region the French name St. Croix (originally Ste Croix) which means Holy Cross.
The boundaries of St. Croix County have remained constant since 1853. St. Croix County is 30 miles wide in the northern part, increasing to 33 miles in width in the central part, and then tapering down to 30 miles again at its southern extremity. It is 20 miles long and has an area of 729.45 square miles. In 1851 the County Board of Supervisors appointed Ammah Andrews to erect county buildings. This order was rescinded at a subsequent meeting, but an appropriation of $350 was made for the construction of a county jail. No further progress was made until 1856 when a contract was again made with Ammah Andrews to build a courthouse for $14,300. The total cost of the buildings, completed in 1856, was $20,045. These buildings were used with minor repairs until 1900 when a new courthouse, jail and sheriff's residence were constructed at a cost of $50,000. As demands for more space became apparent, a new jail was erected in 1963 at a cost of $325,000. Upon completion, the previous jail and sheriff's residence were dismantled and construction commenced on that location for a new county courthouse. Erection of the 1965 courthouse was completed in 1966 at a cost of $725,000.00. (Reference: St. Croix County)
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