Changes We Made As Time Moved On
Withee Township, Clark Co., Wis.
Thorp, Wisconsin
"I came across an addition of the Thorp Courier dated June 3,
1993 that is titled "History of Thorp's First 100 Years". There is a lot of
information in here but I thought I would post some trivia for those
interested." Enjoy, Kathy
- St. Bernard's Church was constructed
in 1885
- The first train ran through Thorp in
on Nov. 23, 1880.
- Tom Mosher owned the first hardware
store.
- St. Hedwig's church was built in
1903. The land was donated by 2 Polish land
agents from Milwaukee.
- James Seneca Boardman moved from
Minnesota to a log cabin in the present
town of Withee, then known as Hixon, in 1870.
- In 1871, D.R. Goodwin and Geo. W.
Richards moved into the present town of
Withee and Michael McCaffrey built the first farm house within the limits of
the present town of Thorp.
- In 1873, Mabel Boardman, the first
white child born within the Thorp borders.
She died at age 7 from a diptheria outbreak.
- In 1874, a log schoolhouse was built
and Mrs. Almeda Edmunds taught there.
That same year the Post Office of Winnieoka was established at B.J. Brown's
farm and he was the postmaster.
- In 1875, E.A. Boardman stocked a
small amount of goods and provisions at his
log cabin, hauling them in from Colby which was 27 miles away and soon
became Thorp's first merchant.
- In 1876 the township of Thorp was
established. April 4th, a town meeting was
held at the schoolhouse and the twon officers were elected: E.A.
Boardman-chairman; C.D. Richards and S.S. Warner-supervisors; J.S.
Boardman-treasurer; Geo W. Courter-clerk; and Chris Nelson-assessor.
- Thorp's namesake was Joseph G. Thorp
Sr, an Eau Claire lumber baron. Mr.
Thorp died in 1895 in Cambridge, Mass.. His wife died in 1893.
- In 1881, J.H. Sargent built the
Forest Queen Hotel and opened it in the fall.
- Thorp consisted of 2 general stores
which were Boardman and Garrison
Brothers, one saloon owned by Peter Schroeder and Mitch DuCate, two hotels
owned by Sargent and J.S. Boardman, a blacksmith shop ran by Herman
Holzhausen, a schoolhouse, the railroad station and five homes.
- The First Baptist church was
organized in 1882. It was finished and
dedicated in 1886. The Union Sabbath school was also organized and C.F.Stone as superintendent. The Methodist Episcopal Church also evolved around
this time and was completed in 1887.
- May 10, 1883, the first areas
newspaper, The Pioneer, was published by W.A.
McIntyre. It was sold by November, publication suspended, and on Nov. 23,
1883 the first issue of The Courier came out.
- Thorp was incorporated as a village
on May 26, 1893. Thorp's population then
was 837.
- The Thorp Telephone company was
organized in 1904 by Myron Lund, James Connor
and C.F. Rainey.
- The first Polish settlers, the
Gruzynski, Ignatz, Wojtkiewica and Barney
Maslowski families came to Thorp around 1900.
- Six doctors served Thorp in its first
fifty years. They were Dr. Seldon, Dr.
McMutcheon, Dr. Riapel, Dr. Jackey, Dr. Kulig and Dr. Neis.
Other Changes
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