The history of Shawano, Wisconsin, takes you back in time...

to an era of logging, farming, and further back, to a history of life among the Menominee Indians. The name 'Shawano' was taken from the local Indians. Chief Sawanoh, meaning South, was the Menominee chief whose band often lived on the shores of what is now Shawano Lake. They lived off the wild rice, waterfowl, and sturgeon that were nourished by the Lake, and they hunted the abundant wildlife that lived in the forests.

The Lake was known to the Chippewa and Menominee Indians as 'Lake to the South', which in shortened form became 'Shawanah.' Thus the historical derivation of 'Shawano' comes from the first inhabitants of the land and the Lake that provided their food.

Prior to 1843 when Samuel Farnsworth came to the region with the intent of setting up lumbering operations, the land that is now Shawano County was a vast wilderness of forest containing the finest pine stands in the world, along with hemlock, maple, and cedar. In 1844, Farnsworth's men built a sawmill where the Wolf River meets Shawano Lake--on top of a beaver dam, so they say--and a crew headed by Charles Wescott transported logging equipment up the River to start operations.

Wescott became a prominent citizen of the area and built a dwelling, the historical Wescott House with a natural wood interior, which still stands today on the outskirts of Shawano in the Town of Wescott.

The Shawano area experienced slow but steady growth over the following two decades. In the late 1860's, Prussian (German) immigrants began to arrive in large numbers, drawn perhaps by the similar climate to their homeland. They began to clear the stump-filled land left behind by the loggers, and developed farming as the predominant industry of the area. Other European and Scandinavian immigrants continued to arrive over the following decades as well, as recorded in the history of census reports from that time.

Shawano was incorporated as a city in 1874. The region was established as a solid dairy farming region by the turn of the century, when most of the good farmland was settled. The dependence of the region on a dairy farming economy, of course, is how we Wisconsinites have come to be known as 'chedderheads.'

By the way, did you know that Wisconsin cheeses repeatedly take First Prize in worldwide cheese contests? Now you know the history behind the rich farmland that produces the best dairy cows and best cheese in the world (and the best fudge as well).