APPLETON POST CRESCENT

Friday, February 17, 1950

 

99 Years Ago Today, Waupaca Was Organized.

First County Seat Temporarily Was at Mukwa 1851-1853

 

WAUPACA – Waupaca County is observing its ninety-ninth birthday today.

 

            It was on February 17, 1851, that the county and town of Waupaca were organized by a legislative act and the county seat was temporarily established at Mukwa.

            During that year the first meeting of the new board was held at the house of H. Ralph, in the village of Mukwa.  At the meeting the members voted a $5.00 bounty for each wolf killed in the county and voted to divide the county into eight road districts.

            A year later the Indian title to the lands in Waupaca County was removed and the final surrender made to the whites June 1, 1852.  On the east side of the Wolf River, the whites had come into possession of the land several years previously.  The government survey on the east side of the Wolf River was made by Theodore Conkey in 1848.

            Previous to the government surveys the settlers had begun to come to the Indian lands, as that part of the county was then called.  Claims were being staked out and tents and log cabins of the squatters were appearing on both sides of the river.

            During the early organization of the county the territory included 21 townships, each six miles square, and 20 organized towns.

            A report from the superintendent of schools for the year ending August 31,1 857, indicated that there were 165 students attending the four schools for 3 months out of the year and that the average wage for the women teachers was $6.00 a month.  The whole valuation of the school houses amounted to $350.00.

            On March 5, 1852, the first division of the county was made.  Township 21, in ranges 11 and 12, was called Lind, the first town set off in the county.  During the same meeting Weyauwega, Mukwa, Waupaca, Centerville, now Little Wolf, and Embarrass townships were also named.

            The first general election was made in 1851 when 147 people went to the polls at Mukwa or Weyauwega and elected County Treasurer Simon Dow, Register of Deeds James Smiley, Coroner John Boyd, Clerk of Supervisors James Smiley and County Surveyor Ira Sumner.

            While the county was in process of getting settled the biggest issue before the people and the county was the question of where the county seat would be finally located.  The first county seat was at Mukwa, but two years later the board passed a resolution naming Waupaca as the seat and moving the offices of elected officers there.

            After an election in 1853 the county seat was moved from Mukwa to Weyauwega and then back to Waupaca in 1861.

            In those primitive times it was quite the fashion at lawsuits in justice courts for the parties in the suit to set jugs of whiskey on the table for the use of the court, jury and witnesses, and the man who furnished the best liquor and the biggest jug generally won his case.

            The village of Waupaca was incorporated in 1857 and the city of Waupaca in 1875 when there were 9 general stores, 5 grocery stores, 1 merchant tailor, 3 harness shops, 3 barber shops, 4 hotels, 3 livery stables, 3 pump shops, 3 farm machinery warehouses, 4 shoe shops, 6 blacksmith shops, 1 starch factory, 2 temperance saloons, 6 saloons, 2 banks, 7 churches, and 4 millinery stores.