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Landscape
Illuminating the ways of life before and after electricty
arrived in St. Croix County, Wisconsin
By Carol Johnson
with living history contributions by Bill Hoffman,
Wayne Willink & Miles Wittig
Lighting the Landscape:
Illuminating the ways of life before and after electricty arrived in St. Croix County, Wisconsin
By Carol Johnson
with living history contributions by Bill Hoffman, Wayne Willink & Miles Wittig
In 2012, St. Croix Electric Cooperative (SCEC) celebrated its 75th Anniversary. There are few members
who remember a life before the convenience of flipping a switch to light up a room. It’s a luxury taken for
granted and, rarely, does anyone stop to think about what has to happen – all of the behind-the-scenes
activities – to ensure a reliable electrical connection. Power outages, however, seem to be that jolt of reality
that breeds a bit of appreciation for what is momentarily lost.
Bringing electricity to rural America was one of the most important events in the history of the
United States. It makes one wonder if not for President Roosevelt and his New Deal, how many more years
would it have taken to electrify the rural area. Electricity made it possible for farmers to live happier, healthier
and more productive lives.
The staff at SCEC works hard to provide electricity and service members can depend on. The history
behind today’s Cooperative is rich with stories of the struggle to bring electricity to the rural areas of St.
Croix County in a time of economic and political turmoil.
Printed at the St. Croix Electric Cooperative Office, 2012
Editor: Dana Bolwerk, Communications & Events Coordinator
Contributors .................................................................1
Rural Life ... In the Dark ..............................................2
Brief History of Electricity ...........................................5
Delco-Light Farm Electric Plant .................................5
Electricity on the Farm Becomes a Reality..................6
Electricity - A Life-Chaniging Technology ..................8
St. Croix County History ............................................10
Growing up on the Farm/Going to School.................11
Early Politics .............................................................12
i. A Political Timeline....................................... 12-13
Illness in St. Croix County .........................................13
Then & Now ...............................................................14
References ..................................................................15
A special thank you to Mary Sather of the Heritage
Center in New Richmond (Wisconsin) and the staff
at the Clear Lake Museum for their assistance in this
project.
There are three individuals who were willing to contribute
to this historical piece. They not only witnessed a time of
transformation, but their families were instrumental in bringing
rural electrification into reality, allowing farmers to modernize
their farms and ease their work load.
Miles Wittig, Wayne Willink and Bill Hoffman varied in
age (10 to 15 years old) when the rural electrification project
came to their farms and they each have unique stories to share
about that time. The impact rural electrification made on them
and their families was also meaningful enough for all three to
assume roles on the St. Croix Electric Cooperative Board of
Directors.
waste too much energy. We need to build smarter buildings
and practice conservation of energy.”
Willink also feels that before alternative sources of energy
will be practical on the large scale, we have to change the way
we generate electricity. He does, however, think it is important
for individuals to install wind, solar and methane to help with
our energy future.
“We definitely need to clean up the pollutants from the
fuels we have used,” he said.
Bill Hoffman
Bill Hoffman’s family was one of the few families in the area
that had a Delco-Light Farm Electric Plant installed in 1917. It
worked well for the family, but when Wisconsin Hydro Electric
came along in 1918, his father decided to hook up with them.
While attending a social event, his father learned that he was
paying more for electricity than some of his neighbors. When
he called to ask the company about it, the representative was
rude, so – not one to be pushed around – Hoffman’s father
went to the basement, restarted the Delco-Light system, and
called Wisconsin Hydro Electric and told them to come pick up
their equipment – he no longer wanted to purchase electricity
from them.
By 1941, when Hoffman was 15, his family had an
opportunity to connect to the REA line, which they chose to
do. They were challenged, however, by the Wisconsin Hydro
Electric company, as they had left one of their poles in the
barn yard. The company claimed that the pole rotting on the
Hoffman farm staked the property as their territory and they
could not legally purchase power from any other utility but
them. Hoffman’s father contacted David Rodli (Bill Rutzen was
general manager at this time) the St. Croix Electric Cooperative
manager, who called Wisconsin Power Cooperative (WPC).
WPC had the resources to help their member cooperatives
with these types of legal battles. Wisconsin Hydro Electric
eventually lost the battle and was instructed to remove their
pole from the Hoffman property. The Hoffman family farm
was customer number 250 to connect to the REA lines.
The Hoffman farm in rural Glenwood City is currently
farmed by David Hoffman, Bill and Mable Hoffman’s son.
They are proud to have been certified in 2001 with the State
of Wisconsin as a Century Farm – a farm that remains in
operation by the same family for at least 100 years.
Hoffman served 33 years on the SCEC board, as did
his father. He is proud to have been part of the cooperative
movement. All four of Bill and Mabel’s sons, are active electric
cooperative members, and their granddaughter’s husband,
Derrick Oberle, currently serves District 8 as a Director on the
SCEC Board. District 8 is the same district that Hoffman and
his father served. Both Bill and Mabel are supportive of clean
energy sources like solar and wind.
The experiences of Wittig, Willink and Hoffman, and
their families at the time electricity came to the rural areas of
St. Croix County differed, but their pride in family and the
roles their families played in helping the electric cooperative
movement to be a success are very similar.
Miles Wittig
Miles Wittig was about 10 years old when his family farm was
hooked up to the Rural Electric Administration (REA) lines –
number 492, which was part of the second (“B”) phase of the
project. He remembers staying home “sick” from school that
day, recalling he was most likely so excited about how electricity
would make life on the farm easier for him and his family.
Wittig wasn’t fond of milking their 10 to 15 cows by hand and
recalls telling his father they needed a milking machine. He was
happy to report that it didn’t take very long after the power was
turned on that his father purchased the vacuum equipment and
a milking machine. Having that milking machine was a huge
improvement on their farm.
Wittig and his wife, Audrey, live on the family farmstead
in Somerset, where the pole for the original REA meter was
connected is still used for a yard light. They live in a modern
house, but the barn that was home to his family’s livestock
remains. This was the second barn on the homestead as the
first one was struck by lightning when Wittig was an infant.
The barn burned to the ground, killing his father’s work horses,
a crisis his father never got over.
Wittig served 7 ½ years on the SCEC Board of Directors
(Dec. 1990 to April 1998). He remains active in his community
as a Plan Commission member for Somerset Township.
In looking toward our energy future, he isn’t quite sold on
alternative sources of energy but both Miles and Audrey say
all options must be considered for the future.
Wayne Willink
Wayne Willink was 13 years old when his family farm was
hooked up to electricity in July 1939 – number 129.
The farm where Willink was raised is still in operation, but
he and his wife, Phyllis, live east of there, near Baldwin.
Willink served 21 years on the SCEC board from 1972
to 1993. He also served on the Dairyland Power Cooperative
Board for 17 years (1976-93), and was president for 10
years. He received the Cooperative Builder Award from the
Wisconsin Federation of Cooperatives in 1991 and also served
as a member of the St. Croix County Board for 14 years. He
remains active in his church, Gethsemane Lutheran, ELCA,
in Baldwin, which was also his parents’ church. When asked
about how he sees our energy future, Willink stressed that we
“have to get our act together to conserve and reuse more. We
1
Until the nylon bristle tooth brush was created in 1938, hog
hair was used for toothbrush bristles. Animal fat was rendered
(cut into small pieces) and boiled down to use in making lye
soap. The lye came from wood ashes. Mixing wood ashes with
the melted animal fat created a soap that was especially useful
in laundering clothes.
Animal bones were boiled to extract the marrow for use
in broths, soups and stews. All animals were a possible source
of meat, especially if their production fell off. Some farmers
even raised honey bees and the honey was used in the Saturday
baking of breads, cakes and cookies.
Farm families not only provided food for those who lived
in towns and cities, they needed to provide enough food to get
their own families through the entire year. A vegetable garden
was necessary on every farm in order to provide enough
produce for the summer months, as well as enough to preserve
by canning or drying to get the family through the long winter
months.
One of the main chores of the farm wife and children in
the 1930s was caring for the chickens and gathering the eggs to
sell in town at the local grocery store – likely on Thursday (also
known as grocery shopping day). The eggs would be used to
barter for other groceries the family might need, like flour for
bread to be made on baking day.
Before electricity, ice boxes were used to keep food cool.
The ice box had shelves for food, a compartment for an ice
block, and a pan to catch the drippings from the ice block as it
melted. If it wasn’t too hot outside, the ice block was expected
to last a week. Ice was cut from frozen lakes in the winter and
stored in ice houses for sale in the summer months. When a
family needed more ice, they would place a sign in their window
or at the road for the ice man to see and he would drop off ice
when in the area. Without refrigeration spoiled food was a real
danger.
Milk and milk products (butter, cream, buttermilk, & ice
cream) were delivered to front porches of customers in towns
and cities by milkmen, first using horse-drawn wagons and
later using trucks. In the early 1940s, milk was picked up and
delivered to the creamery or dairy plant by a milk hauler.
The first milk truck for the Farmers Cooperative Creamery
in Clear Lake was a Model “A” Ford. The farmers would get
the milk out to the road if their driveway was not passable. The
hauler would then return the empty cans back to the farmer for
the next milking. He might also deliver wood, groceries, or any
other items farm families might need from town, making the
multiple trips more worthwhile.
Farming has always been a difficult way of life. At the peak of
the Great Depression, droughts and dust storms raged across
the country and winters were brutal. But, in rural America,
there were no days off for inclement weather.
Wayne Willink recalled daylight savings time did not exist in those
days, so everyone started working at sunrise. In summer months,
when school was out of session, he would wake up at the first light
and head to the barn to help his father milk their 20 to 25 cows,
usually by hand. They did have a gas generator they would hook
up to one or two milking machines, but they had trouble with the
belts slipping so, eventually, they’d end up milking the cows by hand,
anyway.
Eggs were valued at 29 cents per dozen. Wittig said his family
purchased Leg Horn chicks, the most popular chicken of that time,
at the hatchery in Star Prairie. They kept the chicks warm in an
incubator that was heated with a kerosene lamp. In their prime,
their hens produced about eight to 12 dozen eggs per week, which
was worth $2.50 to $3.50 in groceries.
In order to make sure an egg was good, Wittig recalls his
mother holding the egg in front of the light of a kerosene lamp
(candling). If any spots were seen, then the egg was not good and
could not be sold at market. She had to be careful to make sure
the eggs being delivered were good because the grocery owners in
Stillwater or New Richmond, which were the closest towns for
shopping, would also candle the eggs and would not pay her for any
bad eggs. She needed to make sure she was being paid fairly.
In the Barn
Milking was the main chore on the family farm, having to be
done twice a day: in the morning and late afternoon/early
evening. Without electricity, the cows usually had to be milked
by hand into pails by the light of a kerosene lamp. The full pails
were then carried to the cream separator, which was usually
hand-cranked to separate the cream from the milk. The cream
would be poured into the larger cream cans and carried to the
wagon or truck for delivery to the nearest creamery (i.e. New
Richmond).
Another job on the farm that was not particularly popular
was cleaning the barn after the milking. The manure from the
cows would accumulate in the gutter behind the cows. When
the milking was done, the gutters had to be cleaned by hand
with a shovel. Once the soiled straw was removed from the
gutters, fresh straw would be put back and the barn would be
back to feeling and smelling fresh. As is true today, the manure
was used to fertilize gardens and crop fields.
Chores All Week
During the school year,
children’s daily chores
involved
cleaning
the
kerosene lamps, stockingg
the wood box, and haulingg
water from the well that was
Waste Not
The family farm commonly consisted of cows for milk, butter,
cream & ice cream, as well as meat; chicken for eggs and meat;
hogs for meat; and sheep for wool and meat. Nothing was
wasted on the family farm.
Cream Separator
2
day before. The modern-day iron got its name from that heavy
slab of iron. Any clothes that showed wear and tear were put
in a pile for the Wednesday mending.
Cooking and keeping the house warm in winters involved
cook stoves and space heaters that required a source of fuel –
mostly wood, but some people used coal.
In 1940, the Inter-State Lumber Company in New
Richmond advertised “Coal Facts”, which boasted of the
benefits of coal as a fuel:
pumped from the ground to the surface by a windmill. If the
wind wasn’t blowing that day, they had to pump the well by
hand or, if they were lucky, turn on a back-up generator. It
was critical to have a steady supply of fresh water for both
humans and animals. Many children would have to chase the
cows out of the barn so they could drink from the water tanks
near the well. As much as possible, farmers tried to use a
generator to run the cream separator and the well pump – two
jobs that were very physically demanding. However, even with
machinery to pump the water, it still had to be hauled to the
house, especially on Monday and Saturday – laundry and bath
days, respectively.
Laundry was also a major chore. A large tub of water
had to be heated over a wood or coal fire, usually outdoors;
if rainwater was available, it would be used. First the whites
would be washed using a cake of lye soap. A broom stick, or
similar type pole, was used to agitate the clothes. When the
whites were deemed clean, the lightly-soiled colored clothes
would be washed, followed by the more heavily soiled clothes.
Clothes with more stubborn stains were rubbed against a wash
board.
The sun was the only clothes dryer for the rural housewife
(i.e. the clothes line). If the day was rainy, the clothes were
hung around the house to dry. There was no fabric softener so
the clothes would be stiff and wrinkled, requiring that some be
ironed.
To get the clothes ready for ironing, they were sprinkled
with water, rolled into a ball, and then placed into a basket for
the Tuesday ironing. A slab of iron would be placed on the
wood or coal fired stove until it was hot. Then it would be used
to press the wrinkles from the clothes that were washed the
“Some early Indian tribes prized coal more highly than precious
ores. Modern science respects coal, too. It gives natural heat, free
from shocking “quick changes” that sometimes result in colds and
even graver illnesses. For natural, steady, dependable heat in any
kind of weather, burn coal”.
COAL
Both Wittig and Willink remembered using space heaters that
used both wood and coal.
“Coal was the old standby – it was cheap and we had a lot
of it,” Willink said.
Coal would be delivered to local towns by
train and Wittig said his father would take a
trailer to Stillwater to get coal for heating their
home.
KEROSENE LAMPS
Wittig remembers an evening when his mother
was not home. He and his father went to the
barn to do the chores and forgot to turn the
kerosene lamp out. The lamp overheated, went
out on its own, and smoked the house up.
“It was a big mess,” he said.
All in a Day’s Work
Grandmother, on a winter’s day, milked the cows, and fed
them hay, slopped the hogs, saddled the mule, and got the
children off to school; did a washing, mopped the floors,
washed the windows, and did some chores; cooked a dish of
home-dried fruit, pressed her husband’s Sunday suit, swept
the parlor, made the bed, baked a dozen loaves of bread,
split some firewood, and lugged in enough to fill the kitchen
bin; cleaned the lamps and put in oil, stewed some apples she
thought would spoil; churned the butter, baked a cake, then
exclaimed, “For heaven’s sake, the calves have got out of the
pen!” – and went out and chased them in again; gathered
the eggs and locked the stable, back to the house and set the
table, cooked a supper that was delicious and, afterward,
washed all the dishes; fed the cat and sprinkled the clothes,
mended a basketful of hose; then opened the organ and began
to play, “When you come to the end of a perfect day.”
Coal continues to be an abundant and cheap source of
fuel. It is no longer burned in individual homes, but is used as
fuel in some electric generation plants.
Families in the 1930s and 1940s tended to be large, living
in large houses that were difficult to heat. Insulation in homes
consisted of old newspapers or sawdust. To conserve heat in
the winter months, sections of the house would be closed off
so the heat could be focused into the main rooms. In summer,
heat would be the issue. Animals would suffer and die if they
had no access to cool water. People would shade the windows
of the house in the day and open windows at night to try to
keep the house cool. During long spans of hot weather, typical
of the drought in the 1930s, it would become impossible to
cool the house. A dip in the favorite water hole provided relief,
if it wasn’t dried up. The Dust Bowl of the 1930s severely
impacted 27 states – mostly southern and Midwestern states;
Wisconsin was spared the worst of those impacts.
Writing from Clear Lake Centennial 1875 – 1975, pg. 121
3
RURAL LIFE (continued)
Community
In the fall, the focus turned to the harvest. The long hours of
harvesting crops was made easier with the help of neighboring
farmers. Farmers always helped each other, especially at harvest
time. No one was done with the harvest until everyone’s crops
were out of the field, at which time the successful harvest was
cause for celebration.
Square dances, folk music, good food and laughter with
friends and neighbors was a reward everyone looked forward
to after the hard work of harvesting was done. Those who
knew how to play a banjo, guitar, or a handmade instrument
entertained the crowd. Grant Haium’s Pitchfork Orchestra
was a father/daughter professional entertainment team from
rural Wisconsin. Haium played an instrument made from a
pitchfork, broom wire, and a violin bow, while his daughter
played guitar. (Clear Lake Centennial 1875 – 1975, page 202).
It’s exhausting just thinking of a typical day on the family
farm in the 1930s and 1940s. But people also knew how to
relax and have fun. When the day was done, it was time to
settle in with the family. The children might finish homework
for school the next day; their mother might work on mending
clothes, needlepoint, or any other handiwork that needed to be
done; and their father might catch up on reading – all of which
were by the light of kerosene lanterns.
The weekend brought a well-deserved hot bath, usually
Saturday night in preparation for Sunday church services.
Photo courtesy of Clear Lake Museum
Threshing, also known as thrashing, brought farmers together
to help each other harvest the year’s crops. A “jag”, or load, of
hay would be taken to the barn for storage in the haymow. Miles
Wittig’s father had two teams of horses: one to bring in the hay
from the field, the other to hoist the hay from the wagon into the
haymow using hay forks and straps. His mother made sure all
of the workers had a good meal when working on their farm. She
had a kerosene cook stove on their large back porch to cook meals
for all of the workers.
Women didn’t always “just” cook the meals. Some worked
side-by-side with the men to bring in the crops – although in
a more stylish fashion. Even while helping with the physically
demanding farm work, women wore long dresses. It was common
to remake flour and seed sacks into clothing during the 1930s
and 1940s. Flour and seed companies started to use decorative
patterns on their sacks when they learned women were using
them to make clothing. “Repair, reuse, make do, and don’t throw
anything away” was the motto during the Depression years.
St. Croix County
Churches
1930s & 1940s
Sunday church services were a time and
place where all could reflect on what they
were grateful for: family, health, enough
food that week and, hopefully, a bountiful
harvest. Church was an important link to
the community, as it is for many today.
Baptist Church
English Lutheran
Federated Church
St. Luke’s Lutheran
Swedish Covenant
Zion Lutheran
St. Mary’s Immaculate Conception
St Bridget’s Catholic Church (closed 2002)
Gethsemane Evangelical Lutheran Church (Baldwin)
Immanuel Evangelical Lutheran (German, Somerset)
St. Paul’s Evangelical Lutheran (German, Glenwood City)
Photo courtesy of Clear Lake Museum
Farming in St. Croix County
1930s & ‘40s
4
A Brief History
The first known experiments with generating electricity were conducted in 1650 by German physicist Otto von Guericke. In
1886, American scientist William Stanley demonstrated how a high voltage transmission system could bring electricity to a larger
territory. These early inventions paved the way for the American entrepreneurial spirit to take over, resulting in several patents
being secured in the electrification industry.
The Westinghouse Company, which included Nicola Tesla and Oliver B. Schallenberger, invented the induction meter for
measuring alternating current in 1888, while Elihu Thomson, an electrical engineer, acquired nearly 700 patents in his career
during the early 1900s.
In the late 1800s, the city of New Richmond gained electricity, thus significantly changing the way people lived. Wells Electric and Gift Shop was founded in 1914 by seven prominent businessmen in the city: Albert S. Wells, Ward S. Williams, L. A.
Baker, P. C. Harmon, P. F. Neverman, Harry Williams, and H. E. Rounsavell. Once electrical service evolved from the battery
systems to transmission lines distributing electricity, the Wells Electric company changed their focus to electrical construction
and the selling of electrical appliances.
The distribution systems typical of cities were low voltage and could only carry electricity for about four miles. Consequently, it was nearly five decades after electricity was available to the cities that the REA was created to help finance building the
infrastructure to bring electricity to rural areas.
The Delco-Light Farm Electric Plant
The St. Croix County Forum, a local newspaper, reported
installations of Delco systems on local farms in 1927 (notice
courtesy of the St. Croix County Historical Society):
St. Croix County Forum, 24 Nov 1927, p. 1
Two More Delco Light Plants Installed
“A modern Delco-Light Plant has been installed on the
farm of Mrs. A. Gartmann, Route 2. The plant is one of the
automatic and battery storage type, and will be used for both
lighting and power on the Gartman model dairy farm.
Howard Phillips, of the town of Kinnickinnic, has also
installed a new Delco plant. Both were sold through the agency
of Alex Nicholson, local representative.”
Image courtesy of www.delcolight.com
St. Croix County Forum, 2 Feb 1928, p. 7
New Light Plant on Krattley Farm Will Provide Illumination
and Power on Big Place North of Hudson
“A new Delco-Light Plant is to be installed on the Kratley
[sic] farm, three miles north of town by Alex Nicholson, local
Delco representative.
The new plant will furnish light for the house, barns
and hen house. A large yard lamp will also be installed. The
power plant will be used to operate the shallow well pump, of
35-pound pressure, and also the washing machine. The plant
is of the newest type, which combines all the advantages of
an automatic Delco-Light combined with the advantages of
a storage battery Delco-Light. It operates from the battery on
small loads and automatically switches to power for the heavier
service.”
In the early 1930s, wind generators manufactured by a
variety of companies (e.g., Winpower, Jacobs Wincharger,
Air Electric, Allied Rural-lite, Parris-Dunn, and Wind King)
powered the batteries in the Delco systems, reducing the
need for fossil fuels. A 32 VDC unit could power a variety of
appliances, lights, farm equipment and tools.
Mary Sather, curator of the Heritage Center in New
Richmond, said her parents were very excited about electricity
being connected to their farm in Southeastern Minnesota. Their
neightbor, though, did not want to connect to the REA lines and
the power company had a policy of not hooking up properties if
they were a certain distance away from the last hookup. When
Sather’s family learned this, they installed a Delco-Light Farm
Electric Plant (manufactured from 1916 to 1947), which was
a dedicated, gas-fed generator system that used large batteries
for storage. Unlike the fairly automatic Delco system on the
Hoffman family farm, the system on Sather’s family farm
required more attention.
“There was a long row of big batteries out in the machine
shed, which were attached to a gasoline motor. When the lights
started to dim in the house, someone would say, ‘Gotta start the
engine.’ We would get the motor started, let it run for several
hours and the lights would immediately brighten up – that is, as
bright as a 25- or 40-watt bulb could get.”
5
how R.E.A. is dead in St. Croix County; and I don’t know any
time when it has been more alive than it is right today.”
Nelson goes on to discuss a competing utility who had
been casting doubt on the ability of REA to build in the county,
saying they had been “…very busy these days trying to build
a line into R.E.A. territory.” That company, however, failed to
get a permit from the Public Service Commission (PSC) and
was stopped.
Competition
The Delco-Light Farm Electric Plant companies were also
competing with the REA, as well as the investor owned utilities
(IOUs). They claimed the real cost of wiring a typical rural
home was $950 – more than half of the average annual wage
at that time. They stressed to their potential customers that the
cost of a Delco system with a Jacobs wind turbine was less
than $950 with no monthly bill.
Regardless of what the accurate estimates of wiring were
and how difficult it was for the rural community to come up
with the money necessary to receive electrical service, the lure
of more efficient farming methods and a more convenient
lifestyle was strong. As farmers were connected, more farmers
wanted to be. C. H. Nelson, the St. Croix County REA Agent,
stated in a July 14, 1938, interview for the St. Croix County Leader,
that the news of the project to soon be approved and funded
by Washington “…is especially encouraging to those who are
still trying to convince their neighbors that R.E.A. lines will be
built in the near future. Every day we hear a different story on
Bill Hoffman’s family had a pretty large Delco-Light Farm
Electric System so hooking up to the REA lines when he was a
pre-teen (1918) didn’t have as big an impact on him, but he believes
it was one of the most important accomplishments of that time.
Even though the Delco system worked pretty well for them, it was
a machine and machines require maintenance. Hooking up to the
transmission line made life more convenient. The first thing that was
modernized in their kitchen was the washing machine; his father put
a motor on the machine so it could be run with electricity.
were anxious to be part of the cooperative movement. One
of the issues confronting farmers was the cost of becoming
a member. The $5 membership fee was a lot of money for
some people and the wiring costs, estimated by the REA to be
$150 to $200 for the average farm, were an even more difficult
amount for rural families to come up with. When asked if they
could hook up to a Northern States Power Company line that
Wayne Willink remembers “plain as day” when the lights came on.
“It felt like a miracle,” he said.
“Electricity coming to the rural area was one of the greatest
things that ever happened,” Miles Wittig said.
Wittig’s neighbor, Bill Bergeron, was among the first members
of St. Croix Electric Cooperative and an official in the state
legislature.
“Bill Bergeron had great foresight and was instrumental in
making sure the Somerset area was served by the REA lines.”
It was a long process of getting funding, securing the service
area, and getting the actual work done before the lights came
on. In order for St. Croix County to receive funding from
Washington for a rural electrification project, they were
required to have a number of farmers willing to sign on as
members of the local cooperative.
Officially recognized as an electric cooperative in the State
of Wisconsin on Nov. 5, 1937, it wasn’t until January 1938
that plans for a 269-mile rural electrification project for St.
Croix County were delivered to the REA office in Washington,
D.C. At the time, the State REA Director was John A. Becker
and William Rutzen, of Glenwood City, served as the project
president (and would later become the first general manager
of the Cooperative). This first section of transmission line
was proposed to serve 811 customers in the Townships of
Stanton, Cylon, Forest, St. Joseph, Somerset, Richmond, Erin,
Emerald, Glenwood, Hudson, Warren, Baldwin, Springfield,
Troy, Kinnickinnic, Pleasant Valley, Rush River, Eau Galle, and
Cady.
By mid-1938, the controversy of investor owned utilities
(IOUs) versus cooperatives was heating up. Not all farmers
6
was serving their neighbors to the north, the Wittig family was
told it would cost $1,000.
For the $5 membership fee, a farmer received full
membership and the cooperative received an easement for the
power line to be placed on the farmer’s property. C. H. Nelson
claimed in June 1938 that the farming community would “…
be given electricity, by winter, at a reasonable rate which would
never be possible except for a cooperative move of this kind
…” and in spite of the “… false propaganda being used to
keep this project from going through.”
REA, wanting to make it as affordable as possible for
farmers to hookup, suggested farmers could hold down their
costs if they were willing and able to do some of the work.
They could also purchase materials cooperatively with others
in order to get bulk prices, which is exactly what Willink’s
grandfather and father did, followed by setting the poles by
hand and wiring the home and barn themselves. They did not
run the wires inside the walls and ceilings, but along the outside
of the walls and ceilings and they had pull-chains to turn on
the lights.
The REA also stressed to electricians to keep their costs
down for those farmers who hired them, which is what the
Hoffman and Wittig families did. If the farmers spent all their
money on the wiring, they wouldn’t be able to afford to buy
electrical appliances. If electrification was to be a real benefit,
they needed to have appliances. Amos Wayts, an electrician from
Baldwin, offered free estimates and specialized in REA wiring.
His advertisements promised, “My work has no comeback”,
presumably a warranty on his work.
By mid-June 1938, 316 farmers had signed membership
“blanks” indicating their desire to be included in the REA
project. This amounted to about two customers per mile
– short of the three-customer per mile requirement set by
Washington.
In late August, the project was under final review by
Washington and, by mid-September, $186,000 was approved
to fund the construction of 170 miles of the St. Croix County
line. A contract for $127,526 with Holtz Bros., of Chippewa
Falls, to build the lines was approved by the Cooperative
on Oct. 28, 1938, and included copper and copper weld
conductors, southern white pine treated poles, and General
Electric transformers. Construction was scheduled to start by
Nov. 15, 1938, but was pushed back to Dec. 6, at which time
325 farmers were scheduled to be served by those first lines.
Rutzen was approved as the project superintendent for the
construction project.
Throughout the last years of the Great Depression, prior
to the United States entering World War II, the REA continued
to call on that Wisconsin cooperative spirit to sign more rural
properties into the rural electrification project, while placing
poles and running wires to as many farms as they could, as fast
as they could. As they progressed, they became more efficient.
While the first poles had to be dug in by hand – made more
difficult by the long drought – a digging machine was utilized
as 1938 came to a close, which allowed crews to place 80 poles
(about four miles) per day. By the end of December, 1938, more
than 35 miles of poles had been installed, the wiring ordered
and scheduled to be installed as soon as it was delivered. Once
20 or 30 miles of poles and lines were constructed, the farms
along that line would be energized.
At the dawn of 1939, meetings were held in each township
of the county as the Cooperative resolved to bring the benefits
of electricity to every farm in St. Croix County within the year.
Wisconsin Power Cooperative had grown to a membership of
16,000 farmers and continued to lobby for additional state appropriations to support rural electrification. Finally, on May
24, 1939, Lorents Lorentson’s farm in Baldwin was the first St.
Croix Electric Cooperative member site to receive electricity.
Pole No. 1 stood on the Lorentson farmplace until mid-2012,
when it was relocated and placed in front of the Cooperative
office in Hammond.
By the end of July 1939, the first section of the St. Croix
County REA project was complete and serving 204 members.
The REA was making progress quickly as more farmers wanted
to be part of the REA transmission system. Newspapers
started to report areas of the county receiving electricity.
In the Aug. 3, 1939, edition of the St. Croix County Leader,
the following notice appeared:
LIGHTS ARE ON (Horse Creek)
“At last, all those who have their homes wired can now turn the
switch and have lights without cleaning the lamp chimneys and
filling (them) with kerosene.”
Wayne Willink specifically remembers the competition between
the utilities: When a utility wanted to be a “thorn in the side”
of its competitor, they would go out in the middle of the night
and place poles along the road right of way bordering rural
properties. These were referred to as “spite lines” because they
were “put there to spite the other company”.
Willink said both the investor owned utilities (IOUs) and
REA did this.
“It was dog-eat-dog in those days between the IOUs and
REA” he said.
Both were trying to secure their territories, but there were
regulations that eventually settled the issues.
“The IOUs weren’t even interested in the rural areas because
they didn’t think it would be profitable enough,” Willink said.
“When REA came along, they started to realize someone else
was going to be serving the rural territory and got interested.”
The second section of the project was soon started by
Holtz Bros. The pressures of trying to convince farmers to sign
on as members now evolved to pressures on the REA agent
to get electricity to the farmers, who were getting increasingly
impatient at how long it was taking to get power to their farms.
By the end of 1939, 287 members had electricity, yet delays
continued to be a problem. The pole supplier was not able to
deliver more than half of the poles necessary to construct the
second section of the project, pushing the Dec. 5 completion
goal back to Christmas.
Two months into the New Year, the REA had completed
311 miles of electric transmission lines, serving 461 members.
The townships of Erin, Richmond, St. Joseph, Somerset,
Stanton, Cylon, and Forest were all wired, but needed a certain
type of transformer, of which delivery had been delayed,
causing yet more frustration. However, by 1950, approximately
90 percent of American farms had electricity.
7
Chippewa Generation Station
While it took longer than anticipated to get the St. Croix
County transmission lines started, in some of the Wisconsin
Rural Electric Cooperative service area, the construction of
power transmission lines started within days of completing
the Chippewa Generation Station. J. Morgan Wilson, manager
of the Wisconsin Rural Electric Cooperative Association,
in commenting on the dedication of the generation plant,
stated:
“Today we write history. On May 22, 1938, the first cooperative
electric generating plant in Wisconsin is being dedicated to service
by, of and for farmers of our State. Ten distribution cooperatives,
Buffalo, Chippewa, Clark, Dunn, Pierce-Pepin, Taylor,
Trempeauleau, Jackson, St. Croix and Eau Claire Cooperatives
are members of and will receive their power supply from the
Wisconsin Power Cooperative. The 243 miles of transmission lines
were built under the supervision of the Wisconsin Rural Electric
Cooperative Association. This farmers’ engineering organization,
more particularly known as “State-wide”, was organized in the
spring of 1936 to supply the technical services on a cooperative
basis…The organization has successfully met the responsibility
of supervising the construction of over 5,000 miles of electric
transmission and distribution. Its control, vested in the Statewide
Board made up of a representative from each of the 20 member
cooperatives at this time active in construction and operation, is
a typical illustration of democratic achievement by the cooperative
technique.”
On Dec. 16, 1941, Wisconsin Power Cooperative merged
with Tri-State Power Cooperative to form Dairyland Power
Cooperative, the wholesale electricity provider to St. Croix
Electric, which today serves more than 10,000 members. The
Chippewa generating station was dismantled in 1975, but an
official Wisconsin Historical Marker remains on that site.
Modernizing the farm with electricity was liberating. In a
series of articles by Dr. F. E. Townsend titled, Buying Power
– The Quest of the Hour! Townsend proclaims, “Leisure and
plenty is in sight for virtually all civilized mankind.” (St. Croix
County Leader, Aug. 25, 1938).
hand tools to be replaced with electric powered tools like saws
and drills.
In the farm house, electricity was an exciting and definite
improvement. It allowed for reading, sewing, and playing board
games without burning the dangerous and dirty kerosene lamps.
One of the first appliances many purchased for the home was
the refrigerator. Being able to keep food cold reduced the
chances for food-borne illnesses and the chicken farmer was
able to ensure that the eggs didn’t spoil before being delivered
to market each week. Electric refrigerators were designed with
shelving that could hold a 15-dozen egg basket and space for
a five-gallon cream can, along with room for the typical food
needs of the family.
Even in a struggling economy, once a rural farm house was
connected to electricity, most people found a way to purchase a
refrigerator. In 1940, about 44 percent of all American homes
included a refrigerator.
People who lived in towns and cities had enjoyed the convenience
of electricity for several years before electricity was available to
farm families. But those farm families were very aware of the
types of appliances and equipment they would be able to use once
they had access to a reliable source of electricity.
Wayne Willink enjoyed attending “national troupe shows”
hosted by the REA in the mid-1940s, where they would show
off the latest and greatest in new appliances for the home and
farm. One of those shows was hosted by the Wm. Guiser Farm,
1.5 miles northwest of Martell.
“They would give you small appliances like hand mixers or
those donuts, that’s what they called them, that you drop in water
to heat it up,” he said.
Displays and demonstrations were used to show consumers
the benefits of a convenient and reliable electrical supply that
would “lighten farm labor and relieve household drudgery” for
all rural people.
Plumbing
Cooking, bathing, and washing clothes were all difficult for the
rural family before electricity; water had to be carried from the
well for all of those tasks. As was true for bringing water to the
cows, once electricity was available, electric pumps could be
used to pump the water through piping into the house. Those
rural families who could afford it and had available space in
the house, built bathrooms with tubs and toilets connected to
the water pipes.
Indoor plumbing not only simplified daily life, but, also,
improved overall public health. In the 1930s, indoor plumbing
was a measure of class with the upper class being able to afford
full indoor plumbing. At the time, 70 percent to 90 percent of
the middle class enjoyed complete bathrooms (flush toilet, sink,
and plumbed bathtub), while just one of five homes among
the poor had a toilet that flushed and only seven percent had a
complete bathroom.
Electricity through transmission lines revolutionized farm
operations. Farmers could use several milking machines to
milk the cows, making it possible to grow their herds. Lighting
in the barn was brilliant in comparison to kerosene lamps.
Keeping the baby chicks warm with kerosene lamps was
replaced with electric brooding houses. Electric motors to
pump water and run irrigation systems soon became common
necessities for the farming operation. It did not take long for
8
released in 1939. Other popular movies of that time included
Christmas Carol (1938), Flash Gordon (1936), and Every Sunday
(1936).
Some families were able to listen to the first long playing
(LP) vinyl record in 1931 on a RCA Victor phonograph. In
1935, Parker Brothers released Monopoly - a game that allowed
people with little or no money to pretend to be wealthy real
estate tycoons.
“Having electric lights and a motor for the well were the most
important improvements,” Wittig recalled. Hoffman agreed.
A motor for the well meant neither boy would have to herd
the cattle out of the barn just to get a drink of water.
Willink said his family’s first electric purchases were a
refrigerator and the motor for the cream separator. He also
remembers getting a barn cleaner in 1946 from Hedlund in
Baldwin. It had a dual purpose – it also worked as a mechanism
to get hay into the haymow.
“It was called a straight out barn cleaner and worked really
good” he said.
“Things changed quickly once we had electricity. It’s right
there when you need it – convenient,” Willink continued. “In
the early days, they did lose power quite a bit because they didn’t
have a good, reliable source of generation. But once additional
generation plants were constructed and dedicated to specific areas,
power outages were no longer a problem. There was a diesel
generator plant built in 1946, right here in Baldwin, to serve
this area.”
Movies were not very popular with the farm
m
kids but “every small town had a dance,””
Wittig said.
He remembers riding along with thee
neighbor boys who had a car.
“We would go all over the place, evenn
to Withrow, Minnesota, to dances” hee
said.
A friend purchased a “picturee
machine” and he would take photos of
couples at the dances for a price.
Marbles, the yo-yo, and paper dolls cut from magazines
were a common entertainment for children.
Hoffman remembers having to put boards on the ground
at the height of the Dust Bowl so they could play with their toy
trucks and tractors.
“The dust was this thick (indicating six to eight inches),”
he said. “It was so bad those days that dad had to take some of
the cows up north just to keep them alive.”
Wittig said his brother-in-law, who later worked in the
utility business, hooked up a 6 or 8 volt wind turbine (made
by Winpower in Newton, Iowa) to charge a battery so they
could listen to the radio. The smaller (6 VDC) wind turbines
were commonly referred to as “radio chargers”, as they provided
enough power to run a radio and perhaps a few lights – VDC
meaning “Voltage Direct Current”.
Two new diesel engines at the Baldwin Power Plant, 1946.
Entertainment
In the 1930s, families with electricity could listen to radio
programs with music by Bing Crosby, Lena Horne, Billie
Holiday or Ella Fitzgerald, to name a few. Dick Tracy mysteries
offered exciting radio entertainment, while The Lone Ranger
and Tonto fed the imaginations of young boys yearning to ride
off into the sunset after a day of fighting the bad guys.
The likes of the Marx Brothers, Jack Benny, George
Burns & Gracie Allen, Laurel & Hardy, and the Three Stooges
brought humor to an otherwise difficult life. The radio was one
of the only links to the rest of the world for many families.
With the war raging in Europe and talk of the United States
possibly getting involved, tuning in to a news station could get
a family the latest information on the war effort.
The family with enough money to take in a movie now and
then may have been able to enjoy the first all-talking, all-color
movie – Warner Brothers’ Song of the Flame – in 1930. This
movie paved the way for Disney’s Snow White and the Seven
Dwarfs, which premiered Dec. 21, 1937, at the Carthay Circle
Theatre in Los Angeles, Calif., and was released nationwide on
Feb. 4, 1938. The Little Princess and The Wizard of Oz were both
Conservation
In the 1930s and 1940s people grappled with the issue of access
to electricity. Energy conservation techniques were as much an
issue then as they are today. In 2012, we use more efficient
light bulbs and intelligent construction practices in an attempt
to keep our energy usage down. In the 1930s and 1940s, home
economics departments encouraged the use of light-colored
walls to help cut electric bills. A Chicago decorator went a little
further, covering the walls with metallic aluminum paper. The
expectation was that the aluminum paper would reflect enough
light so that, even at night, no electric lights would be necessary.
While that trend didn’t exactly catch on, many people do use
aluminum-covered insulation in the attic to help reflect heat in
the summer and hold it in the house in the winter.
9
Early settlers of St. Croix County originated from Ireland,
Germany, Norway, Denmark and England. In 1852, immigrants
were encouraged to settle tracts of land as farms in the United
States. As the settlers arrived, many settled in communities
with others of their same ancestry due to language and cultural
similarities. Erin Prairie was the center for most of the early
Irish settlers, as well as Emerald, Cylon, St. Joseph and Hudson.
The Scandinavians primarily settled around Rush River, Eau
Galle and Cylon, and branched out to Hammond and Pleasant
Valley. Early German immigrants settled primarily in Somerset,
St. Joseph and Cylon areas, while the English settled mostly in
the small towns along the St. Croix River.
Industry
Lumbering was a major industry in the St. Croix County
area in the 1840s. Pristine virgin forests of White Pines near
the Mississippi and St. Croix Rivers were a great draw to
lumberjacks who had no intention of settling in the area. They
would homestead a parcel of land only to clear it of timber,
abandon it, and move on to other timbered parcels.
In 1856, an act was put in place authorizing the St. Croix
and Lake Superior Railroad Company to protect its land and
timber from the lumber companies. Later, a law was passed
to protect the settlers from losing their land and timber to the
large timber companies. The law read, in part, “Any person
who, prior to the first day of January 1874, may have settled
upon any quarter section of said lands and improved the same
as a farm, and who has since continued to reside thereon and
occupy the same as his home, may on proving such settlement,
improvement and continued residence, acquire the title to the
same by paying to the state treasurer of Wisconsin for the use
of said lands, the sum of $2.50 per acre to be made within one
year from the passage of this act.”
The 1870 census indicated 25 dairy farmers in Wisconsin
and 160,000 people involved in agriculture. By the end of the
1800s, farmers began to focus on dairy farming and, in 1872, the
Wisconsin Dairymen’s Association was formed. Shortly after,
cheese factories started popping up, starting with the Willow
River Cheese Factory in 1880. It closed in 1898, but reopened
in the early 1990s, only to close shortly after 1913. In 1883,
a cheese factory opened in Roberts and, by 1895, St. Croix
County was home to seven cheese factories and 14 creameries.
By 1930, that number had switched to 11 creameries and 19
cheese factories.
In the early 1900s, dairy farmers received about $3 per
hundredweight for their milk. That price steadily decreased and,
by 1932, farms were receiving less than $1 per hundredweight,
prompting the withholding of milk from the dairies by farmers
in 1933.
Dairy plants soon emerged, which utilized and produced
milk, cheese and butter (specific breakdowns of each product
are unknown). There were 19 dairy plants in St. Croix County
in 1949, but just 10 by 1958.
In 2012, St. Croix County is home to the Cady Cheese
Factory and Bass Lake Cheese Factory.
Wisconsin was still a territory in 1840 when St. Croix County
was created from a very large area called Crawford County
(now contained within Michigan). On May 29, 1848, Wisconsin
was admitted to the union as the 30th state. The St. Croix
River established the state’s western boundary, as well as St.
Croix County’s western boundary, and is also the source of the
county’s name.
It is not clearly established in history where the name
St. Croix originated, however, a couple of stories have been
passed down: One was a French explorer named Monsieur
St. Croix drowned at the mouth of the river in the late 17th
century. Some historians speculate that the river was named
to commemorate that drowning. Other stories point to the
French missionary explorer, Father Hennepin, believed to be
one of the first white people to visit the area. Father Hennepin
noted that several burial markers were placed at the mouth of
the river and, in the French language, Holy Cross translates to
St. Croix.
In addition to territory now contained within the state of
Michigan, St. Croix County originally included areas now in
Minnesota and in other Wisconsin counties. The counties of
Pierce and Polk, and parts of Dunn, Barron, Washburn and
Burnett counties were all originally part of St. Croix County. In
1853, St. Croix County was reorganized to the size and shape
it is today. Still bounded on the west by the St. Croix River, St.
Croix County includes 736 square miles, 14 of which are water.
The 2010 census set the population around 84,000. In 1930
and 1940, the population was around 25,000.
Inhabitants
The original inhabitants of St. Croix County were the Native
American Sioux and Chippewa tribes. The first white occupants
were French fur traders and explorers. The first trading post was
established in 1793 along the St. Croix River, which continued
to operate as a major trading hub for Native Americans and
explorers for 40 years. The fur trading industry eventually gave
way to farming and the lumbering industry. In 1840, Joseph
Haskell started what is believed to be the first farm in St. Croix
County. Another pioneer farmer, James Walston, settled a farm
two miles east of Hudson in 1850.
10
Growing up on a farm in the 1930s and 1940s meant much of
a child’s life involved farm work. While the farm children were
expected to handle a variety of chores, their main responsibility was to do well in school, if they were among those fortunate
enough to attend school. As has always been true, parents
wanted their children to make a better life for themselves, but
the years of the Great Depression created obstacles that not
all families could overcome. Many rural children did not attend
school as they were needed at home to help on the farm, or
to find work to supplement their family’s income. The high
school graduation rate in the United States was at 29 percent
during the 1930s and 49 percent in the 1940s.
The typical “country school”, in the 1930s and 40s was a
one-room classroom taught by one or two teachers. While the
youngest students worked on their ABCs, or quietly read the
latest Adventures of Dick and Jane, the older children practiced
more difficult tasks in arithmetic, reading or science.
At that time, an eighth-grade education was considered
good enough for most. If a child was among the 25 percent
lucky enough to attend high school, their family was required
to pay tuition and expenses, including books. In some areas,
schools were closed due to lack of funding for teachers and
books. Some schools provided wagons or buses to transport
children to school; the first school buses in Baldwin were in 1972.
Hoffman attended elementary through high school in Glenwood
City, his life-long home community. He played FFA basketball
with farm boys from other schools and Hoffman’s team, in
particular, was good. After one of their games, a varsity coach
who had been observing asked if Hoffman’s team would be
willing to play his team. They agreed and beat that varsity team
badly. The coach asked Hoffman if he’d be willing to play for
his team and Hoffman replied, “No, I’m needed on the farm.”
Willink completed first through eighth grades at Happy
Valley School in Baldwin, which was built in 1929. In 1937,
he attended high school, also in Baldwin. That was also a new
school and had a very nice, large gymnasium, which hosted all
district tournaments for a 10-year period. Willink graduated
from high school in 1941 and entered the military.
Wittig completed first through eighth grades at Landing
Hills Grade School about 1.5 miles from his house, followed by
high school in Somerset. He walked to Landing Hills with the
neighboring children and recalled one day when the snow was
too deep to walk through. A neighbor used his handmade plow,
which he attached to his horse-drawn wagon, to plow the road so
they could get to school.
Building Tomorrow’s Youth
In 1928, Future Farmers of America (FFA) was established
with the mission of developing leaders through agricultural
education. Personal growth and career success in agriculture is
reflected in their motto: “Learning to Do, Doing to Learn, Earning
to Live, Living to Serve.” FFA continues to be an important
element in the lives of rural farm children, as does 4-H.
4-H was started in the late 1800s by university researchers
who realized that young people were more willing to accept
new ideas in farming than their parents were. The hands-on
learning of 4-H helped build a strong community among rural
youth, as well as develop farming skills.
Clark County, Ohio, is deemed the birthplace of the 4-H
program. An official club was started in 1902, adopting the
clover leaf as their symbol and, in 1910, the pin with an “H”
on each leaf to symbolize Head, Heart, Hands, and Health was
developed. The 4-H pledge reads:
where members display their handiwork that might include an
animal they raised, a few stalks of corn, prized tomatoes, an
heirloom quilt, or an invention.
The St. Croix County fair has a proud history of more
than 125 years. Hudson and New Richmond hosted the fair for
the first years of its existence and, in 1910, St. Croix and Dunn
Counties held the first inter-county fair. From the 1930s to
the early ‘50s, Hammond
hosted the fair. The
current County Highway
Department shops were
used for the display of
cattle, while the middle
school building was used
for other exhibits. A polio
epidemic cancelled the
fair for a few years in the
mid-1940s, but it returned,
in 1948, as the St. Croix
County Fair. Today, the
St. Croix County Fair
is an annual event in late July, hosted at the 41-acre county
fairgrounds off of Highway 128 in Glenwood City. In 2012, St.
Croix Electric Cooperative and its members donated $24,000
to Friends of the Fairplex, which manages the fairgrounds.
The total represented $1 for every past and present member
of the Cooperative.
I pledge my Head to clearer thinking,
My Heart to greater loyalty,
My Hands to larger service,
And my Health to better living,
For my club, my community, my country, andd my world.
ld
4-H was nationalized in 1914 with the passage of the
Smith-Lever Act, which created the USDA Cooperative
Extension System. By 1924, 4-H clubs involved with home
economics and agricultural practices were organized all over
the country. 4-H continues to be an important teacher of
citizenship, leadership, and life skills for American youth. A
visit to your county or state fair will include the 4-H barns
11
In 1932, Franklin Delano Roosevelt (Democrat) was elected
President of the United States. With his election came great
hope that he could lead the United States out of the desperate
times of the Great Depression (1929-39).
Within 100 days of taking office, Roosevelt created several
agencies that would be instrumental in turning the economy
around; he called this the “New Deal” – an economic stimulus
package that addressed everything from banking practices to
agricultural practices to initiating a more fair treatment of
American Indians. The New Deal included agencies that are
still in place today (2012):
• Social Security Administration
• Federal Housing Administration (FHA)
• Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC)
• Rural Electrification Administration (REA)
(reorganized in 1994 as the Rural Utilities Service (RUS).
The REA was created on May 11, 1935, by executive order
of President Roosevelt. When the Rural Electrification Act of
1936 was passed (May 20), only 10 percent of rural Americans
had electricity. The Act allowed for low-interest loans to be
made to non-profit cooperatives in order to bring electricity
to the rural areas of the country. The RUS, today, still oversees
loans for development and improvements in rural areas for
electric, water and waste needs.
On May 2, 1937, Wisconsin farmers formed the Wisconsin
Power Cooperative, a predecessor to Dairyland Power – the
wholesale power provider to St. Croix Electric Cooperative.
From 1939-42 Julius P. Heil (Republican), an 1881 German
immigrant, served as governor of Wisconsin (two, two-year
terms). In 1940, he declared Feb. 26 to March 2 as Wisconsin
Co-operative Week.
“It is 100 years since Wisconsin’s farm people, faced by the
stern necessity of working together, established the first dairy
co-operative,” he said in his declaration speech.
Support, though, for Governor Heil waned as voters –
especially farmers – became frustrated by what they saw as
broken promises that included increased taxes for the “farmer,
homeowners, worker, and small business man.”
The poor economic times of the farmer was also reflected
in the number of debt adjustments being made by the Farm
Security Administration (FSA) because of the all-time low
prices of the 1930s.
In 1940, Governor Heil’s agenda to repeal the $0.15/lb tax
on oleomargarine in Wisconsin – a tax that was meant to be
an incentive for consumers to purchase real dairy products to
help Wisconsin dairy farmers – as well as a 4 percent drop in
Wisconsin farming income at a time when all other agricultural
states realized an increase in income hurt Heil’s popularity. Heil
and his Republican legislature also abolished the WI Home and
Farm Administration in 1939. Thus, in 1942, Orland Loomis
(Progressive) defeated Heil in his run for a third term.
Fighting for Wisconsin Agriculture
At the end of 1938, the Department of Agriculture was working
on marketing programs to help stimulate the Wisconsin farming
community with ideas, such as the “Cheese for Christmas”
program, which was hugely successful and generated thousands
of orders for specially-wrapped 2.5 pound packages of cheese
to be distributed throughout Wisconsin stores.
In 1940, the Wisconsin Agricultural Conservation
Committee used financial incentives to get farmers to
recondition soils with lime and fertilizers, with less emphasis
on building soils with seeding legumes and grasses, for erosion
control and soil productivity. The Farm Program also allowed
for $30 per farm for planting trees.
In February 1940, U. S. Sen. Robert M. LaFollette, Jr.
(Progressive), became a champion of Wisconsin farmers when
he led a successful battle against a proposal by southern states
to feed war veterans, through the Veteran’s Administration,
oleomargarine instead of butter and cheese. The proposal was
defeated 42 to 11.
The sense of community in St. Croix County remained
strong and people were encouraged to help each other. A large
ad in the St. Croix Leader Telegram in early 1940 titled “Patronize
Home Institutions and witness Prosperity Turn the Corner”
proclaimed, “New Richmond and environs have it within their
grasp to make 1940 one of the happiest years in its history. Let’s
take advantage of this vision by working for one another.”
By late 1940, Roosevelt’s New Deal was focusing on
building roads, public buildings, and water mains through
the Works Progress Administration, later renamed the Work
Projects Administration (WPA). The WPA was the “largest
and most ambitious” New Deal agency. Approximately three
million people were employed through this program that
especially benefited the rural areas of the country. The WPA
also constructed 238 miles of secondary, or farm-to-market
roads, in St. Croix County. In 1943, the WPA was abolished
due to low unemployment (President Roosevelt’s New Deal
had worked!).
A Political Timeline (1929-45)
Largest Stock Market
crash in U.S. history. Debilitating drought.
21st Amendment
Marks start of
Later termed The FDR elected President;
ratified; ends
Great Depression
Great Dust Bowl enacts The New Deal.
Prohibition
Oct. 1929
1932-38
Nov. 1932
5 Dec. 1933
12
Dairy farmers protest
Rural Electrification
low prices with milk Progressive Party Act of 1936 passed;
strike
formed in Wisconsin
creates REA.
1933
1934
20 May 1936
The life expectancy in the 1930s and 1940s was 58 for men and
62 for women. On the farm, though, day-to-day tasks could
be dangerous: Open belts, augers, steam from steam-powered
engines, sharp blades on farm machinery, and unpredictable
animals caused serious – and sometimes fatal – injuries.
An often fatal condition associated with the 1930s Dust
Bowl was dust pneumonia. Silage stored in brick pit silos created a deadly gas that quickly claimed the lives of careless farmers.
People rarely were able to go to a hospital if injured or
very sick and, while doctors made house calls, they were not
nearby and it could take days for a doctor to get to someone in
need.
The infant mortality rate for 1933-40, the heart of the
Great Depression, was 80 live births for every 1000 pregnancies (8 percent). Many of those births were at home and, if
lucky, assisted by friends, relatives, midwifes or the country
doctor. Maternal mortality rates remained fairly consistent
from the early 1900s to 1930 at 600 to 700 deaths per 100,000
(<1 percent) births. By 1939, 50 percent of all women delivered babies in hospitals, but most of those women were living
in cities.
Without electricity, cleanliness was subpar, which added to
the spread of disease. Families would have one “bath night”
per week – usually Saturday – where the youngest would bathe
first, followed by the older children, with the adults being last
– all using the same water that had to be carried from the well
and heated over a wood or coal fire outside or on the cook
stove. It was a happy day when electricity made it possible for
a home to include indoor plumbing.
In 1940, deaths from tuberculosis were down slightly from
the 1939 death toll of 839 people, but the epidemic continued to alarm Americans, especially in the city centers where it
was able to spread more easily. It was a bit ironic that infantile
paralysis, commonly known as polio, also afflicted President
Roosevelt. His private struggle with polio mirrored his public struggle to free the country from the grip of the crippling
economic times of the Great Depression. The polio vaccine
The Wittig family also had a couple good teams of horses that
were important to the farm.
“Horses were the life of the farm,” he said.
Farmers depended on them to work the land, bring in
crops, and other “heavy lifting” projects. With the advent of
the tractor, people were becoming less dependent on horses, but
not all farmers could afford a tractor. In 1938, an epidemic
of sleeping sickness in horses drastically reduced their numbers
in Wisconsin. St. Croix County was the hardest hit county in
the state with Somerset, Richmond, Cylon and Hammond, in
particular, suffering equine losses.
Wittig said they minimized exposure to horses from
other farms during thrashing season with hopes that it would
help prevent the spread of the disease. It was later discovered,
however, that sleeping sickness was carried by mosquitoes and
transferred to horses when they were bitten. Luckily, the Wittig
horses were not affected by the disease.
Willink said their family was careful not to expose any of the
pigs or their feed to animals from another farm. Because Wittig’s
family depended on the money from the sale of hogs to pay their
annual property taxes, losing any of their hogs to the cholera
epidemic would have been devastating.
was not developed until the 1950s. Rickets, a disease caused
by a vitamin deficiency, and scarlet fever were also common
diseases in the 1930s.
There were also some serious animal diseases that the
farm family had to cope with. In October 1939, hog cholera
broke out in the Baldwin area and nearly 40 pigs had been lost
within the first two weeks of discovering the disease. It was a
devastating disease to those farmers who raised and depended
on the meat from hogs.
Orland Loomis
elected Governor of
U.S. Senator Robert
U.S. drops atomic
Wisconsin. Upon his
LaFollette, Jr., wins
Julius P. Heil elected decision to give war WPA created to build Japan attacks Pearl untimely death, Lt. Germany officially bomb on Hiroshima;
Japan surrenders
Governor of Wisconsin vets butter & cheese, U.S. infrastructure; Harbor, provoking Gov. Goodland named surrenders; U.S.
14 Aug. 45
acting governor declares date V.E. Day.
not oleo
employs 3 million U.S. entry into WWII
Nov. 1939
Feb. 1940
Late 1940
7 Dec. 1941
13
Nov. 1942
8 May 1945
9 Aug. 1945
Then
Now (2012)
Bulk Milk Prices
per 100 lb
$1.17
Sept. 1938
19.38
Eggs (per dozen )*
avg 100 birds/farm (1938)
$0.29
1938
$1.23 - $1.69
$2.89 - $3.86 (organic)
Meat Chicken Prices*
per lb
$0.17
1937
$1.76 - $2.49
Coffee*
per lb
$0.29
Feb. 1940
$9.12 - $15.00 (whole bean)
$4.96 - $14.99 (ground)
Chocolate-covered cherries
per lb
$0.23
Feb. 1940
$11.52
Wal-Mart, 2012
Sweaters
$1 - $1.95
$10 - $80
Feb. 1940
Nordstroms: as high as $1,900.
* prices from New Richmond Family Fresh (unless otherwise noted) week of Oct. 7, 2012
Build one mile of line
Build 170 miles of line
Holtz Bros., of Chippewa Falls
Home/Barn wiring
Refrigerators
Electric Stoves
$750
1938
$46,100
2012
$127,526
1938
60 amp, 230-volt fuse panel
$135
1940
$350 - $3,510
2012
$149.50 (Norge )
$329 - $4,300
2012
1940
Monthly electricity usage
200-amp, 240-volt panel
52 kWh
1939
1265 kWh
Average 2012 cost/kWh: $0.10
St. Croix County Commodities
annual production (bushels)
Wheat
Oats
Rye & Barley
Corn
Potatoes
Hay (tons )
Cheese (pounds )
Butter (pounds )
Oats & succotash
Barley
Wheat/Rye
1888
1,375,000
800,000
35,000
200,000
2007
46,644
295,036
30,689 (barley)
5,353,544 (grain)
222,851 tons (silage)
n/a
123,470 (Forage all: hay, haylage, silage & green)
26,117,000 lbs of milk produced in WI (2011 )
20,630 lbs milk/cow in WI in 2010
150,000
20,000
180,000
350,000
1938
$0.03/bushel
$0.04/bushel
$0.06/bushel
2012
n/a
n/a
n/a
14
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www.doctordelco.com
www.delcolight.com
www.hmdb.org/marker.asp?marker=13798
www.chippewacounty.com/visit/HistoricalMarkers-3a.asp
www.answers.com/topic/rural-electrification-act
www.usda.gov/rus/regs/info/100-1/title_i.htm
www.ideafinder.com/features/smallstep/electricity.htm
www.useconomy.about.com/od/grossdomesticproduct/
p/1929_Depression.htm
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Works_Progress_Administration
news.nationalgeographic.com/news/pf/48152328.html
www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=44130163263
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(Selling Eggs in the 1920s and Incubating Eggs in the 1930s)
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www.livinghistoryfarm.org/farminginthe30s/life_03.html
(Farming in the 1930s)
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www.angelfire.com/retro/lisawebworld
(Lisa’s Nostalgia Cafe)
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en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaff
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_War_of_the_Worlds_(radio)
nostalgiacafe.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=1930s&act
ion=display&thread=181
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shepherdshillhomestead.com/2011/07/23/lye-soap-making/
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www.straightdope.com/columns/read/2644/how-wasice- made-and-sold-in-pre-industrial-times
www.e-referencedesk.com/resources/state-history-timeline/wisconsin.html
timelines.com/1848/5/29/wisconsin-is-the-30th-state-admitted-to-the-union
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www2.uwrf.edu/arc/stcroixhistory.php
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Croix_County,_Wisconsin
Births, Deaths, and New Deal Relief During the Great Depression by Price V. Fishback, Michael R. Harris, and Shawn
Kantor, Revised September 2005.
St. Croix County Historical Society
Wisconsin Historical Society
New Richmond Heritage Center (Mary Sather, Curator)
“Historic New Richmond Downtown”
St. Croix Electric Cooperative – History
St. Croix County Leader – 1937 to 1940
Clear Lake Wisconsin Museum
Clear Lake Centennial 1875-1975
Home Power Magazine, Feb/Mar, 2012, Issue 147
Early History of St. Croix County Wisconsin by Helen Sophia
Johnson, University of Wisconsin, 1921. Thesis submitted for the degree of Bachelor of Philosphy Course for
Normal School Graduates.
Cows, Creameries and Cheese Factories, by St. Croix County
Association for Home and Community Education History Project Committee, 1995.
Fifteenth Census of the United States: 1930, Agriculture, Vol.
II, Bureau of the Census Library.
Sixteenth Census of the United States: 1930, Agriculture, Vol.
II, Bureau of the Census Library.
National Agricultural Statistics Service, 1978-1997. U.S. Census of Agriculture.
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www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=B956C64C33787F4B
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www.livestrong.com/article/498524-is-eating-beef-bonemarrow-healthy-for-you/
www.english.illinois.edu/maps/depression/dustbowl.htm
www.u-s-history.com/pages/h1583.html
www.airships.net/hindenburg/disaster
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snow_White_and_the_Seven_
Dwarfs_(1937_film)
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1930s
stcroixcofair.com/fairgrounds-history
www.homedepot.com
www.lowes.com
www.jcpenney.com
www.target.com
www.walmart.com
www.nordstroms.com
www.familyfreshmarket.mywebgrocer.com
www.progressivedairy.com
www.4-h.org/about/4-h-history/
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/4-H
www.ffa.org/about/whoweare/Pages/MissionandMotto.
aspx
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dust_pneumonia
www.midwiferytoday.com/articles/timeline.asp
www.globalaging.org/ruralaging/us/indoorplumbing.htm
imhdd2.ms11.net/1932/wash_well_09.html
www.ehow.com/info_8526887_information-farmhouses1930s.html
1925 Ridgeway St. · Hammond, WI 54015
800.924.3407 · www.scecnet.net
©2012 St. Croix Electric Cooperative