A Historical Bike Ride

I don’t remember where I first read about the Library Bike Ride. However, I wasn’t too keen on going at first because helmets were required. I don’t own a bike helmet…I barely have a bicycle. Then at book club last month, Angela our moderator, was telling us she had to go on the bike ride this year and the cool places they went last year. This really got my interest piqued and I set off on trying to find a helmet. Luckily, my nephew’s fit me. When the night of the ride rolled around, I dusted off the cobwebs off the hubby’s bicycle, loaded it in the escape, and headed to Little Chute.

The way the bike ride was planned, we would ride to 5 different historical spots in Little Chute or Kimberly where the head curator from the History Museum at the Castle would tell us the history of the location. In all we would bike about 5 miles. It didn’t seem to bad and really wasn’t except for the few hills.

Our first stop was the site of the Treaty of Cedars on the edge of Little Chute. This is the approximate site of where the Indians and the US Government signed a treaty where the Menominee Indians ceded much of the northeastern part of the state to the US Government. The 4,000,000 acres included the present day cities Marinette and Wausau to the north, Stevens Point and Wisconsin Rapids to the West, and Appleton and Oshkosh to the South. It was called the Treaty of Cedars because the spot on the Fox River had Cedar Trees.

Our second stop was the War Memorial in front of the Village Hall in Little Chute. Here we learned about Jacob Coppus and how he lost his life in WWI. Jacob was part of the All Kansas Unit that fought a hard battle on Halloween across in Germany. Many lives were lost some to friendly fire because of all the rounds being shot. I probably should have taken notes to get the entire story but I didn’t even think of it.

Our third stop was Island Park and the start of the Heritage Parkway Trail in Little Chute. Here we learned about Arnold Verstagen who was a Dutch settler that built a mill along the Fox River almost directly across the river from where we were standing. Arnold wrote letters to his father-in-law describing his initial impression of the area once he settled here as well as his plans for the mill. We were told all of his letters are for sale in the Windmill in town.

While at this stop we also learned about the bridge standoff between Outagamie County and the Village of Little Chute. During the 1950s, Outagamie County and Little Chute were at odds at who was supposed to operate the draw bridge over the Fox River. There were several industrial sites that relied on the bridge to get trucks to and from the businesses. The county said Little Chute was responsible and the Little Chute said the County was responsible. The bridge was left in the down position stalling several tug boats while they figured it out. Neither side would budge and eventually they went to court to determine who was to operate the bridge. It was determined that Little Chute would operate the bridge. Both the mill and the bridge are long gone but the historical society had pictures of both that they passed around.

Our fourth stop brought us into Kimberly. After a bit of an adventure crossing the street, we stopped at a random parking lot on xxx street. Here we learned about the company town. Although Kimberly didn’t quite fit the exact definition of a company town, it was built for Kimberly-Clark workers. They could rent or build a house to company standards. We saw a picture of all the houses being one of two designs. On
xxx Street, one of the houses still resembles the old style. Although there wasn’t much to see, it was interesting to learn how and why Kimberly was founded.

Our last stop of the evening took us to Holy Name Catholic Church which is celebrating it’s 110th Anniversary. The Church itself was built in the 1950s by the same architect who build Valley Fair Mall but the parish was around much longer. It was established as part of the company town. It would have been interesting to go inside.

It was a nice night for a bike ride. I wish the stops were a little more interesting. I like history but bike to stops and talk about things that are no longer there wasn’t overly thrilling. I want to be able to see what you are talking about it. I know the History Museum has other walks and bike rides, I may check out another one besides the asylum walk in November that I am already going on. Hopefully they do this again next year so I can learn more about these little communities.

And the best part of this ride it was FREE!!! Gotta love free programs from the library. And who said libraries aren’t needed anymore?