MY LAND, MY HOME, MY WISCONSIN by Robert & Margo Gard

MY LAND, MY HOME, MY WISCONSIN  by Robert & Margo Gard

pg 42   Until farmers fenced their pastures and separated their herds, cattle mingled and interbred.  Livestock exhibits at state and county fairs helped to stimulate interest in improving the breeds.

     The first state fair in Wisconsin opened on October 1, 1851, in Janesville.  Exhibits included 52 cattle, 68 horses, 120 sheep, and 20 hogs.  It is possible that not a single purebred Shorthorn or Devon animal was owned in Wisconsin at that time.  No distinct breeds of horses are mentioned in the exhibitors' lists.  One horse, a Hambletonian, was said to be registered on the stallion's side, but not on the dam's.  Sheep were highest among improved livestock. ***

pg 44  ***  Horses were very important in Wisconsin.  Many farmers slowly developed "big teams" during the 1860s and 1870s for heavy farm work; breeds were imported from Europe: Clydesdales, Percherons, and Belgians.  Before that, oxen had been used for the heavy sod-breaking work, ordinary farm horses being too light.  the large breeds were often interbred with lighter horses.

     Most of the prize-winning horses in Wisconsin up to the time of the Civil War were Morgans or Blackhawks.  The Henry was a Morgan breed, as was the Blackhawk.  A few thouroughbreds were developed and shown, their bloodlines going back to English sires.  The Morgan and Blackhawk bloods were so widely diffused through Wisconsin that, during the Civil War, cavalry regiments from Wisconsin used medium-sized, spiritied, and fleet mounts derived from the famous Morgan stock.  As a cavalry officer, William Dempster Hoard, once governor of Wisconsin, owned a daring escape from rebel troopers to the fleetness of his Morgan horse.

     The Morgan has a somewhat obscure history.  The sire of the famous stallion, owned by Justin Morgan of Vermont, that started the Morgan breed is not known.  Somehow a great-spirited, short-coupled animal, both swift and sturdy, resulted from a mating between perhaps a race horse and a common mare.  Whatever the ancestry, the famous Morgan that all his life doubled as a workhorse and stud was able to leave his style and imprint on a breed that became the  best-loved in America.  The King Ranch Morgans of Texas were the prototypes for the roping and cutting horses of the cattle industry.  Adaptable for the saddle, the race track, and field work, the Morgan was important in the development of the West and Middle West. ***

***  pg 48   On early Wisconsin farms, the all-purpose or "scrub" cow was a great idea, and sound economy too.  She could provide milk, butter, and cheese (and ultimately meat) and occasionally even do some field work.

     For a long time after breeds of cattle were introduced in Wisconsin, the scrub cow continued to be the standard of the day.  Nor were there any great improvements in farm buildings; cows were often milked out in the barnyard, and sanitation was hardly considered.  It was tough to get farmers to improve their herd.  They remained fond of "old Brindle." ***

*** Breeds of cattle were introduced in Wisconsin in the latter half of the nineteenth century: Jerseys in 1859; Ayrshires in 1860; Brown Swiss in 1886.  Shorthorns increased rapidly after 1860.  Septer Wintermute of Whitewater brought the first Holstein bull into Wisconsin in 1873.  N. K. Fairbanks brought the first real Guernsey herd in 1881.  George Murry of Racine owned the famous Slausondale herd, known as one of the choicest herds in America.

     European precedents influenced farming in Wisconsin.  Improvements in cattle, swine, sheep, and horses as noted in England, France, and Spain were ultimately reflected in the showings of livestock at fairs.

EARLY DAIRYING

pg 49  Along with their knowledge of livestock, the immigrants brought cheese-making skills.  Soon after the Swiss formed the colony at New Glarus in 1845 they were making Swiss cheese. ***

     *** Early cheese factories in Wisconsin were really cooperatives.  A number of farmers got together and agreed to bring their milk to a central place.  A building was constructed and a cheese maker employed.  By 1870 there were about fifty cheese factories in Wisconsin.  Butter making was also becoming commercial.

     The dairy industry did not have much of an incentive until the collapse of the wheat boom.  A cow, in 1848, was worth about twelve dollars and not more than twenty-four dollars ten years later.  There were a few farmers, of course, who made butter and shipped it to Milwaukee, or when the weather was too warm for shipping or keeping butter, they made cheese.

     It was soon learned that in the hilly parts of the state, where it was impossible to raise much corn, more money could be had from selling the whole produce to the factories for cheese; while in the mixed farmin country where hogs were kept in large numbers, in fact exceeded cattle by 40 percent, it was more profitable to make butter and sell the skimmed milk to the farmers for the hogs.  So the cheese factories were in the hilly Dane dairy towns of Blue Mounds, Vermont, Perry, and Primrose, and the butter factories were in the mixed farming towns of Springfield, Bristol, Fitchburg, and Rutland. ***

*** pg 52  The Wisconsin Dairymen's Association carried news of Wisconsin dairy products to other states, and created markets for Wisconsin butter and cheese.  In the Centennial Exposition at Philadelphia in 1876, Wisconsin stood next to New York in the excellence of its dairy products, even though many of Wisconsin's best cheese factories did not exhibit.

     In 1867 there were 245,000 dairy cows in Wisconsin; in 1912 there were 1,460,000; and in 1945 there were 2,585,000.  In 1976 there were 1,811,000. ***