The Bridgeport evening farmer. [volume] (Bridgeport, Conn.) 1866-1917, 1916-01-31
Milwaukee Celebrates
10th Birthday of
the City Today

| Milwaukee will celebrate today its
| 10th anniversary a city. Charter
Day. in the Wisconsin metropolis
commentaries the acceptance of the
city's first charter on the last day of
January, 1916. Milwaukee then had
population of about 10000, and was di-
vided into three separate villages,
known as JuneautoWn, Kilbournetown
and Walkers Point. The great Ger
man invasion, which in later years
gave the city a typicaIIy Teutonic cast,
had not yet commenced, and a ma
Jority of the people were of French
and English descent. The revolution
in Germany two years after Milwau-
KEGS municipal birth inaugurated the
great exodus from the fatherIand
where they had been so bitterly per-
secuted. While many settled on the
Atlantic coast of America, the ma
jority pushed on into the interior and
settled in Cincinnati, Milwaukee, st.
Louis and other cities
Milwaukee, like st. Louis, was
founded by a Frenchman. The CEN
tenary of the first settlement of pale
I faces on the site of Milwaukee will
be commemorated two years hence, as
1T was in 1918 that Laurent Solomon
Juneau, a French Canadian fur trader
arrived in the Pottawatonaie village
on the shores of Lake Michigan where
the Wisconsin metropolis now stands.
Juneau was born near Montreal in
1898, and he. was twenty-five when he
founded the trading which was des-
tined to be the starting point of a
great city. Until his death in 1856
Juneau was an honored citizen, and
he was the first mayor and the first
postmaster Of the city. He passed
away at Shawano, Wis, but in 1887 his
remains were removed to the city he
} had founded, and a statue of heroic
size was erected to perpetuate his mem
Dry. Juneau Park, with its high, lake
ward terraces, also commentaries the
city's French founder. 1t is a. little
irony of fate that the American city
which is most typical1y German, and
which in all it's institutions, customs
amusements and habits of life bears
marked traces of the Fatherland,
should have to honor a F'renchman as
its founderi
The growth of Milwaukee in recent
years, however has been at the ex-
pense, of the Teutonic preponderance
| OF the 425,0o0 or so Inhabitants, it is
probable that less than a, third are of
German blood, while a quarter of a
century ago, when the population was
about half the present number, at
/, least half were of Teutonie descent
The German dominance of Milwaukee,
in its political and social aspects, is
already becoming a thing of the past,
and with each passing year the spirit
of Berlin and Nuremberg and Heide1-
berg becomes less visible.
In the early days of Milwaukee the
Irish represented no uncomfortable ell
ement in Mi1waukee's population. One
of the products of that period of which
Milwaukee is proud is Thomas George
IShaughnessy, who went to Canada in
1928, became president of the Cana
dian Pacific railway in 1898. and, after
attaining the honor of knighthood,
was created lord of the British realm
on the first of this year.
Milwaukee remained a mere trading
post for 20 years after Juneau landed
there, and in 1910 had a population or
only 1,712. This had increased to near
! ly 10000 when Milwaukee became a
city in 1876, and the population dou-
bled in the following four years. In
1860 the census taker found $4,000 peo-
pie in Milwaukee; in 1870. II, 900; in
1880, 115,000, and in 1900, 285, 900. With
a population of about 425, 900, Milwau-
kee now ranks 18th among the mu-
inequalities of the United States.