Finding the First Schaal to Arrive in the United States

We stayed a few days in Horicon, which is a bit south of Oshkosh, and is in Dodge County, the destination of the first Schaal in Russ' line to arrive in the USA. We don't know a lot about him other than he, his second wife (the sister of his first wife) and 12 children arrived around 1848 and headed to Mayville to settle. We conjectured they went to Mayville because others in their Prussian village had emigrated there and encouraged them to come over. Unfortunately, 3 years after arriving, the wife died in childbirth, the husband died a few months later and the orphaned children either were taken care of by the older siblings or were farmed out to families in the area. I was interested in learning more about the siblings of Russ' great-grandfather and Mayville.

We found the cemetery where the founding Schaal and his wife are buried.  We found some of the children and their families also there, but when we went to the county records office to search for marriage, death and land records, we found out the that the court had burned in the 1870's and most of the records were destroyed.  It took a trip to the library to discover that the University of Wisconsin and the Wisconsin Historical Society have partnered to found 14 archive centers, including one in Oshkosh which has records for Dodge County. So even though we didn't find much in Mayville, I am hopeful that we will find the missing info when we go to Oshkosh.

The largest tourist attraction in Horicon is the Horicon Marsh. It is the largest freshwater cattail marsh in the USA and hosts two wildlife refuges. Humans have lived in and around the marsh for over 10,000 years. Of course, once the Europeans arrived, things went south for the marsh. A dam was built to generate power for the various industries that were being formed. The marsh water level rose and ruined hunting and overflowed onto neighboring farmland. So then the dam was torn down 20 years later and hunting resumed.  Then of course, hunting went extreme with the result that bird and muskrat populations were decimated - I mean things like using canon like devices to shoot most anything you can think of into a bird flock, killing hundreds at a time. So then the marsh was drained and changed to farmland - except no one apparently knew that drained marshland makes terrible farmland - no nutrients. Now it has been restored to marsh and the wildlife refuges protect the birds.

We enjoyed our tour of the Visitor Center which included a Morgan Freeman narrated walk through a timeline of the marsh from the perspective of an arrowhead. Weird sounding but it worked well. Outside, there is a trail that walks you through a small portion of the marsh.  Elsewhere there are miles and miles of trail.

Excited about next week, when we go to Oshkosh for the EAA Airventure Convention. We will have Chris with us for the week - a great family time!

It took a while to find the cemetery. Graceland is the pioneer cemetery and their index of names is handled by a volunteer who met us at the cemetery and used typed pages to find where Russ' ancestors are buried.  Sure hope they get digitized soon.

Several of the stones were very aged and difficult to read. We tried using water to help view the letters, but some were so covered with mold, it was impossible.

The Rock River goes through Mayville. The city has done a wonderful job of creating a green park area on both sides with a nice walkway which we wandered down after having lunch at a local pub. I have discovered a beer (actually Chris told me about it) called Spotted Cow. It is only available in Wisconsin and is delicious. I am enjoying sampling the local brews!

Cattails are abundant in the Horicon Marsh. 

Lots of wildflowers also.  Coneflowers, Queen Anne's lace, various daisies, Salvia.  Doubt that these are indigenous to the area though.

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A large metal sculpture of a young man fighting a mastodon stands in front of the Visitor Center for the marsh. Lots of evidence of man's hunting of the animal including bones and arrowheads in the area. 

We saw lots of birds in the area surrounding the Visitor Center.  Don't know what kind this is though.

Interesting entrance design for this bird apartment complex. Apparently it allows only certain species to enter the nest area.  Pretty clever. Wonder how long it takes the bird to figure it out.

The marsh seems to go on for forever. There are island like formations similar to what we saw in the Everglades where the soil has built up sufficiently to host clusters of trees. Elsewhere there are waterways winding through the cattails. The marsh is part of the migratory path for many birds, including Canadian geese.

Hundreds of Canadian geese summer in the marsh. Wonder if they have their passports in order?

We also saw a large collection of egrets.  Interesting that the different species of birds stay separate from each other, must be some kind of territorial behavior going on. So did the birds learn this from us, or did we learn it from the birds, or is it just some kind of cosmic axiom that like species clump together and keep away from others that are different? At least these groups seem to get along with each other.

Russ and I took the trail from the Visitor's Center for a ways, but when it got too steep for my scooter, Russ continued on his own. Until he reached a junction where, on the right there were about 30 geese and on the left there were a like number. These birds are huge and can be aggressive. So Russ ceded the trail to them and came back up.

Even though the marsh is freshwater, it attracts seabirds. Saw several pelicans and seagulls.