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Town Addison

Source: Washington County, Wisconsin : past and present; by Quickert, Carl, ed
Publication date : 1912
Publisher Chicago : S.J. Clarke Publishing Co. Page: 25

By an act of the Legislature the town of Addison was incorporated on January 21, 1846. It included territory of the town of Wayne. On March 11, 1848, by another act, the latter was separated and the present town line established.

Timothy Hall, the first settler of the town of Hartford, found at his arrival in July, 1843, Alfred Ohrendorf to be the only settler in all of Town Addison. He had settled on Limestone creek, close to the Fond du Lac Road.

In the same summer Uriel S. Wordsworth took up land two miles further away. Hall helped him build his log house.

In 1844 four more settlers, Simeon Aaron Andrus, Harmon Ostrander, and Jacob and Franz Stuesser, arrived in the town.

Following them, and during 1845, the pioneers came in squads and platoons to take possession of the teeming wilds.

On April 7, 1846, the first won meeting was held in the home of Caleb Spaulding. It was resolved to levy $50 for incidental expenses, and $9 for the poor fund, furthermore that the town officers shall be paid $1 a day for services and that pigs shall not be left running at large.

The first street built by the town commenced near the house of J.W. Dickerson and led in a northwesterly direction to the town line. At the first election in November, 1846, a total of 44 votes were cast.

Among the first settlers of the town was Lehmann Rosenheimer who in 1844 arrived with his young wife and bought a farm. In Germany he had learned the butcher's trade, and his vocation he continued here, besides doing a lively business as a drover. He acquired extensive tracts of land in the town, and in 1846 removed to Schleisingerville in the town of Polk.

Another German whose name stands out prominently among old setters was John Schlagenhaft. He came in 1850 and was the first Catholic layman who settled in the town. In 1851 FAther Bieter of Hartford read the first mass in the old church of SS. Peter and Paul, which was built of logs. The surroundings were as primitive as the church.