- Narrator: In 1805, Lieutenant Zebulon Pike,
sent on an expedition to explore the Mississippi river,
stopped at a sand prairie
that French explorers called "Prairie La Crosse."
- Man, as Zebulon Pike: Came up Prairie La Crosse,
so named from the ball game played on it by the Sioux.
This prairie is very handsome.
It is bordered by hills
similar to those of the Prairie du Chien.
- Narrator: Climbing a tall bluff,
Pike was overcome by what he saw.
- Man, as Zebulon Pike: It is altogether a prospect
so varied and romantic
that man may scarcely expect to enjoy such a one,
but twice or thrice in the course of a life.
- Narrator: La Crosse, Wisconsin,
the city that sprang up on that prairie,
today retains the beauty that so struck Zebulon Pike.
- Chuck Lee: La Crosse is situated
on the banks of the Mississippi,
and in the middle of the Driftless region,
the unglaciated region of southwestern Wisconsin,
a topography created basically by erosion,
as the glaciers retreated.
And so it is contrary to the Midwest's image,
much more rugged.
Like practically every other river city,
La Crosse sits on a sandy, alluvial plain
formed by the juncture
of the Mississippi, the Black River,
and the La Crosse River.
- Narrator: The confluence of the three rivers
gave life to the city.
The Black River, its banks lined with valuable white pine,
brought in great wealth.
The valley of the La Crosse
provided a route through the hills for the railroads.
And the Mississippi brought commerce,
a lifeline to the rest of the world,
and gave the city its identity as a river town.
[chatter, music, splashing]
In 1841, Nathan Myrick borrowed a government keel boat
at Prairie du Chien, filled it with a stock of goods,
and with three passengers, poled his way up the Mississippi
to Prairie La Crosse.
- Ed Hill: He was a New Yorker, and came west.
He heard about this Prairie La Crosse site,
thought it lent itself well
to the kind of trade he wanted to get into.
- Narrator: When he built a trading post,
Myrick became the first European settler of Prairie La Crosse.
Myrick's account books show that he was an Indian trader,
exchanging goods for silver and furs
with the Ho-Chunk who remained in the area
they called [Ho-Chunk name.]
The settlement grew slowly.
After 10 years, La Crosse consisted of five houses,
a warehouse,
and a long shed used as a bowling alley.
But soon after, Fredericka Levy,
who lived in the little settlement,
wrote that "settlers came in with a rush,"
drawn by the prospects of the huge pine forests to the north.
- Ed Hill: Some of the earliest lumber in this area
was done by the Mormons.
And they were getting logs and lumber
from farther up on the Black River,
up toward Black River Falls.
And that lumber was to be used
for the construction of buildings in Illinois.
Then, in 1852, the Federal Land Office moved from Mineral Point,
and it was there because of the mines,
to La Crosse because of the timber.
So as soon as the government began opening these pine-lands,
lumbering took off furiously.
Supplying of goods, and food, and everything else
to the whole logging/lumbering operation
was a huge business.
- Narrator: La Crosse became a busy steamboat port,
taking in goods to haul
up to the lumber camps and sawmills to the north.
- Ed Hill: From the period 1840s
up through the late '60s, maybe the '70s,
I can hardly imagine a La Crosse without the steamboats.
And steamboats, let's face it,
have a romantic appeal that few other historical objects do.
They're noisy.
They're dramatic when they move.
The most popular type of boat was the packet.
This was the pickup truck on the river, a big pickup truck,
because it carried passengers,
but it would carry anything else that you wanted.
The passengers were primarily on one of the upper decks,
there could be two or three of them.
But down on the main deck
could be sacked wheat going downstream,
it could be coal, it could be farm implements,
hogs, cattle, hay, lead,
anything at all that needed moving could be put onto a boat.
And they were the carrier of choice,
almost of necessity for a long while.
- Narrator: On the Black River, lumbermen floated whole logs
through the river's sharp turns and rapids.
They began to build steam-powered mills
in La Crosse and nearby Onalaska to turn the logs into lumber.
Raftsmen would then ride the wood to market,
steering rafts of boards with the current,
down the Mississippi.