furniture in Wisconsin is centralized especially in Sheboygan, where in 1905 was manufactured about one-third of the furniture made in the state.
Mines and Quarries.—The lead mines of south-western Wisconsin played an important part in the early development of the state (see § History). When the main deposits had been worked down to the water level, mining (up to that time principally of lead) stopped and did not start again until about 1900, when the high price of zinc stimulated renewed working of these deposits. The principal ores are galena, sphalerite or zinc blende and smithsonite or zinc carbonate, which is locally called “dry bone” and which was the first zinc ore mined in the state. In 1908 the lead product was valued at $347,592 and the zinc product at $1,711,364, Wisconsin ranking fourth among the zinc-mining states. The production of iron ore in the Gogebic and Menominee ranges on the upper Michigan border is important. Red haematite was mined in Dodge county before 1854; in 1877 the deposits in Florence county were first worked, and in 1882 276,017 tons were shipped from that county; and about 1884 began the development of the Gogebic deposits in Iron and Ashland counties. The maximum output was in 1890, being 948,965 long tons; in 1902 it was 783,996 long tons (79% from Iron county); and in 1908, 733,993 tons. The output is almost entirely haematite. There are large deposits of stratified clay along the shores of Lake Michigan, from which is made a cream-coloured brick, so largely used in Milwaukee that that city has been called the “cream city”; the total value of clay products in 1907 was $1,127,819 and in 1908 $958,395. By far the most valuable mineral output is building stone, which was valued in 1908 at $2,850,920, including granite ($1,529,781), limestone ($1,102,009) and sandstone ($219,130). In 1907 and 1908 the state ranked fifth among the states of the country in the value of granite quarried; in 1902 it ranked fifteenth. The industry began in 1880, when the first quarry (at Granite Heights, Marathon county) was opened. The principal quarries are in Dodge, Green Lake (a blackish granite is quarried at Utley and a pinkish rhyolite at Berlin), Marathon, Marinette, Marquette, Sauk, Waupaca and Waushara counties. Wisconsin granite is especially suitable for monumental work. Limestone is found in a broad belt in the east, south and west; more than 40% of the total output in 1908, which was valued at $1,102,009, was used for road-making and more than one-sixth in the manufacture of concrete. In 1907 and 1908 Wisconsin ranked seventh among the states in the value of limestone quarried. The first limestone quarries were opened at Genesee, Waukesha county, in 1848; at Wauwatosa, near Milwaukee, in 1855; and near Bridgeport in 1856. Freshwater pearls are found in many of the streams; and in 1907 and 1908 Wisconsin ranked first among the states in the value of mineral waters sold, with a value of $1,526,703 in 1907 and $1,413,107 in 1908, although in both years the quantity sold in Wisconsin was less than in Minnesota or in New York. The most famous of these springs are in Waukesha county, whence White Rock, Bethesda, Clysmic and other waters are shipped.
Forests.—In 1890 and in 1900 (when the wooded area was estimated at 31,750 sq. m., or 58% of the total area of the state) Wisconsin was the foremost state in the Union in the production of lumber and timber. In 1905 the value of the lumber and timber product was exceeded by that of Washington; but as late as 1908 Wisconsin was the chief source of the white pine supply. Next to white pine (used largely in shipbuilding) in value in 1908 were red or Norway pine (used in house building), hemlock (used for lumber and wood pulp) and white spruce, a very valuable lumber tree. In 1908 the area of the state forest reserve lands under a state board of forestry (chiefly in Oneida, Forest, Iron, Price and Vilas counties) was 253,573 acres. Forest fires have been numerous and exceedingly destructive in Wisconsin; the loss of timber and other property from this cause in 1908 was about $9,000,000.
Fisheries.—The fisheries of Wisconsin are of considerable importance; the catch in 1908 was valued at $1,067,170, lake trout and herring being the most valuable. There is a state board of commissioners of fisheries (see below, § Government), which distributed in 1908 149,338,069 eggs, fry and fingerlings, including 112,075,000 wall-eyed pike and about 12,000,000 each of lake trout and whitefish. There are state hatcheries at Madison (for brook and rainbow trout), Bayfield (brook, rainbow and lake trout and whitefish), Oshkosh (lake trout, whitefish and wall-eyed pike), Minocqua (pike, bass and muskallonge), Delafield (black bass and wall-eyed pike) and Wild Rose (brook trout).
Transportation and Commerce.—Railway building in Wisconsin began in 1851, when a track was laid from Milwaukee to Waukesha (20 m.), which was extended westward in 1854 to Madison and in 1857 to the Mississippi at Prairie du Chien. This line was the forerunner of the great Chicago, Milwaukee & St Paul system, which now crosses the southern half of the state with two trunk lines and with one line parallels the shore of Lake Michigan. The Chicago & North-Western and the Chicago, St Paul, Minneapolis & Omaha, which it controls, are together known as “The North-Western Line.” The tracks of the Chicago & North-Western (built to Janesville in 1855 and to Fond du Lac in 1858) form a network in the eastern part of the state, affording direct connexions with Chicago. The Chicago, St Paul, Minneapolis & Omaha extends into the western part of the state, where it connects with the trans-Mississippi lines of the Chicago & North-Western. The Chicago, Burlington & Quincy (owned by the Great Northern and the Northern Pacific railways) traverses the state along its western boundary and gives it access to a third great railway system with transcontinental service. The Minneapolis, St Paul & Sault Ste. Marie, in which has been absorbed the old Wisconsin Central, crosses the state and extends into the Canadian North-West, sharing in the heavy grain traffic of that section, and, like the Duluth, South Shore & Atlantic, which runs along the Lake Superior shore, is a link in the transcontinental system of the Canadian Pacific, which controls both these roads. The Northern Pacific enters Wisconsin in its north western corner and extends to the Lake Superior country. The Green Bay & Western railway between Winona and Kewaunee has ferry connexion across Lake Michigan. In 1900 there were 6538 m. of track, and on the 1st of January 1909 7512 m. Characteristic of the commerce of the state is the shipment by the Great Lakes of bulky freight, chiefly iron ore, grain and flour and lumber. The return freight movement to the Wisconsin lake ports is made up chiefly of coal from the Lake Erie shipping points for the coalfields of Pennsylvania and West Virginia. Milwaukee is one of the leading lake ports, and is the only port of entry in the state; its imports were valued at $796,285 in 1899 and at $4,493,635 in 1909, and its exports at $2726 In 1899 and at $244,890 In 1909.
To connect the upper Mississippi river and the Great Lakes, between 1840 and 1850 a canal was begun between the Fox, flowing into Green Bay, an arm of Lake Michigan and the Wisconsin river, flowing into the Mississippi,[1] and improvement of navigation on these rivers was undertaken by the state with the assistance of the Federal government; in 1853 the work came into the hands of a private corporation which in 1856 opened the canal. In 1872 it was taken over by the United States. In 1887 the route through the Wisconsin river was abandoned, and thereafter only the Fox river was improved. Up to June 1909 $3,810,421 had been spent by the Federal government on this improvement. Green Bay has communication with Lake Michigan, not only by way of its natural entrance, but by a government ship canal (built 1872-1881 by a private company; taken over by the Federal government in 1893; maximum draft in 1909, 20 ft.; projected channel depth, 21 ft.) at Sturgeon Bay, an arm of Green Bay, which cuts across the Door county peninsula. In 1908 there passed through this canal 2307 vessels carrying cargoes of an estimated value of $18,261,455.15.
Population.—The population of Wisconsin in 1890 was 1,686,880 (exclusive of 6450 persons specially enumerated); in 1900 the total was 2,069,042—an increase of 22.2% on the basis of the total at each enumeration; and in 1910 it reached a total of 2,333,860.[2] The density of the population in 1910 was 42.2 to the square mile. Of the total population in 1900, 1,553,071, or 75.1%, were native born, the increase in native-born since 1890 having been 32.3%, while there was a decrease of foreign-born of 0.6%. The falling off in foreign immigration in the decade 1890-1900 contrasts strongly with the increase of 28.1% in the number of foreign-born in 1880-1890. Of the native-born population in 1900, 84%, or 1,304,918, were born within the state. Of the foreign-born 242,777 were Germans, 61,575 were Norwegians, 26,196 were Swedes, 25,607 were natives of German Poland, 23,860 were English-Canadians and 23,544 were Irish. Of the total population 1,472,327 persons, or more than seven-tenths (71.2%), were of foreign parentage—i.e. either one or both parents were foreign-born—and 576,746 were of German, 134,293 of Norwegian, 76,593 of Irish and 70,585 of Polish parentage, both on the father's and on the mother's side. At the census of 1840, with the exception of a few thousand French-Canadians, the population was made up of American-born pioneers from the Eastern states, and in the southern portion of the territory of a sprinkling of men from Kentucky, Virginia and farther south. Before the next census was taken the revolutionary movement of 1848 in Germany led to the emigration of thousands from that country to Wisconsin, and there was an increase of 886.9% in the population from 1840 to 1850. Norwegians and other Scandinavians, Irish, Poles, Dutch, Belgians and Swiss followed. Germans and Irish are now scattered throughout the state; but the German element predominates markedly in Milwaukee. Norwegians, Danes and Swedes are more numerous in the western and northern counties. There are Finns in Douglas county and Icelanders on Washington Island, in Green Bay. Poles are chiefly in Milwaukee, Manitowoc and Portage counties, Belgians and Dutch in Brown and Door counties, German Swiss in Green, Fond du Lac, Winnebago, Buffalo and Pierce counties, and Bohemians in Kewaunee county, where they form almost 50% of the population. Some Italians are massed in Vernon and Florence counties, and there are French Canadians in the north. There were 8372 Indians, of whom 1657 were not taxed, 2542 negroes, 212 Chinese and 5 Japanese in the state in 1900. The Indians include representatives of the Menominee (1487 in 1909), Stockbridge and Munsee (582) tribe sunder the Keshcna School, Chippewa under the Lac du Flambeau School (705) and the La Pointe School (4453), Oneida (2259) under the Oneida
