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Did You Know?
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March 1883 Wisconsin Telephone Company installed the first telephone exchange in Kaukauna. In 1948 the dial phone came to Kaukauna.
The Kaukauna interurban electric streetcar ran from 1901-1928.
Nicolet and Park schools were the first buildings to house what is now Kaukauna High School.
In 1891, the City of Kaukauna had 2 newspapers, Kaukauna Times established in Sept. 1880 and The Kaukauna Sun established in 1885. In 1917 they consolidated.
Kaukauna has a post office since March 5, 1831. We were the 3rd community in the State of Wisconsin to have a post office.
The first paper mill in Kaukauna was built in 1872 by Stovekin & Frambach called the Kaukauna Paper Company.
The Outagamie County Teachers College operated in Kaukauna from 1912-1972.
Kaukauna Community Hospital operated from 1954 to 1999.
The first cornerstone was laid for the Kaukauna Public Library on July 21, 1905. In 1976 the Kaukauna Public Library added a 6,300 sq. ft. addition.
Kaukauna’s nickname is “The Electric City”.
There are 5 canal locks on the river in Kaukauna.
O.G. Lord was Kaukauna’s first doctor in 1873.
In 1969 the city set aside 240 acres to form the 1000 Islands Conservancy Zone.
The Stockbridge Indians arrived from New York in 1822 and settled on the south side of Kaukauna. Captain Hendrick Aupaumut, a member of the Stockbridge tribe, served as an aide to General George Washington.
Kaukauna has 14 parks – LaFollette, Horseshoe Valley, Thelen, Riverside, Glenview, Fassbender, White City, Strassburg, Grignon, Central, Monument, Fieldcrest, Hydro and Thilwerth.
George W. Lawe is known as the founder of Kaukauna.
Division Street in Kaukauna got its name by being the boundary line between the Ducharme and Grignon land claims.
The Veteran’s Memorial Bridge in Kaukauna was dedicated on June 16, 1984. It rises up 56 feet.
The Vaudette Theater opened in 1912 in Kaukauna, and then moved to the building that currently houses the St. Vincent de Paul store in 1938. The theater closed in 1975.
The Rialto Theater opened in Kaukauna in 1937 and closed its doors in 1965.
The oldest family in Kaukauna with descendants still living here is the family of Andrew Black.
The Population of Kaukauna is 12,983
The size of Kaukauna is 4,190 acres
Kaukauna means the stopping place of the pickerel. The name derives from the Menomini word O-Gau-Gau-Ning.
1851 marked the real beginning of Kaukauna. On March 11th of 1851 the name was changed from Grand Kaukaulin to Kaukauna.
Electa Quinney was Wisconsin’s first public school teacher. The school she opened in Kaukauna in 1828 was the first in the state where students did not have to pay to be enrolled.
The first recorded sale of land in Wisconsin occurs when Dominique DuCharme bought 1,282 acres of land that today’s Kaukauna from Wapisipine and LeBlack Tobacco for two barrels of rum in the year 1793.
In 1885 the villages of Ledyard (Southside) and Kaukauna (Northside) were incorporated into the City of Kaukauna.
In 1889 the Free Public High School was organized in Kaukauna.
In 1905 construction of the Kaukauna Public Library started with the assistance from Andrew Carnegie.
In 1932 the U.S. Post Office was constructed on the island.
In 1837 Charles Grignon built his “mansion in the woods” as a gift for his bride, Mary Elizabeth Meade.
In 1851 excavations began in Kaukauna for the locks and dam system.
In 1862 the Chicago and Northwestern Railway, the main line between Green Bay and Milwaukee comes to Kaukauna.
Before 1851 Kaukauna had many names: Kakalin, Cacolin, Cau Caulin, Kackaloo, Grand Kaukaulin, Grande Coquiller Rapids.
The first white explorer to see Kaukauna was Jean Nicolet in 1634.
On April 5, 1885 Colonel H.A. Frambach was elected Kaukauna’s first mayor.
In 1851 the first bridge was built across the Fox River at the foot of Kaukauna St. by George Lawe.
Wm. Van Dyke, owner of the Vaudette, also managed the Bijou in 1927 and for a few years after. His son Melvin would hop on his bike and pedal the film reels back and forth, occasionally waiting for the bridge to go back down.
The Rialto theater was originally the Bijou, owned by the Conkey family. In 1918, it was purchased from the Conkey's by the Cleland family who operated it as the Bijou, changed the name for a while to the "Colonial", and later sold it to the Rialto chain of theaters in 1937, which closed the doors in 1965.
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