34200 GENEVA RD

34200 GENEVA RD

Kenosha

Wheatland

1

19

E

2

1851

2019

cemetery

No

A non-extant parsonage was constructed in 1895, and the parish had over 110 families at the turn of the century. In 1907, a large fire destroyed the church, parsonage, and school; and a new Gothic Revival style church building AHI #240462 was constructed that same year by Olaf Hoganson for $17,000. The church held services in German until the 1910s.

A new brick school AHI #240463 was completed in 1916 for $11,000 and contained four classrooms.

The church and school were renovated in 1941 and again in 1954. The school was remodeled in 1967; and in 1973, the parish switched to a completely lay staff at the school. The latest round of additions to the school building were completed in 2001, including an elevator.
The parish had 225 families by 1976.

Decorative wrought iron crosses are commonly found in cemeteries throughout Germany and around the Black Sea in southern Russia. Iron cross grave markers can also be found in thousands of cemeteries across the American heartland, from Kansas to central Canada and from the Mississippi River to the Rocky Mountains. Unlike wooden crosses, those made of metal were capable of withstanding the elements over time. Wrought iron cross grave markers in the United States were used predominately by Catholics of German, Polish, and Czech heritage during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The tradition of wrought iron cemetery crosses is especially tied to the wave of German migration to the United States from the Volga region of Russia that started in the 1870s. Many Volga Germans first traveled to Wisconsin before settling in heavy concentrations in Great Plains states.

Many cross-making blacksmiths learned their trade before they immigrated to the United States during the late nineteenth century and were from a variety of nationalities including German, Irish, Hungarian, Czech, Ukrainian, and French. Use of the wrought iron crosses waned by the end of World War II, as tombstones of granite, marble, or concrete increased in affordability and the demand for other services of local blacksmiths declined. During the late 1980s and 1990s, wrought iron cemetery crosses in North Dakota were heavily researched and documented by the Institute of Regional Studies at North Dakota State University. This marks what appears to be the first major research conducted on the subject and recognizes the wrought iron crosses not solely as a product of a cultural group or matter of ethnic tradition, but also an as folk-art form.

Crosses were commonly homemade, while others were manufactured commercially throughout the region by blacksmith shops and foundries. Companies known to manufacture the crosses in Southeastern Wisconsin include Badger Wire and Iron Works of Milwaukee, active during the early twentieth century and the foundry of Hubert Wagner in Burlington in neighboring Racine County, active during the late nineteenth century.

Some of the crosses in the St. Alphonsus Catholic Cemetery are stamped “Burlington,” and therefore were likely produced by the foundry of Hubert Wagner of Burlington, Wisconcin. Hubert Wagner was born in France in 1824 and migrated to Pottsville, Pennsylvania in 1844. There he married Salome Zwiebel of France in 1846 and went on to have eight children: Charles, Hubert Jr., Elizabeth, John, William, Mary, Theresa, and Emma. In 1856, Wagner moved his family to Burlington, Wisconsin, where Hubert partnered with Anton Zwiebel to open a machine shop and brass foundry in a wood frame building on Pine Street north of Milwaukee Avenue. The partnership dissolved in 1863, at which time Wagner continued operating the company under his own name. In 1867, Wagner partnered with F. G. Klein, continuing the machine shop and iron foundry. Among their products were threshing machines and fanning mill irons. The foundry was producing wrought iron cemetery crosses by the 1870s. In 1875, the company hired John P. Mather to set up agents for selling Wagner’s Threshing Machines in Minnesota and Iowa. The company was producing corn shellers, churns, Iron Horse Hitching Posts, cast iron sinks, and leach tubs by 1877. Wagner bought out Klein’s interest in the company in 1879 and continued its operation for a while under his own name and later Burlington Foundry & Machine Shop. By 1881, the company was known as Hubert Wagner’s Machine Shop & Foundry and was marketing a hay and straw cutter. In 1884, Wagner’s sons, Hubert Jr., William, and John Wagner, began leasing their father’s machine shop and foundry under the name Wagner Brothers Burlington Foundry. The majority of the crosses in St. Alphonsus cemetery date from the 1870s and 1880s.

“About our Parish,” St. Alphonsus website <www.st-alphonsus.com/about.php> Churchin Vrooman, Nicholas and Patrice Avon Marvin, eds. Iron Spirits. Fargo, ND: North Dakota Council on the Arts, 1982. Winistorfer, Jo Ann. “Iron Crosses: Sentinels of the Prairie.” North Dakota Living, April 2003. Isern, Thomas D. and Kevin Nesemeier. Wrought Iron Cross Cemeteries in North Dakota-Continuing Survey, 1998-99. Fargo, ND: North Dakota State University Institute for Regional Studies, 2000.

Not Listed

Yes