Bugline (Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul railroad)
Compiled and Edited by Michael R. Reilly
Last Revised 09/18/2007
Railroad workers living in the 1910 Sussex - Lisbon Area (unfortunately the railway they worked for isn't listed, except for some of the Chicago & North Western employees working to build the new railroad). Source 1910 Federal Census
Residence - Township of Lisbon
Cleary, Frank, 49, b. Mass., railroad foreman.
Noble, Otho, 43, laborer
Evanson, Elmer, 21, depot agent
Miller, Rheinhart (?), 50, foreman
Miller, Jacob, 49, laborer
Askew, Frank, railroad agent, bds. with John R. Small family
Pettmann, Albert, 32, laborer
Miller, Louis, 30, laborer
Dempsey, Thomas, 42, laborer.
Weaver, S (?), teamster for NWRR (age 48, born abt 1862, wife Sarina ?, age 47, son Harry, age 22, married to Gertrude, age 24, and son Clarence, age 10 - Source 1910 Federal Census, Wisconsin, Waukesha County, Lisbon Township. Related to Sussex Weavers ?)
Note the following NWRR employees boarded at a Sussex hotel run/operated by Fuller Hurdinger (?):
Seus (?), Arny or Army, 23, Superintendent NWRR
Irving, Thomas, 30, Civil engineer NWRR
Whitehouse, Myson, 29, Civil engineer NWRR
Ralely (?), Harry J., 26, Civil engineer NWRR
Davis, Fredrick E. (?), 22, Civil engineer NWRR
Railroad workers living in the 1930 Sussex - Lisbon Area (unfortunately the railway they worked for isn't listed.). Source 1930 Federal Census
Residence - Town of Lisbon
Well, Emory C, 25, telegraph operator
Held, Adam, 54, railroad caretaker
Beier, Fred, 22, section hand
Brochner, Ralph, 18, section hand (nephew to Frank Pentalli)
Schmidt, William R., 29, section hand
Stone, John W., 51, section hand
Soto, Panfilo, 23, Mexican, section hand
Sanchesz, Elenterio, 33, Mexican, section hand
Residence - Village of Sussex
Morgan, Raymond J., 33, telegraph operator
Gasman, Charles C., 51, foreman
Weber, Joseph C., 28, foreman
Miller, Reinhard, 67, foreman
Meyer (Mesye?), Arthur T., 38, station agent
Kayser, Peter, 59, section hand
McEntee, John E., 46, watchman
Johnson, Edwin, 62,
Chambers, Paul, 51,
Wileden, Charles A., 56,
Woodchick, Henry C., 62, station agent
Cleary, John T., 33, car inspector
Mudlitz, John, 46,
Stroick, Matthew F., 33, foreman
Pautzke, Alfred, 32, foreman
Muth, John, 22,
Brochner, John, 22, bds. with Muth
McCann, Elra, 21,
Petihehowski, Martin, 49,
This railroad line enters Waukesha County at Butler, then runs
westward somewhat north of Silver Spring Drive, skirting the south
of Menomonee Falls and Lannon before entering Sussex. From there it
runs to Merton and North Lake and on to Mapleton, where it enters
Dodge County.
The Sussex Depot, built in 1911, was abandoned in 1977 and moved to downtown Sussex in June 1978. In 2003, it became the Sussex-Lisbon Historical Museum. The Northwestern Railroad merged with the Union Pacific in April 1995, a dozen years ago. Before World War II, railroad passenger trains were a big deal. The Northwestern joined the competition with a special train from Chicago to Milwaukee and Minneapolis called "The 400" because that was how many miles it traveled and because they promised to make it in 400 minutes. In 1909, the railroads tried to buy up the right-of-way without condemnation, but they eventually had to resort to condemnation for recalcitrant landowners. Some people were reluctant to let the railroad go through their land. Others were not satisfied with the compensation they were offered. Usually, the railroad wanted 100-foot-wide swaths of land, for which it paid about $1,000 per acre.
When this roadway was closed down for a while, the railroad used the down time to bend the eastern end of Main Street south to intersect with Town Line Road. A double bridge was eventually built over that street. One section remains and has been known to each graduating class at Hamilton High School since 1962 as "graffiti bridge." In 1911, the Northwestern Railroad began mining Observatory Hill, a glacial hill east of Sussex, for gravel to fill their many miles of right-of-way. Traveling on raised wood trestles through the Towns of Menomonee (Menomonee Falls) and Lisbon, railroad engines would leave that gravel pit every 24 hours, pulling 150 gondolas with 22 yards of gravel each. The Sussex depot, constructed in September 1911, was about 20 feet wide and 72 feet long. At the same time, a house was built on the other side of the tracks for the section foreman. (It still stands today next to Sussex Creek.) The late Sussex resident Roy Stier used to tell a story about some temporary work his father, Fred, did for the Northwestern Railroad. It seems Guy Peterson of Madison was drilling for the company's depot, but lost the bit at 500 feet. Fred, an accomplished blacksmith and troubleshooter, was hired to retrieve the lost bit, but failed. The well driller eventually gave up on the plugged well and drilled an 800-footer next to it. Collectively, that meant about 1,300 feet of drilling. Roy said that working on the problem consumed almost a year's time. A pump house and water tower were built to take in the well's water, but it was so "hard" (filled with calcium) that it ruined the engine's boilers. The solution, Roy said, was to dam the nearby Sussex Creek, put in a pump and use creek water. The water tower and pump houses were torn down about 1930. John Hutchinson worked many years keeping the water tank filled for passing trains needing water. Meanwhile, the older Soo Line Railroad (now Wisconsin Central) had lost most of its workers to the Northwestern, which paid better wages. Frank Clarey was a section foreman in the early days, with Albert Dettmann taking care of the line east of Lisbon and Sussex. The first operating trains drove through in October 1911, though work on the line was not completed until the next year. A train accident Dec. 5, 1912, at the Herman Abel crossing (today Highway 164) marred that year's operations. A train stopped, going east, and the train behind it crashed into the caboose, causing a lot of train and property damage. The caboose stove set the wreckage on fire, burning three cars: a wood slab car, a general merchandise car and the caboose itself. |
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| İSussex Sun 2007 |