Wauwatosa

History

The lush Menomonee Valley of the Wauwatosa area provided a key overland gateway between the rich glacial farmland of southeastern Wisconsin and the Port of Milwaukee. In 1835, Charles Hart became the first Euro-American to settle here, followed that year by 17 other families. The following year a United States Road was built from Milwaukee through Wauwatosa, eventually reaching Madison. Charles Hart built a mill in 1845 on the Menomonee River which gave the settlement its original name of "Hart's Mill." The mill was torn down in 1914. The Town of Wau-wau-too-sa was created by act of the Wisconsin Territorial Legislature on April 30, 1840. As of the 1840 census, the population of the Town of Wau-wau-too-sa or Wauwatosa was 342. The town government was organized in 1842. The town's borders originally extended from the present-day Greenfield Avenue in the south to Hampton Avenue in the north, and from 27th Street in the east to the Waukesha County line in the west, encompassing sections of present-day Milwaukee, West Milwaukee and West Allis, plus the southern part of former North Milwaukee, which was wholly annexed into the city of Milwaukee in 1927. Most of the town was farmland through the remainder of the 19th century. In 1849, the Watertown Plank Road was constructed through Wauwatosa, mainly following the old Madison territorial road. In 1851 Wisconsin's first railroad (later The Milwaukee Road) established Wauwatosa as its western terminus. The Village of Wauwatosa was incorporated from the central part of the Town of Wauwatosa in 1892, and was rechartered as the City of Wauwatosa on May 27, 1897. On November 25, 1952, Wauwatosa more than doubled its size by annexing of land west of the Menomonee River, the entire remaining portion of the Town of Wauwatosa,…

Geography

According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of , all land. Eastern Wauwatosa is also known for its homes and residential streets, at one time just a short streetcar ride away from downtown Milwaukee. Prior to the arrival of Dutch elm disease, many of Wauwatosa's older residential streets had large gothic colonnades of American elm trees. In Wauwatosa, the Menomonee Valley made it easier to quarry portions of the Niagara Escarpment, which provided the necessary materials for cream-colored bricks and limestone foundations used in many homes and public buildings throughout the region.

Race & ethnicity

Most-observed species

• American Robin

  Turdus migratorius Linnaeus, 1766 · Aves
  49,288
• Northern Cardinal

  Cardinalis cardinalis (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  49,144
• Black-capped Chickadee

  Poecile atricapillus (Linnaeus, 1766) · Aves
  45,069
• American Goldfinch

  Spinus tristis (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  40,381
• House Sparrow

  Passer domesticus (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  38,947
• Mourning Dove

  Zenaida macroura (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  35,875
• Downy Woodpecker

  Dryobates pubescens (Linnaeus, 1766) · Aves
  35,183
• House Finch

  Haemorhous mexicanus (P.L.Statius Müller, 1776) · Aves
  33,042

Largest nearby schools

• HAPA-Hmong American Peace Academy K3-12
  Other · Milwaukee · 1,828 students · 28.6:1 ratio
• Hamilton High
  High · Milwaukee · 1,439 students · 14.2:1 ratio
• Obama School of Career and Technical Education
  Other · Milwaukee · 1,402 students · 29.8:1 ratio
• Milwaukee Academy of Science
  Other · Milwaukee · 1,401 students · 20.3:1 ratio
• Reagan College Preparatory High
  High · Milwaukee · 1,343 students · 22:1 ratio
• King International
  High · Milwaukee · 1,283 students · 17.8:1 ratio
• Nathan Hale High
  High · West Allis · 1,261 students · 16.8:1 ratio
• Riverside High
  High · Milwaukee · 1,229 students · 13.8:1 ratio