EXPLORING WISCONSIN'S WATERWAYS: THE Fox - WISCONSIN


the efforts of Norbertine missionaries who came to Green Bay from Holland
in 1893 at the invitation of the bishop of Green Bay, to do missionary work
among the Belgian Catholics under his jurisdiction.
White Pillars, 403 North Broadway and North Broadway Street Historic
District*
  Built in 1836 as the office of the De Pere Hydraulic Company, White Pil-
lars, somewhat altered from its original Greek Revival appearance, now
houses the museum and research center of the De Pere Historical Society.
The society's extensive collection includes maps from the early French period
to the present, government records, newspapers, photographs, military
equipment, and many other tangible reminders of the area's long history.
  White Pillars lies within the North Broadway Street Historic District*,
a 5-
block area of North Broadway extending from Cass Street to several blocks
north of Randall Avenue. It includes primarily the residences of community
business, professional, civic, and social leaders of the late 19th and early
20th
centuries. While many of the homes are altered, the district still reflects
the
atmosphere of a prestigious residential neighborhood.

3. Former Lost Dauphin State Park Site, 5 miles south of De Pere on County
Trunk D
  Although no longer a state recreational park, the Lost Dauphin Park site
is
located in such an historically significant and beautiful place that it well
mer-
its a visit. Here lived one of the more controversial individuals in the
history
of Wisconsin's Indian people, Eleazer Williams. Usually written off by his-
torians as a fraud because in later years he claimed to be the Lost Dauphin,
the lost son of Louis XVI of France, he deserves attention because of his
work with the Oneida Indians. Of British, French, and St. Regis Indian line-
age, well-educated and trained for missionary work, he was involved with
Episcopal mission activity among the Oneidas of New York State and advo-
cated their removal farther west, away from white influence. In 1821 he came
to the Green Bay area with an Oneida delegation and representatives of other
eastern tribes to plan a settlement west of Lake Michigan. He eventually
settled at this location on the Fox River with its magnificent view and built
a
home, where he lived with his wife and ministered to the needs of the
Oneidas. Williams, a controversial figure among the Oneidas, died alone and
impoverished in 1858 in New York State. Honor finally came to him in 1947
when, in recognition of his work with the Oneidas, his remains were reburied
in the churchyard of the Holy Apostles Episcopal Church at Oneida,
Wisconsin.
  When Reuben Gold Thwaites canoed the lower Fox in 1887, he made a
special point of visiting the Williams home site. Though the house no longer
exists, here is what he saw:
      Above this [river beach] and commanding delightful glimpses of forest
and stream
      and bayou and prairie, a goodly hillock is crowned, some seventy-five
feet above
      the water's edge, with a dark, unpainted, time-worn, moss-grown house,
part log
      and part frame, set in a deep tangle of lilacs and crabs .... The ground
is historic.
      The house is an ancient landmark. It was the old home of Eleazer Williams,
in his
      day Episcopal missionary and pretender to the throne of France.33


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