Visitors can walk the brick-paved street of yesteryear, lined with the homes and businesses to be found in the lake area from 1830 to 1930. Walk through those doors, to see and touch what made up everyday life in those days. Trains, cars, boats, fire engine…It’s all there, full size or in miniature.
44 Trees that fill Main Street. Represented by area Service Groups and Business in the Lake Geneva area. Special I-SPY games for the kids of every age.
Harry Clemons “Buddy” Melges Jr., considered to be one of the greatest competitive sailors in the sport of sailing, passed away on May 18, 2023. He leaves behind a remarkable legacy as one of the most accomplished and revered sailors in American history.
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Northwestern Military Academy (founded 1888) was a high school in Linn, Wisconsin which was founded by Harlan Page Davidson. Originally located in Highland Park, Illinois, the school was relocated to the town of Linn, Wisconsin on the south shore of Geneva Lake near the city of Lake Geneva in 1915 and was renamed Northwestern Military and Naval Academy (NMNA).
R. T. Crane was a manufacturer of plumbing supplies for industry in Chicago and other cities in the US. Furnishing pipe and steam heating equipment for large public buildings. Crane had a large farm and a home on Geneva lake. These windows are more than 100 years old.
A tea house commissioned by Queen Victoria for the Columbian Exhibition in Chicago in 1892. Built entirely of special woods from the island of Ceylon off the southern coast India (Sri Lanka). After the Fair the Chandler Family had it moved to the shores of Geneva Lake as a summer home.
Visiting Black Point Estate & Gardens feels like you are stepping back into a 19th-century dinner party, as you enjoy the cool lake breezes on the mansion’s veranda, sip Seipp beer, and hear the soothing sounds of the 1911 Chickering piano. Considered one of the finest examples of period architecture and furniture in the Midwest, and one of the oldest homes in Lake Geneva.
The Mill Street Room is now The Mapping the Past Exhibit. Ed & Lawrie Weed map collection has given the Museum the opportunity to showcase the history of Geneva Lake and the surrounding Lakes Area. Period Plat Maps from the mid 1800’s show property ownership through the years. Fun maps of places to fish and where to catch the train to Chicago.
The lake was first discovered in 1831 when an Army party, under the command of Major John Kinzie, was traveling along Indian Trails from Fort Dearborn in Chicago to Fort Winnebago near what is today Portage, Wisconsin. The trail led through the Potawatomi Indian Village located on a plateau near the seven ceremonial pools at the western end of the lake. There is a bronze marker located on the south shore lake path just east of Fontana marking the location where the Kinzie party first observed the lake.