50 Fun Facts About Wisconsin

Wisconsin was admitted to the Union as which numbered state?

It was the last state carved entirely from the old Northwest Territory, joining a decade after neighboring Michigan.

What is the capital of Wisconsin?

It is only the state's second-largest city; the founder named it for a president who had died just months earlier.

Wisconsin's 'Badger State' nickname originally referred to what group?

The nickname predates statehood and has nothing to do with wildlife counts; the animal was only made the official state animal in 1957.

Wisconsin borders which two of the Great Lakes?

The Mississippi River forms most of the western border, so three of the state's four sides are water.

What is Wisconsin's largest inland body of water?

Oshkosh, Fond du Lac and Neenah all sit on its shore, and the lake feeds the Fox River on its way to Green Bay.

What is Wisconsin's official state motto?

It has been the motto since 1851 and appears on the state flag and seal.

Which bird has been Wisconsin's official state bird since 1949?

Wisconsin shares it with Connecticut and Michigan, and it beat several flashier candidates to the title.

Which fish is Wisconsin's official state fish?

Musky anglers call it 'the fish of 10,000 casts'; Hayward's Fishing Hall of Fame is built inside a giant fiberglass one.

What did Wisconsin name its official state beverage in 1987?

Given the state's brewing fame it surprises many, but the dairy lobby got there first.

Which dance became Wisconsin's official state dance in 1993?

It reflects the German, Polish and Czech immigrants who filled the state's dance halls; the state also has an official waltz and ballad.

Which mineral, an ore of lead, is Wisconsin's official state mineral?

The southwestern hills were dug so heavily for it in the 1820s and 1830s that the state got its nickname from the diggers.

What is Wisconsin's official state soil?

Named for a city in Langlade County, it is a glacial soil that suits both potatoes and dairy pasture.

Roughly what share of the US cranberry crop does Wisconsin grow?

The cranberry has been the official state fruit since 2003, and most of the crop is grown in the central sands around Wisconsin Rapids.

Wisconsin grows around 90 to 95 percent of America's ginseng; which county produces almost all of it?

The Wausau-area crop is prized in Asia, and Chinese buyers reportedly pay a premium for roots grown in that specific soil.

Roughly what fraction of all cheese made in the United States comes from Wisconsin?

It is also the only state with a master cheesemaker program, modeled on the apprenticeship systems of Europe.

Wisconsin's official state pastry, an oval Danish, is most associated with which city?

A traditional one weighs about a pound and a half and takes three days to make because the dough must rest overnight.

Which city calls itself the 'Bratwurst Capital of the World'?

Locals insist a brat belongs on a hard roll, not a bun, and the city's Brat Days festival includes a world eating championship.

Culver's opened its first restaurant in 1984 in which small town?

The company still keeps its headquarters just across the Wisconsin River in Prairie du Sac.

At a Wisconsin supper club, what all-you-can-eat meal is the Friday-night staple?

The tradition grew out of Catholic meatless Fridays and Prohibition-era taverns that needed a cheap draw.

In 2023 Wisconsin lawmakers named which drink the official state cocktail?

Wisconsinites drink so much of the base spirit that the state has long been one of Korbel's biggest markets.

The Packers take their name from a company that packed what?

Curly Lambeau's employer put up money for uniforms in 1919 on the condition the team carry its name.

What makes the Packers' ownership unique among major-league US teams?

More than 500,000 people own stock that pays no dividend, cannot be resold and grants no ticket privileges.

Which coach led the Packers to victory in the first two Super Bowls?

The Super Bowl trophy was renamed for him in 1970, months after his death.

Which Packers safety invented the Lambeau Leap in 1993?

He scored after Reggie White recovered a fumble and lateraled to him against the Raiders; the NFL later exempted the leap from its celebration crackdown.

Who made the first foam Cheesehead hat in 1987, cutting it out of his mother's couch?

His company Foamation still makes them in St. Francis, and the Packers themselves bought the business in 2023.

What does University of Wisconsin mascot Bucky Badger do after every Badgers score?

He does one for each point on the scoreboard, so a 70-point blowout means hundreds of them by the fourth quarter.

Harley-Davidson and which rival were the only two major US motorcycle makers to survive the Great Depression?

William Harley drew up his first small engine at age 20, meant to power a bicycle rather than a motorcycle.

Frederick Miller launched his Milwaukee brewing business in 1855 by buying which small brewery?

He paid $2,300 for it; the name was revived in the 1990s for the Icehouse and Red Dog labels.

Pabst Blue Ribbon got its name from what?

The beer was originally called Best Select, and customers simply started asking bartenders for 'the blue-ribbon beer.'

Which machine was patented in Milwaukee in 1868 by Christopher Latham Sholes and his partners?

It introduced the QWERTY layout, which spread only because Remington's version of the machine sold so well.

Frank Lloyd Wright was born in 1867 in which Wisconsin town?

He returned to the region to build Taliesin, and the town's only Wright building is a warehouse with a Mayan-style frieze.

The House on the Rock near Spring Green is a central location in which 2001 Neil Gaiman novel?

The attraction is home to a 218-foot glass Infinity Room and what it bills as the world's largest indoor carousel.

Wisconsin Dells calls itself the capital of the world for what?

The first duck-boat tours started there in 1946, more than 30 years before Noah's Ark opened next door in Lake Delton.

The county on Wisconsin's thumb-like peninsula is named for a strait the French called Porte des Morts, meaning what?

The peninsula has 50 lights and lighthouses along its two shorelines and six state parks.

Which is the largest Apostle Island, and the only one outside the national lakeshore?

In hard winters the lake freezes solidly enough that the Park Service lets visitors walk out to the mainland sea caves.

Wisconsin's 1,200-mile Ice Age Trail roughly follows what feature left by the last glaciation?

It runs from the St. Croix River to Door County and is one of only 11 National Scenic Trails.

The Wisconsin State Capitol dome holds what distinction?

A state law also bars any building within a mile of the Capitol from rising above the base of its columns.

The Hodag, a horned and spiky creature of lumberjack lore, is the symbol of which northern Wisconsin city?

Prankster Eugene Shepard 'captured' one in 1896 and confessed only when Smithsonian scientists announced a visit.

Which Wisconsin village on the Mississippi was Laura Ingalls Wilder born near in 1867?

The Big Woods of her first book were real; a replica cabin now stands on the family's old land seven miles from town.

Which artist was born in a farmhouse in Sun Prairie in 1887?

The 'Mother of American modernism' grew up on a dairy farm before New Mexico's deserts became her signature subject.

Budapest-born Harry Houdini grew up in which Wisconsin city, where his father served as a rabbi?

He liked to claim the city as his birthplace, and today its history museum runs a permanent Houdini exhibit.

Guitar pioneer Les Paul, born Lester Polsfuss in 1915, came from which Wisconsin city?

His homemade prototype, 'the Log,' inspired the Gibson model that carries his name, and he is buried back in his hometown.

Which future prime minister attended Milwaukee State Normal School in 1916 and taught in the city?

The school is now the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee, and a Milwaukee public school and library still bear her name.

Aldo Leopold wrote A Sand County Almanac from a chicken coop in which Wisconsin county?

The book came out in 1949, a year after he died fighting a grass fire on a neighbor's farm.

Margarethe Schurz opened the first kindergarten in the United States in 1856 in which Wisconsin city?

She started it in her home for her daughter and four neighbor children, using the methods of German educator Friedrich Fröbel.

Senator Joseph McCarthy was born on a farm in which Wisconsin town?

The Senate censured him 67-22 in 1954, one of only a handful of senators ever disciplined that way.

Progressive icon Robert La Follette, Wisconsin governor and senator, was known by what nickname?

Running for president in 1924 he took nearly 17 percent of the national vote and carried his home state.

A 2008 bronze statue on Milwaukee's Riverwalk honors which TV character?

Happy Days was set in 1950s Milwaukee, though it was filmed entirely in California.

That '70s Show is set in which fictional Wisconsin town?

The show ran from 1976 to 1979 in story time but from 1998 to 2006 on Fox.

Justin Vernon founded the band Bon Iver in 2006 in which Wisconsin city?

The name comes from 'bon hiver,' a greeting he picked up from the TV series Northern Exposure.