Sauk County, Wisconsin

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Sauk County Neighborhoods

Sauk County government offices are located at 505 Broadway, Baraboo, WI 53913; phone: 608-356-5581.

Beginnings [1]

James S. Alban, moved in 1838 with his family to the south end of Sauk Prairie where he built a cabin in the midst of a small cluster of trees. Mr. Alban was an Ohio man who married Miss Amanda Harris. In 1836 they started for the West, spent the winter of that year and 1837 near Chicago, and in the following spring set their faces toward Wisconsin. They stopped for a time at Blue Mounds, Dane County, and their next move was to the Wisconsin River opposite what is now Sauk City. There they remained a few months watching the negotiations between the United States and the Winnebagoes. At the first notice of the extinguishing of the Indian title to the lands north of the Wisconsin River, the young couple crossed the river and became "squatters" on the southern end of Sauk Prairie. There the pioneer family of the county remained until the death of Mrs. Alban in October, 1843.

In the meantime, probably in the late fall of 1838, Abe Wood, the first permanent settler of Baraboo, had built his cabin on the bank of the Baraboo. It is said that the chance for water power and quick riches was the lodestone that drew Wood to the Baraboo rapids.

  1. Harry Ellsworth Cole, editor, A Standard History of Sauk County, Wisconsin, Lewis Publishing Company, Chicago/New York, 1918

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