Karl travelled northeast through Wisconsin from Milwaukee to Madison City then westwards to North MacGregor, Iowa.
He shared with the Truro newspaper that in Wisconsin there were some good roads for biking. Still, there was one thing he did not like. “Wherever there happens to be a bicycle path alongside the road, some person will tie their cow onto the fence and let them stroll across the path leaving the rope for the wheelmen to run over”.
Karl experienced this first hand and reported that while travelling along one of the cycle paths, he saw a cow lying near the path, thought he would scare it, and yelled out a wild “hurroo”. He told the newspaper that the cow jumped up, but then he realized that the cow was tethered to the fence and that the rope was stretched across the path. The rope became taut right between his two bicycle wheels, and Karl admits that he landed 10 feet ahead of his bicycle!
In 1899, over ninety percent of Wisconsin farms were dairy farms, and the state was the leading producer of dairy products in the United States. In short, there were a lot of cows in Wisconsin.
But, this wasn’t always the case.
Throughout the 19th century, Wisconsin farmed wheat, a crop that unfortunately depletes the soil’s nutrients and is also susceptible to bad weather and insects. Recognizing the vulnerability of wheat, some Winsconsin farmers started to substitute other crops, but the majority shifted to dairy farming. Many of these farmers were immigrants from Germany and Scandinavia with backgrounds and experience in dairy farming and cheese making.
The University of Wisconsin also supported the dairy industry’s promotion through their research labs. Their first professor of agriculture experimented with new dairying techniques, including the silos for the storage of feed; how to test the milk for butterfat content and bacteria, which led to better pasteurization processes. In 1880, the University offered agricultural courses to educate the farmers in the dairying business, and various farmers groups held sessions around the state with scientists and farmers to share ideas.
By 1913, Wisconsin was the leading producer of dairy products in the United States and became officially known as “America’s Dairyland.”
Today, Wisconsin is the second-largest dairy producer in the United States, generating 2.4 billion pounds of milk per month and the largest cheese producer. There are over 7,000 registered dairy farms in Wisconsin, 95% of which are family farms. Each one of these farms has on average 150 cows per herd — equating to 3,350,000 cows in Wisconsin. For the record, I didn’t see any of them tied to fences!
