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are questions that we have received about St. Germain
and our area. |
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questions come in no particular order and no attempt has
been made to sort them into groups. You may scroll or
use the menu below this to go to a particular question. |
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| What
does PSL stand for? |
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PSL is a derogatory term sometimes used by developers, real
estate agents, contractors, people in general, and this
site. PSL stands for "Postage Stamp Lots" where a parcel
of land or a resort, usually bordering water, is chopped
up into little lots just large enough to legally build a
house and maybe a garage along with some yard space. The
lots (or resort cabins) are then sold (or condoed) to
people from "down below" who purchase them at prices far
beyond their actual worth simply to be on water. The
practice is very detrimental to a lake, but those who
PSL are ruled by greed and could not care less about the
damage to the lake. Little St. Germain is an example of
a lake that is being almost PSL'd to death. |
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The old-timers here have a saying that, if you want to
sell your house to someone from "down below" and it is
not on water, wait until it rains to show it. If
there is a mud puddle in your backyard, you can add
$50,000 to the price. |
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| How
large were the lumber camps in the late 1800's? |
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Most of the lumber camps were not real large. Rather
they were satellites of a large camp. For instance, Star
Lake had a very large lumber camp with about 2000 people
living in it with satellite camps like Camp 5, Camp 12,
and others some distance off. |
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| Is it
true that Star Lake was almost wiped out by smallpox? |
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We are not sure whether it was "almost wiped out."
However, someone did bring smallpox into the Star Lake
lumber camp and, of course, it spread rapidly. There were a
considerable number of people who died from it and are
buried in the Star Lake Cemetery which is located at the
Junction Cty N and K. |
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Many years after the smallpox epidemic, a tornado went
through the area and struck the cemetery. It blew the
wooden markers here and there from the graves of those who died
from the smallpox. They were all buried in one general
area, but it was long ago. People simply could not figure out
which markers went where to replace them, so there is
one very large marker in the cemetery to commemorate
them all. |
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| The
hodag was first seen in the Star Lake area? |
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At the risk of upsetting Rhinelander, WI which claims
the hodag as their own, it was actually first seen in a
meadow on Hwy K a short distance from the Star Lake
lumber camp. If you look closely along the left side of the
road when you come to this meadow, you will see a small,
neglected and badly weathered wooden sign in the grass stating
that the first hodag was sighted here. When the snow
melts and before the grass gets long, we are going to
take a photograph of it for the site. |
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| Did
the Star Lake camp have a medical center? |
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It certainly did and even a hospital of sorts. The
hospital was located on an island in Star Lake, probably
to keep contagious people from the camp. Since Pine
Island is the largest island, it is probably safe to say
it was located there, but who knows now? Keep in mind
that the Star Lake water level was much lower than it is today, so this
island and the others, would have been larger. |
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| Why
is it named Star Lake? |
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It was named after Harry Star who was killed in an
accident while they were driving pilings for the
railroad bridge. |
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| Does
anyone know who built the first cabin in our whole area? |
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We do not know his name, but we know it was built by
Bob's Lake in the Star Lake area. Perhaps his first name
was Bob, we do not know. It was built even before the
Star Lake lumber camp existed. |
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| Why
are so many area lakes named after women? |
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Most of the lakes in our area were named by the early
lumberjacks. Our area lumber camps had many camp
followers as they were known, including prostitutes.
There were few other women in the area besides them.
Some of these prostitutes also acted as nurses, shrinks,
shoulders-to-cry-on, and some married lumberjacks. Most
of the lakes in our area with female names were named
after camp prostitutes. |
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| How
did Lost and Found Lakes get their names? |
A group of Chippewas stopped by some lumberjacks who
were working in the woods and asked if they were close
to Lost Lake (it was not called Lost Lake then) which is
where they were going to camp. The lumberjacks said it
was not far and pointed them in the right direction.
When the Chippewas left, the lumberjacks decided to call
the lake Lost Lake. One of the lumberjacks said, "Well,
if we have a Lost Lake, we should have a Found Lake!"
The lumberjacks agreed. |
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| How
did Lake Content get its name? |
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A government surveyor was working the area by this lake
and brought his wife along one day. As they were eating
lunch by the lake, she said, "I could be content right
here!" The surveyor named the then unnamed lake Lake
Content. |
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| Who
built the first cabin in St. Germain? |
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Lawrence Weber and the cabin was located at the end of
Weber Road off Hwy 155. His cabin was purchased by a
museum which transported it away for an exhibit. |
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| What
was a blind pig? |
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Blind pigs were places where people could purchase
alcohol on the sly. There were several in our area, but
we have only been able to verify the location of two.
There was one located on an island in Star Lake and was
evidently well-hidden from the camp bosses. Old-timers
say they heard it was a deep hole in the ground making
it invisible through the brush on the island. A person
would lower money down and bring a bottle back up. |
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It was
forbidden to have alcohol in the lumber camps and the
camp bosses were strict about this rule. The early
lumberjacks in the Star Lake camp utilized the island and
other blind pigs located outside the camps. If the camp
bosses found out about a blind pig, they would wipe it
out. The one on the island was not found out by them for a
long time. |
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The only other blind pig we have been able to verify was
located on Hwy 155 on a curve very close to where Howard
"Pop" Dean had his home, but on the opposite side of the
road. "Pop" had nothing to do with the ownership of this
pig, but certainly would have been aware of it. This one
was more obvious and better known than the one on the
island in Star Lake. But the one on Star Lake was
long-gone by the time this one popped up during
prohibition. There is a regular house located there now,
but the owner probably has no clue about the history of
the lot. |
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There are rumors of other blind pigs in our area both
during the lumbering days and during prohibition.
However, we have not been able to verify them. Also, the
blind pigs in this area were not like the ones in the
cities. The city ones started out by having animals do
tricks and people would pay to watch the animals. They
would then be served "complimentary" drinks. The ones in
our area had nothing to do with animals and were kept
secret and undercover and people purchased bottles
directly from them. |
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What were the first buildings in the St. Germain Mall? |
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This is a source of arguments because different people
say different buildings were first. It took a lot
of investigation and and talking with old-timers to come
up with what we think were the first buildings. Welch's
Sport Shop (now called St. Germain Sport Shop)built by
Allen Welch was most likely the first building. |
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The second and third buildings are up for grabs because
there seems to be little agreement on this. The grocery
built by Al Camp (Camp's Red Owl) and the restaurant (St
Germain Restaurant) built by Walter Anderson vie for
second. It seems more people lean towards the restaurant
as being second and the grocery store as being third.
The restaurant building was moved away to make room for
the new grocery store, but we do have a photo of it in
What's What. |
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Although Rux's Standard Station was not technically in
the mall, it would have to be considered fourth. The
station stood where the Subway is now located. |
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What businesses started the St. Germain Chamber of
Commerce? |
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The actual beginning of our Chamber of Commerce was
started by Ed Gabe and Oscar Eliason. They called it the
Highway 155 Club and would meet in Ed Gabe's home. More and
more resort and business people became part of the club
and it eventually expanded into a regular Chamber of
Commerce. |
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Who was Jean Francois St. Germain? |
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Jean Francois was with the French army and, when his
enlistment was over, remained in the area. He married a
Chippewa woman and settled down as a trapper and trader. |
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If St. Germain was named after Jean Francois, why is the
statue in front of the Chamber of Commerce an Indian? |
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We really don't want to get into this because anyone who
questions this is automatically a racist. The original
statue was that of an Indian. That statue became badly
weathered, so it was replaced. There was a group who
wanted the statue to be replaced with a French fur
trapper to represent Jean Francois. The politically
correct, never a group to be swayed by facts, won. |
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What was the Red Dye Incident? |
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You rarely hear about it anymore, but it was a bone of
contention for a long time. Court Huelsbeck was on the
town board at the time and was one who often growled
about it years later. As we understand it, the town
board voted $1500 to put red dye into the septic systems
of the places on Little St. Germain Lake. They wanted to
find out which homes and resorts were leaking sewage
into the lake. |
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Various people with resorts and homes on the lake put
pressure on the town board and it was never done. To top
it off, the $1500 disappeared! |
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How did St. Germain actually get it's name? |
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Our township was once part of Cloverland. When it was
split off, it was named Farmington, a ludicrous name for
the town, but purposely done by the lumber companies and
railroad. Anyway, it was eventually decided to change
the name and the public turned in choices they thought
would be appropriate. The townspeople voted on the
choices and the name Lakewood won. |
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With no public input or notification of any kind, it was
officially entered in as St. Germain. No one seems to
know the person or persons responsible for this. Small
town politics at its best! |
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