Editing Hartford, Wisconsin (section)

===Early history and settlement===
[[File:1911 Hartford, Wisconsin High School.jpg|thumb|1911 Hartford, Wisconsin High School]]

In the early 19th century, Hartford was inhabited by the [[Potawatomi]] and [[Menominee]] people, who had a trading post on the Rubicon River and a village on the eastern shore of [[Pike Lake Unit, Kettle Moraine State Forest|Pike Lake]]. In 1831, the Menominee surrendered their claims to the land to the United States Federal Government through the [[Treaty of Washington, with Menominee (1831)|Treaty of Washington]], and the Potawatomi surrendered their land claims in 1833 through the [[1833 Treaty of Chicago]], which (after being ratified in 1835) required them to leave the area by 1838.{{sfn|Quickert|1912|pp=17-18}}<ref>{{cite journal |last1 = Gerwing |first1 = Anselm J. |title = The Chicago Indian Treaty of 1833 |journal = Journal of the Illinois State Historical Society |date = Summer 1964 |volume = 57 |issue = 2 |pages = 117–142 |jstor = 40190019 |issn = 0019-2287 }}</ref> However, when the first White settlers arrived in 1843, they found that the Potawatomi were still living at the Pike Lake village.{{sfn|Quickert|1912|pp=30}} Some Native Americans remained in the area and were referred to as "strolling Potawatomi" in contemporary documents because many of them were migrants who subsisted by [[squatting]] on their ancestral lands, which were now owned by White settlers. Eventually the Potawatomi who evaded forced removal gathered in northern Wisconsin, where they formed the [[Forest County Potawatomi Community]].<ref>{{cite web|title=Potawatomi History|url=https://www.mpm.edu/content/wirp/ICW-152|publisher=Milwaukee Public Museum|access-date=2020-02-20}}</ref>

In July 1843, Timothy Hall became the first White person to purchase and settle land in the Hartford area, although when he arrived he found a Canadian named Jehial Case squatting near his land. Later that year, German immigrant settlers John Thiel and Nicolaus Simon surveyed the Hartford area and determined that the Rubicon River would be a suitable location for a hydropowered mill. The following year, James and George Rossman joined Simon and Thiel's venture. The men purchased forty acres abutting the rapids of the Rubicon River<ref name="hartford">{{cite web|last=Hartford Centennial Committee|title=Hartford, County & State History|url=http://ci.hartford.wi.us/Hartford_History/Hartford_History.pdf|access-date=2012-11-06|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120301212004/http://ci.hartford.wi.us/Hartford_History/Hartford_History.pdf|archive-date=2012-03-01|url-status=dead}}</ref> and constructed a dam and a sawmill that harnessed the river's power to make lumber from the [[old-growth forest]]s covering the area.{{sfn|Quickert|1912|pp=29-30}} In 1846, a third Rossman brother, Charles, arrived in Hartford and constructed a [[gristmill]] to process grain grown by the settlers.{{sfn|Quickert|1912|pp=40}} On January 31, 1846, the land was incorporated as the Town of Wright, before the name was changed to the [[Hartford (town), Wisconsin|Town of Hartford]] in February 1847,<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://townofhartfordwi.com/town-history/ |title=Town of Hartford: Town History |access-date=2021-01-03 }}</ref> after [[Hartford, Connecticut]]. Many of the original settlers were [[Yankee]]s from [[New England]] and were part of a wave of farmers who headed west in the early 1800s, though some other settlers—including Theil and Simon—were German immigrants. The early settlers cleared land for farming; constructed roads; created a post office;<ref name="inspirock">{{cite web|url=https://www.inspirock.com/united-states/hartford-wisconsin-trip-planner|title=Hartford Trip Planner • See & Do more in your Hartford holiday|website=inspirock.com|access-date=2021-04-23}}</ref><ref>The New England Connecting Barn, Wilbur Zelinsky, Geographical Review Vol. 48, No. 4 (Oct., 1958), pp. 540-553</ref> erected churches, starting with the [[Congregational church|First Congregational Church of Hartford]] which formed in 1847 and followed by Methodist, Baptist, Lutheran, and Catholic churches in the 1850s;<ref name="early">{{cite book |date=1881 |title=History of Washington and Ozaukee Counties, Wisconsin |url=https://content.wisconsinhistory.org/digital/collection/wch/id/12029 |location=Chicago |publisher=Western Historical Company |pages=412–422 }}</ref> and established businesses to serve the town's agricultural economy, including equipment wholesalers, general stores, and dry goods dealers.<ref name="Encyclopedia">{{cite web|title=Encyclopedia of Milwaukee: Hartford |url=https://emke.uwm.edu/entry/hartford/ |publisher=University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee|access-date=2021-01-03}}</ref>

The [[Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul and Pacific Railroad|La Crosse and Milwaukee Railroad]] was constructed through the community in 1855, with Louis Thiel, son of surveyor John Thiel, being a gatekeeper at the St. Paul railroad.<ref name="Encyclopedia"/> And while rail connections were important to Hartford's growth into the early 1900s,<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://ci.hartford.wi.us/Hartford_History/Hartford_History.pdf |title=Hartford Website Historic Page |access-date=2010-05-14 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120301212004/http://ci.hartford.wi.us/Hartford_History/Hartford_History.pdf |archive-date=2012-03-01 |url-status=dead }}</ref> the company failed in 1861. Many local landowners had taken out mortgages on land for the railroad in exchange for company shares. The company's failure left the landowners with mortgages to pay off, creating a local crisis in which some families were forced to sell their farms. The ''Hartford Home League'' newspaper started during the crisis to advocate for the farmers.<ref name="Encyclopedia"/>{{sfn|Quickert|1912|pp=91-92}}

The community's early years saw increasing tension between the settlers and Native Americans. For example, on August 25, 1861, a group of approximately a dozen Native Americans was living near [[Horicon Marsh]], northwest of Hartford. They owned a horse, which got loose and wandered into a neighboring settler's cornfield. The settler shot and killed the horse, and the Native Americans vowed to take revenge. The story traveled quickly, becoming increasingly exaggerated as it spread. By the time the story reached Hartford on August 26, the dozen peaceful Native Americans had been transfigured into an army of 5,000 warriors preparing to massacre the settlers in the area. Many able-bodied men in Hartford armed themselves, formed a war party, and set out to fight the Native Americans. But when they arrived at Horicon Marsh they found that the threat was entirely fictional. The incident caused widespread fear among the local Native American community as well as in the surrounding settler communities.{{sfn|Quickert|1912|pp=93}}<ref>{{Citation | last = Quaife | first = M. M. | title = The Panic of 1862 in Wisconsin | jstor = 4630295 | journal = The Wisconsin Magazine of History | volume = 4 | issue = 2 | year = 1920 | pages = 166–195 }}</ref>