July 6 to 8, 2015
Rhinelander is a city of almost 8,000 in Oneida Co. It’s also the county seat. We have been wanting to come here for a long time, this gateway to the Northwoods of Wisconsin. We also wanted to see the mythical creature, the Hodag. It was “discovered” by Eugene Shepard in autumn of 1893. This is the famous picture that he used to prove it was real. He showed the hodag at the first Oneida County fair in a dimly lit tent. People were skeptical about this creature, but believed it just enough to run out of the tent screaming when Eugene made it move, marionette-style. The hodag is still part of Rhinelander mythos today, now turned from a scary monster to a cute mascot for the community.
The first place one should stop is the Chamber of Commerce, where you can take your picture with the Hodag and pick up area information. It is at 450 Kemp St. We did just that! Don’t worry, this one is tame and LOVES posing for pictures 🙂 There are many more scattered throughout town, we saw as many as we could. This is a sample, we counted about 20 but probably missed some. You can get Hodag souvenirs here too.
Hodags downtown, such works of art!
This video is a good summary of Hodag lore.
Lets take a look at the historic downtown, it was filled with many beautiful buildings.
City Hall-1908/9
District Library-1898 This is an Andrew Carnegie library.
The Merchants and Trust Building, the library was in a room there before the current building was built.
My favorite building is the Courthouse, beautiful day or night! This is the view shortly after sunrise, then 2 AM on July 8. The night is short there this time of year. The dome is Tiffany glass, VERY unusual. It glows green at night.
Closeup of the glass panels within each square that makes up the dome.
And at night, my favorite!
There are also historical markers on site.
This sounds strange, but we often make a cemetery one of our stops. We stopped at Forest Home Cemetery to see the sites of two notable people buried here. This cemetery is large and it was a challenge finding them. The hardest one was Eugene Shepard, the man who “found” the first Hodag in fall of 1893. For someone who is largely responsible for Rhinelander’s identity, his gravesite is very humble. Here it is, plus it’s coordinates.
N45º 37.867′ W089º 23.912
The other gravesite is John W. Heisman, founder of the Heisman Trophy. His is even more humble, it’s a flat marker. This is how we found it. Look for the Donaldson large monument, it is in front of that.
N45º 37.867′ W089º 23.973
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What a fun trip!!! The pie looks AWESOME!!!! Hope a Packer fan buys the Packer house! Thanks for sharing!
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We had a lot of fun! Thanks for your comment 🙂
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