Waukesha, Wisconsin
| Waukesha, Wisconsin | |
|---|---|
Old Waukesha County Courthouse
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 Location in Waukesha County and the state of Wisconsin. |
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| Coordinates: 43°00′42″N 88°13′54″W / 43.01167°N 88.23167°WCoordinates: 43°00′42″N 88°13′54″W / 43.01167°N 88.23167°W | |
| County | Waukesha |
| Government | |
| • Mayor | Shawn N. Reilly |
| Area | |
| • Total | 25.07 sq mi (64.93 km2) |
| • Land | 24.81 sq mi (64.26 km2) |
| • Water | 0.26 sq mi (0.67 km2) 1.04% |
| Population (2010) | |
| • Total | 70,718 |
| • Estimate (2012) | 70,920 |
| • Density | 2,850.4/sq mi (1,100.5/km2) |
| Time zone | Central (UTC-6) |
| • Summer (DST) | Central (UTC-5) |
| Area code(s) | 262 |
| Website | www |
Waukesha (/ˈwɔːkᵻʃɔː/ WAW-kə-shaw) is a city in and the county seat of Waukesha County, Wisconsin. A suburb of Milwaukee, it is part of the Milwaukee metropolitan area. Its population was 70,718 at the 2010 census. The city is adjacent to the Town of Waukesha.
The area that Waukesha now encompasses was first settled by European-Americans in 1834, with Morris D. Cutler as its first settler. When the first settlers arrived, there was nothing but dense virgin forest and wild prairie. The settlers laid out farms, constructed roads, erected government buildings and established post routes.
Waukesha was a New England settlement. The original founders of Waukesha consisted entirely of settlers from New England, particularly Connecticut, rural Massachusetts, Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine, as well some from upstate New York who were born to parents who had migrated to that region from New England shortly after the American Revolution. These people were "Yankee" settlers, that is to say they were descended from the English Puritans who settled New England in the 1600s. They were part of a wave of New England farmers who headed west into what was then the wilds of the Northwest Territory during the early 1800s. Most of them arrived as a result of the completion of the Erie Canal as well as the end of the Black Hawk War. When they arrived in what is now Waukesha County there was nothing but dense virgin forest and wild prairie, the New Englanders laid out farms, constructed roads, erected government buildings and established post routes. They brought with them many of their Yankee New England values, such as a passion for education, establishing many schools as well as staunch support for abolitionism. They were mostly members of the Congregationalist Church though some were Episcopalian. Due to the second Great Awakening some of them had converted to Methodism and some had become Baptists before moving to what is now Waukesha County. Waukesha, like much of Wisconsin, would be culturally very continuous with early New England culture for most of its early history.
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Wikipedia