Holton Street Viaducts over Milwaukee River in Milwaukee, WI

(Bridge Hunter broke Mar 22, 2023, 3D Satellite) 

Brendon Baillod posted

Here's a nice, historic Milwaukee view that is rarely seen.  This hand-colored, divided back postcard dates from about 1907 and shows Milwaukee's original Holton Street Viaduct.  It was built in 1892 to link Van Buren and Holton Streets, making access to Milwaukee's north side more practical.  The viaduct was replaced with a more modern structure in 1926 and has been substantially modernized since.  The beds of the concrete caissons are all that remains from the original structure.

It is interesting to note the large steel hulled freighter on the left of the image.  Large Lake boats used to navigate far up the Milwaukee River to reach the big tanneries that once stood around Holton and Van Buren.  The boat shown here is moored at the Milwaukee Western Fuel Company, where she is unloading coal.  I believe the A.F Gallun & Sons tannery is visible on the right.

[From Brendon Baillod's private collection. Used with permission.]
Pam Grillj: I can remember having to take the streetcar - or rapid transit as we called it back then - over the viaduct to go shopping in downtown Milwaukee. Back then - in the 40's and early 50s, it was the only place that department store shopping was available.
It was always kind of a scary ride over the viaduct. You looked out the window straight down at the river. When I was in college at Alverno, my friend Joanne Pural and I liked to go to an Italian restaurant for lunch. It was right underneath a part of one of the viaducts where it ran over land. Creepy, location but good food.

 

Rick Jennings, Aug 2021

Brendon Baillod posted

This exceptional early Milwaukee woodcut engraving arrived today.  It comes from the November 5, 1892 edition of the illustrated newspaper The Graphic and was accompanied by other detailed downtown Milwaukee engravings.  It was made to accompany an article about the great Third Ward fire of 1892 which burned over 440 buildings.

The view shows the three-masted schooner Ruby bound up the Milwaukee River with a large deckload of tan bark, bound for the tanneries near Holton Street.  

The Ruby was an interesting vessel, having built built in 1875 as a sidewheel steamer.  She burned at Chicago in 1880 and was rebuilt as a schooner, running primarily in the lumber trade on Lake Michigan.  

She is shown here near the end of her career as she was abandoned due to age and decrepitude at Chicago in 1894.  For more about the Ruby, see my previous post at: post.

[From Brendon Baillod's private collection. Used with permission.]

EarthExplorer: Apr 26, 1955 @ 17,000; AR1VDG000060030

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