Experience Wisconsin's Living History

Written By: Jennifer Buhler  |  Posted: Friday, September 2nd, 2011

                "The great, dark trees of the Big Woods stood all around the house, and beyond them were other trees and beyond them were more trees. As far as a man could go to the north in a day, or a week, or a whole month, there was nothing but woods." This was the opening lines from Laura Ingalls Wilder's book, Little House in the Big Woods, the story of her life in the wild frontier of Wisconsin. This is the same rugged life portrayed in the Chippewa River Rendezvous, a historical reenactment featuring the fur trading years.

                 As you travel through the grounds, you will experience the sights and sounds and smells of an actual early 1800's fur trading center. Among the characters you'll meet are French merchants with red knit caps, black smiths in wide leather aprons, rugged mountain men decked in skins and fur, and Native Americans in elaborately beaded costumes. The rendezvous were centers of trade where Indian, French, English, Irish, and Scottish trappers annually brought their furs to trade for goods and celebrate with boisterous festivities.

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