WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.520 If I told you about a state that was, you know, 00:00:02.620 --> 00:00:04.540 the birthplace of the National Republican Party, 00:00:05.000 --> 00:00:07.919 a massive hotbed for radical European socialists, 00:00:08.419 --> 00:00:11.339 a landscape scarred by the deadliest fire in 00:00:11.339 --> 00:00:14.300 U .S. history, and a place so vehemently anti 00:00:14.300 --> 00:00:16.839 -war it was nationally reviled as the traitor 00:00:16.839 --> 00:00:19.519 state during World War I, you probably wouldn't 00:00:19.519 --> 00:00:21.440 picture a guy standing in the freezing cold wearing 00:00:21.440 --> 00:00:23.859 a giant wedge of foam cheese on his head. Right. 00:00:24.000 --> 00:00:26.160 No, you definitely wouldn't. It really is the 00:00:26.160 --> 00:00:29.269 ultimate bait and switch yeah because the modern 00:00:29.269 --> 00:00:32.130 caricature of the American Midwest is that it 00:00:32.130 --> 00:00:35.570 is placid highly predictable and like entirely 00:00:35.570 --> 00:00:37.810 dairy obsessed yeah totally dairy obsessed yet 00:00:37.810 --> 00:00:40.009 when you actually crack open the historical sources 00:00:40.009 --> 00:00:43.450 that image completely shatters so today we are 00:00:43.450 --> 00:00:45.649 taking you on a deep dive into an absolutely 00:00:45.649 --> 00:00:48.570 encyclopedic history of Wisconsin which is frankly 00:00:48.570 --> 00:00:51.990 an incredibly wild ride It really is. Our mission 00:00:51.990 --> 00:00:54.729 here is to look past the modern stereotypes, 00:00:54.810 --> 00:00:57.689 to discover how this region has actually operated 00:00:57.689 --> 00:01:00.770 as a radical laboratory of democracy. We are 00:01:00.770 --> 00:01:03.350 looking at a place shaped by ancient, highly 00:01:03.350 --> 00:01:06.989 sophisticated cultures, massive ecological shifts, 00:01:07.069 --> 00:01:09.329 and honestly, some of the most bare -knuckle 00:01:09.329 --> 00:01:11.750 political battles in American history. The disconnect 00:01:11.750 --> 00:01:14.469 is profound. I mean, between the myth and the 00:01:14.469 --> 00:01:17.129 reality. The state that currently projects this 00:01:17.129 --> 00:01:20.920 image of quiet, pastoral calm was, in reality, 00:01:21.640 --> 00:01:24.739 forged in an absolute crucible of constant reinvention. 00:01:24.900 --> 00:01:27.180 OK, let's unpack this. Because to really understand 00:01:27.180 --> 00:01:29.859 how wild this story gets, we have to rewind way 00:01:29.859 --> 00:01:32.400 past the invention of cheddar cheese or modern 00:01:32.400 --> 00:01:34.879 state lines. We need to go back to the land itself, 00:01:35.000 --> 00:01:36.680 right at the tail end of the ice age, around 00:01:36.680 --> 00:01:38.959 10 ,000 BC. Right, a completely different world. 00:01:39.260 --> 00:01:42.219 Exactly. Picture a freezing tundra crawling with 00:01:42.219 --> 00:01:44.560 giant beavers and mammoths. The sources were 00:01:44.560 --> 00:01:46.560 looking at detail artifacts found near a town 00:01:46.560 --> 00:01:49.359 called Boaz, Wisconsin, showing paleo Indians 00:01:49.359 --> 00:01:52.420 actively hunting massive mastodons. Which is 00:01:52.420 --> 00:01:55.420 incredible. And geography dictates destiny here. 00:01:55.819 --> 00:01:58.200 As those massive glaciers finally retreated, 00:01:58.459 --> 00:02:01.140 they didn't just leave behind flatland. They 00:02:01.140 --> 00:02:04.219 carved out an incredibly resource -rich environment. 00:02:04.400 --> 00:02:07.439 Which was basically prime real estate. Exactly. 00:02:07.760 --> 00:02:10.560 Because of where this specific region sits, perfectly 00:02:10.560 --> 00:02:12.939 nestled between the Great Lakes to the east and 00:02:12.939 --> 00:02:15.659 the Mississippi River to the west, it was destined 00:02:15.659 --> 00:02:18.780 to become a massive hub. of civilization. See, 00:02:18.819 --> 00:02:21.860 I always imagine that era as purely survivalist, 00:02:22.759 --> 00:02:24.960 just hunter -gatherers trying not to freeze or 00:02:24.960 --> 00:02:26.979 starve to death in the snow. Yeah, that is a 00:02:26.979 --> 00:02:29.520 super common misconception. But the archaeological 00:02:29.520 --> 00:02:31.599 record tells a completely different story. By 00:02:31.599 --> 00:02:34.060 around 4000 BC, you have the emergence of what 00:02:34.060 --> 00:02:36.860 historians call The copper culture. People were 00:02:36.860 --> 00:02:39.139 gathering pure copper ore from the shores of 00:02:39.139 --> 00:02:40.560 Lake Superior. Wait, let me pause you there. 00:02:40.639 --> 00:02:43.340 They were working metal in 4000 BC. Because I 00:02:43.340 --> 00:02:45.060 thought North American cultures at that time 00:02:45.060 --> 00:02:47.879 were strictly utilizing stone and bone tools. 00:02:48.300 --> 00:02:51.060 Right. And that is exactly why this is so mind 00:02:51.060 --> 00:02:52.759 blowing. They weren't just picking up chunks 00:02:52.759 --> 00:02:54.879 of copper and chipping away at them like flint. 00:02:55.400 --> 00:02:57.900 They actually developed a sophisticated process 00:02:57.900 --> 00:03:00.719 called annealing. How does that even work without 00:03:00.719 --> 00:03:04.150 like a modern forge? It requires an incredible 00:03:04.150 --> 00:03:07.069 understanding of materials. If you just hammer 00:03:07.069 --> 00:03:09.550 coal copper, it becomes brittle and eventually 00:03:09.550 --> 00:03:12.590 shatters into pieces. These early metallurgists 00:03:12.590 --> 00:03:14.689 figured out that if you heat the copper to a 00:03:14.689 --> 00:03:17.050 very specific temperature... Like melting it? 00:03:17.509 --> 00:03:20.069 No, not enough to completely melt or smelt it, 00:03:20.469 --> 00:03:22.830 but just enough to alter its molecular structure. 00:03:23.389 --> 00:03:25.599 You essentially relax the metal. then you let 00:03:25.599 --> 00:03:28.360 it cool slowly. Wow. And this made the copper 00:03:28.360 --> 00:03:30.639 malleable enough to be hammered into sophisticated 00:03:30.639 --> 00:03:34.479 axes, harpoons, and intricate jewelry. It was 00:03:34.479 --> 00:03:36.300 a level of metallurgical technology that was 00:03:36.300 --> 00:03:38.520 completely unprecedented in North America at 00:03:38.520 --> 00:03:41.520 the time. The sheer innovation of that is wild. 00:03:42.020 --> 00:03:44.199 And the exact same river networks that allowed 00:03:44.199 --> 00:03:46.580 for that kind of technological leap eventually 00:03:46.580 --> 00:03:49.419 turned the region into a bustling center of continental 00:03:49.419 --> 00:03:51.759 commerce. Like, if you walked into a settlement 00:03:51.759 --> 00:03:55.080 called Astilon around 1050 AD, you wouldn't see 00:03:55.080 --> 00:03:57.620 a primitive camp. Not at all. You would see a 00:03:57.620 --> 00:04:00.919 massively engineered city featuring giant platform 00:04:00.919 --> 00:04:04.000 mounds. Because Astilon was incredibly plugged 00:04:04.000 --> 00:04:07.139 into a broader world, it was directly tied to 00:04:07.139 --> 00:04:09.620 the Mississippian culture. which had its massive 00:04:09.620 --> 00:04:12.099 capital down in Cahokia near modern -day St. 00:04:12.259 --> 00:04:15.340 Louis. Archaeologists excavating Aztalan have 00:04:15.340 --> 00:04:17.639 actually found marine shells that originated 00:04:17.639 --> 00:04:20.519 all the way down in the Gulf of Mexico. It honestly 00:04:20.519 --> 00:04:22.740 sounds like a corporate franchise. Like, Aztalan 00:04:22.740 --> 00:04:26.160 was an ancient northern outpost of Cahokia, strategically 00:04:26.160 --> 00:04:28.759 placed to gather all these rare local resources 00:04:28.759 --> 00:04:31.149 and ship them down the river network. That's 00:04:31.149 --> 00:04:32.829 a great way to think about it. It really makes 00:04:32.829 --> 00:04:35.410 you marvel at how heavily trafficked North America 00:04:35.410 --> 00:04:38.610 was centuries before any Europeans set foot there. 00:04:38.829 --> 00:04:40.930 What's fascinating here is how thoroughly this 00:04:40.930 --> 00:04:43.790 evidence destroys the persistent myth of the 00:04:43.790 --> 00:04:46.689 empty wilderness. When Europeans eventually did 00:04:46.689 --> 00:04:49.129 arrive, they weren't stepping onto a blank slate 00:04:49.129 --> 00:04:51.509 waiting to be civilized. They were stepping into 00:04:51.509 --> 00:04:54.860 a region that had already operated as a dynamic, 00:04:55.319 --> 00:04:58.199 deeply interconnected center of trade for millennia. 00:04:58.600 --> 00:05:00.540 Right. And speaking of those European arrivals, 00:05:00.759 --> 00:05:02.920 their grand entrance plays out like a bizarre 00:05:02.920 --> 00:05:06.399 comedy of errors. Oh, absolutely. In 1634, the 00:05:06.399 --> 00:05:09.040 French explorer Jean Nicolet paddles his way 00:05:09.040 --> 00:05:11.620 through the Great Lakes. He's entirely convinced 00:05:11.620 --> 00:05:13.860 he is about to discover a secret water route 00:05:13.860 --> 00:05:17.220 to Asia. He even packed a ceremonial silk robe 00:05:17.220 --> 00:05:20.040 to meet the Chinese emperor. Which is just amazing. 00:05:20.339 --> 00:05:22.379 Instead of China, he lands on the shores of Green 00:05:22.379 --> 00:05:25.240 Bay, Wisconsin, meets the Ho -Chunk people, and 00:05:25.240 --> 00:05:28.300 promptly names the area Le Bay de Point. Which 00:05:28.300 --> 00:05:31.060 literally translates to the Stinking Bay, probably 00:05:31.060 --> 00:05:33.319 not the glamorous Asian treat hub he had in his 00:05:33.319 --> 00:05:36.759 head. Definitely not. However, the French, and 00:05:36.759 --> 00:05:39.139 subsequently the British, quickly realized that 00:05:39.139 --> 00:05:41.800 the real wealth in this region wasn't a mythical 00:05:41.800 --> 00:05:46.069 route to China. The wealth was the wildlife Specifically 00:05:46.069 --> 00:05:49.110 beaver pelts which were highly prized in European 00:05:49.110 --> 00:05:51.829 fashion right the fur trade But the fur trade 00:05:51.829 --> 00:05:54.959 brought European influence sure, but it was really 00:05:54.959 --> 00:05:57.360 just the appetizer for the chaos that was about 00:05:57.360 --> 00:06:00.920 to hit. That ancient geographical draw of rich 00:06:00.920 --> 00:06:04.379 natural resources is exactly what lured the next 00:06:04.379 --> 00:06:06.720 massive wave of inhabitants. The mining boom. 00:06:07.060 --> 00:06:09.779 Exactly. By the 1820s and 30s, the demographic 00:06:09.779 --> 00:06:12.339 landscape gets completely upended. Suddenly, 00:06:12.759 --> 00:06:14.579 thousands of people are rushing into southwest 00:06:14.579 --> 00:06:16.740 Wisconsin. They aren't looking for gold, though. 00:06:16.819 --> 00:06:20.060 They are digging for gray gold, lead. And that 00:06:20.060 --> 00:06:22.660 lead mining boom fundamentally changed the territory. 00:06:22.899 --> 00:06:25.720 You had this sudden influx of desperate prospectors, 00:06:26.220 --> 00:06:27.899 including highly skilled immigrant miners from 00:06:27.899 --> 00:06:30.279 Cornwall and Britain. The population explosion 00:06:30.279 --> 00:06:32.459 was so incredibly rapid and the frontier conditions 00:06:32.459 --> 00:06:34.819 were so harsh that many of these miners didn't 00:06:34.819 --> 00:06:37.240 even have time or materials to build actual houses 00:06:37.240 --> 00:06:40.199 before the brutal Midwestern winter hit. So they 00:06:40.199 --> 00:06:43.360 improvised. They literally dug tunnels directly 00:06:43.360 --> 00:06:45.740 into the hillsides and lived in the dirt just 00:06:45.740 --> 00:06:47.860 to avoid freezing to death. Just burrowing right 00:06:47.860 --> 00:06:49.920 into the earth. Which, according to the sources, 00:06:50.060 --> 00:06:52.439 is exactly where the state gets its famous nickname, 00:06:52.600 --> 00:06:55.560 the Badger State. They weren't honoring the fierce 00:06:55.560 --> 00:06:57.680 little woodland animal. They were talking about 00:06:57.680 --> 00:07:00.680 human miners living in holes to survive. Yeah, 00:07:00.699 --> 00:07:03.199 that's the origin. Wait, was the Badger nickname 00:07:03.199 --> 00:07:06.060 actually an insult at first? Because it feels 00:07:06.060 --> 00:07:08.819 a little crazy that a modern state's proudest 00:07:08.839 --> 00:07:11.860 identity comes from the desperate freezing living 00:07:11.860 --> 00:07:14.420 conditions of frontier squatters. It absolutely 00:07:14.420 --> 00:07:17.040 wasn't born out of prestige. It was a marker 00:07:17.040 --> 00:07:20.939 of a chaotic land grabbing survivalist culture. 00:07:21.399 --> 00:07:24.379 But that incredibly rough environment had a profound 00:07:24.379 --> 00:07:26.699 psychological effect on the people who stayed. 00:07:27.379 --> 00:07:29.699 The historian Frederick Jackson Turner, who actually 00:07:29.699 --> 00:07:32.779 grew up in Wisconsin, formulated his famous frontier 00:07:32.779 --> 00:07:35.480 thesis based on observing this exact dynamic. 00:07:35.920 --> 00:07:38.920 Ah, right. The theory that the frontier experience 00:07:38.920 --> 00:07:41.220 is what fundamentally made America different 00:07:41.220 --> 00:07:44.230 from Europe. Precisely. Turner argued that when 00:07:44.230 --> 00:07:46.610 you take poor European immigrants and Yankee 00:07:46.610 --> 00:07:48.769 settlers from New England, throw them together 00:07:48.769 --> 00:07:51.389 in a harsh environment and force them to rely 00:07:51.389 --> 00:07:54.430 entirely on themselves, you strip away centuries 00:07:54.430 --> 00:07:57.209 of European class structures. Because aristocracy 00:07:57.209 --> 00:07:59.129 doesn't matter when you're digging a hole to 00:07:59.129 --> 00:08:02.259 survive the winter. Exactly. It forged a mindset 00:08:02.259 --> 00:08:05.800 that was fiercely independent, highly democratic, 00:08:06.339 --> 00:08:09.100 and incredibly stubborn. And we see that intense 00:08:09.100 --> 00:08:11.459 stubbornness perfectly illustrated in how these 00:08:11.459 --> 00:08:13.839 early cities were formed. My favorite example 00:08:13.839 --> 00:08:17.500 from the sources is the 1845 Milwaukee Bridge 00:08:17.500 --> 00:08:19.819 War. Oh, that is a classic. You have these two 00:08:19.819 --> 00:08:22.339 rival settlements, Junotown and Kilburn Town, 00:08:22.800 --> 00:08:24.740 sitting directly across the river from each other. 00:08:24.970 --> 00:08:27.670 The founders, Solomon Juno and Byron Kilburn, 00:08:28.310 --> 00:08:30.930 hated each other so deeply that Kilburn deliberately 00:08:30.930 --> 00:08:33.110 destroyed a portion of a bridge connecting the 00:08:33.110 --> 00:08:36.409 two sides just to economically isolate his rival. 00:08:36.549 --> 00:08:38.450 And it wasn't just a political disagreement. 00:08:38.750 --> 00:08:41.049 It sparked literal skirmishes in the streets 00:08:41.049 --> 00:08:43.750 with mobs confronting each other. They eventually 00:08:43.750 --> 00:08:46.370 cooled off and merged to form the city of Milwaukee 00:08:46.370 --> 00:08:48.950 the following year, but it perfectly captures 00:08:48.950 --> 00:08:51.450 the intense, bare -knuckle competition of that 00:08:51.450 --> 00:08:54.769 era. It really does. And that fierce, survivalist 00:08:54.769 --> 00:08:57.129 independence didn't just stay in the lead minds 00:08:57.129 --> 00:08:59.809 and trading posts. As Wisconsin transitioned 00:08:59.809 --> 00:09:02.870 into official statehood in 1848, that rugged 00:09:02.870 --> 00:09:05.750 energy evolved into a deeply radical political 00:09:05.750 --> 00:09:07.980 culture. Let's talk about that timing, because 00:09:07.980 --> 00:09:11.039 1848 is a massive year globally. It is the defining 00:09:11.039 --> 00:09:14.620 year. Across Europe in 1848, a series of democratic 00:09:14.620 --> 00:09:16.980 revolutions attempted to overthrow monarchies, 00:09:17.019 --> 00:09:19.860 and they largely failed. As a result, Wisconsin 00:09:19.860 --> 00:09:22.559 saw a massive influx of liberal, politically 00:09:22.559 --> 00:09:24.899 active European immigrants, particularly Germans, 00:09:25.220 --> 00:09:27.259 who were fleeing persecution. They arrived in 00:09:27.259 --> 00:09:30.159 the Midwest bringing deeply radical, pro -labor, 00:09:30.620 --> 00:09:32.840 and anti -authoritarian political ideas with 00:09:32.840 --> 00:09:35.340 them. Which creates a fascinating culture clash. 00:09:35.690 --> 00:09:38.070 Because they are joining forces with Yankee transplants 00:09:38.070 --> 00:09:40.509 from New England, who possessed very strict moral 00:09:40.509 --> 00:09:43.009 compasses, particularly regarding the abolition 00:09:43.009 --> 00:09:46.009 of slavery. Right. When you combine European 00:09:46.009 --> 00:09:48.409 political radicals with militant New England 00:09:48.409 --> 00:09:51.309 abolitionists, you get incredible moments of 00:09:51.309 --> 00:09:54.149 defiance. Take the Joshua Glover incident in 00:09:54.149 --> 00:09:58.049 1854. Oh, the jailbreak. Exactly. Glover was 00:09:58.049 --> 00:10:00.590 an escaped slave who had sought asylum in Wisconsin. 00:10:01.129 --> 00:10:03.169 Federal marshals tracked him down, beat him and 00:10:03.169 --> 00:10:05.190 threw him in a Milwaukee jail under the Fugitive 00:10:05.190 --> 00:10:07.570 Slave Act. And the local population did not just 00:10:07.570 --> 00:10:10.230 write a sternly worded letter to their congressmen. 00:10:10.789 --> 00:10:13.950 A mob of five thousand abolitionists essentially 00:10:13.950 --> 00:10:17.129 laid siege to the jail. They used a massive wooden 00:10:17.129 --> 00:10:19.750 beam to completely smash in the jailhouse doors, 00:10:20.250 --> 00:10:22.850 broke Glover out and successfully funneled him 00:10:22.850 --> 00:10:25.710 to Canada via the Underground Railroad. Just 00:10:25.710 --> 00:10:27.529 think about the mechanics of that. It was a highly 00:10:27.529 --> 00:10:29.929 organized, physically violent rejection of federal 00:10:29.929 --> 00:10:32.009 authority in the name of human rights. The state 00:10:32.009 --> 00:10:33.830 Supreme Court even backed them up by declaring 00:10:33.830 --> 00:10:36.629 the Federal Fugitive Slave Act unconstitutional 00:10:36.629 --> 00:10:39.429 within Wisconsin's borders. That is so bold. 00:10:39.669 --> 00:10:43.029 And that same year in 1854, in a tiny white schoolhouse 00:10:43.029 --> 00:10:46.090 in Ripon, Wisconsin, a group of local abolitionists 00:10:46.090 --> 00:10:48.250 and free soilers held a meeting that literally 00:10:48.250 --> 00:10:50.350 gave birth to the National Republican Party. 00:10:50.649 --> 00:10:52.590 Yeah, they were building brand new political 00:10:52.590 --> 00:10:55.990 machinery from scratch specifically to fight 00:10:55.990 --> 00:10:58.529 the expansion of slavery. By the time the Civil 00:10:58.529 --> 00:11:01.690 War broke out, Wisconsin's contribution was immense. 00:11:02.149 --> 00:11:05.899 They sent over 91 ,000 soldiers to fight. Their 00:11:05.899 --> 00:11:08.500 regiments formed the absolute core of the legendary 00:11:08.500 --> 00:11:11.179 Iron Brigade, which sustained some of the highest 00:11:11.179 --> 00:11:14.419 casualty rates while fighting in the war's bloodiest, 00:11:14.460 --> 00:11:17.039 most pivotal battles. They were renowned for 00:11:17.039 --> 00:11:19.559 their toughness. Not to mention the Eighth Wisconsin 00:11:19.559 --> 00:11:21.639 Regiment, who marched into battle carrying a 00:11:21.639 --> 00:11:24.960 live bald eagle named Old Abe as their mascot. 00:11:25.440 --> 00:11:27.919 You really can't invent a more cinematic detail 00:11:27.919 --> 00:11:30.159 than that. It sounds like fiction, but it's totally 00:11:30.159 --> 00:11:32.399 true. But here's where it gets really interesting 00:11:32.399 --> 00:11:34.320 to me, though. After the war, heading into the 00:11:34.320 --> 00:11:37.330 early 20th century, this radical streak morphs 00:11:37.330 --> 00:11:39.830 again into the progressive era, championed by 00:11:39.830 --> 00:11:41.909 governor and Senator Robert LaFollette. Right. 00:11:41.929 --> 00:11:45.049 Fighting Bob. Yeah. But wait, if this state was 00:11:45.049 --> 00:11:47.929 fundamentally built by rugged, fend for yourself 00:11:47.929 --> 00:11:50.370 frontier miners who hated authority, how did 00:11:50.370 --> 00:11:52.669 they suddenly embrace heavy state government 00:11:52.669 --> 00:11:54.809 intervention just a few decades later? That feels 00:11:54.809 --> 00:11:57.830 like a massive contradiction. It seems contradictory 00:11:57.830 --> 00:11:59.750 until you look at how they viewed the government 00:11:59.750 --> 00:12:02.710 at that time. American politics was dominated 00:12:02.710 --> 00:12:06.620 by corrupt machine style politics. Basically 00:12:06.620 --> 00:12:08.940 a black box where corporate bribes went in and 00:12:08.940 --> 00:12:10.899 political favors came out. So it was rigged. 00:12:11.100 --> 00:12:13.399 Completely rigged. La Follette and the progressives 00:12:13.399 --> 00:12:15.580 didn't want a bigger bureaucracy for the sake 00:12:15.580 --> 00:12:17.899 of it. They wanted to bypass the corrupt machines 00:12:17.899 --> 00:12:20.580 entirely. They wanted an open source government 00:12:20.580 --> 00:12:23.620 driven by data. Which brings us to the famous 00:12:23.620 --> 00:12:26.649 Wisconsin idea. They essentially partnered the 00:12:26.649 --> 00:12:28.549 state government with the University of Wisconsin 00:12:28.549 --> 00:12:31.909 in Madison. They used their own public university 00:12:31.909 --> 00:12:34.950 as a dedicated R &D department to study society's 00:12:34.950 --> 00:12:37.990 problems and draft legislation to fix them. Exactly. 00:12:38.570 --> 00:12:40.649 The core belief was that government policy shouldn't 00:12:40.649 --> 00:12:43.049 be dictated by railroad barons or patronage. 00:12:43.490 --> 00:12:45.789 It should be guided by highly educated experts, 00:12:46.429 --> 00:12:49.059 verifiable science, and objective data. Under 00:12:49.059 --> 00:12:52.019 this model, Wisconsin truly became a laboratory 00:12:52.019 --> 00:12:54.000 of democracy. Here pass some massive reforms. 00:12:54.519 --> 00:12:58.039 Huge ones. They created the nation's first comprehensive 00:12:58.039 --> 00:13:00.940 statewide primary election system, the first 00:13:00.940 --> 00:13:03.840 effective workplace injury compensation law. 00:13:04.059 --> 00:13:07.059 and the first state income tax that was actually 00:13:07.059 --> 00:13:09.539 proportional to what a person earned. So if you 00:13:09.539 --> 00:13:11.539 are listening to this right now and you've ever 00:13:11.539 --> 00:13:13.600 looked at your pay stub and noticed progressive 00:13:13.600 --> 00:13:16.480 tax brackets, or if you've ever utilized workers' 00:13:17.100 --> 00:13:18.960 compensation, you are living in the modern world 00:13:18.960 --> 00:13:22.500 that Wisconsin's radical R &D laboratory helped 00:13:22.500 --> 00:13:25.120 design. It's a profound legacy. But you know, 00:13:25.120 --> 00:13:27.320 you can engineer politics all you want. Eventually, 00:13:27.399 --> 00:13:29.820 the natural environment forces your hand. The 00:13:29.820 --> 00:13:31.919 sources show the state had to radically reinvent 00:13:31.919 --> 00:13:34.960 its economy just to survive. The pervasive myth 00:13:34.960 --> 00:13:37.659 is that Wisconsin was always destined to be the 00:13:37.659 --> 00:13:40.850 cheese capital of the world. In reality, in the 00:13:40.850 --> 00:13:43.450 mid -19th century, it was a massive wheat -producing 00:13:43.450 --> 00:13:45.870 empire. They were growing roughly a sixth of 00:13:45.870 --> 00:13:47.610 all the wheat in the United States. Until they 00:13:47.610 --> 00:13:49.830 pushed the land too far. They completely depleted 00:13:49.830 --> 00:13:52.429 the soil nutrients by over -farming. And then 00:13:52.429 --> 00:13:55.110 came the chinch bugs. Oh, the chinch bugs. Yeah. 00:13:55.129 --> 00:13:58.789 In the 1860s, millions of these insects swarmed 00:13:58.789 --> 00:14:02.330 the state like an invading army, entirely decimating 00:14:02.330 --> 00:14:05.289 the weakened wheat crops. The entire state economy 00:14:05.289 --> 00:14:07.409 was teetering on the edge of total collapse. 00:14:07.789 --> 00:14:10.590 They desperately needed to pivot. And this is 00:14:10.590 --> 00:14:12.970 exactly where that Wisconsin idea university 00:14:12.970 --> 00:14:15.669 R &D department steps in to say the day. The 00:14:15.669 --> 00:14:17.350 University of Wisconsin School of Agriculture 00:14:17.350 --> 00:14:20.350 realized the local climate and soil were much 00:14:20.350 --> 00:14:22.649 better suited for forage crops and dairy farming. 00:14:23.029 --> 00:14:25.389 So they basically had to retrain everyone. Right. 00:14:25.470 --> 00:14:27.789 They began aggressively re -educating farmers. 00:14:28.409 --> 00:14:31.129 But the real game changer was a technological 00:14:31.129 --> 00:14:33.610 invention from the university, the butterfat 00:14:33.610 --> 00:14:36.549 test. OK, on paper, the butterfat test sounds 00:14:36.549 --> 00:14:39.210 incredibly boring. But how did it actually work? 00:14:39.350 --> 00:14:41.970 And why was it so revolutionary? Picture a farmer 00:14:41.970 --> 00:14:44.330 bringing a massive jug of milk to market in the 00:14:44.330 --> 00:14:47.309 1880s. Buyers had no way of knowing if the farmer 00:14:47.309 --> 00:14:49.549 had watered down the milk to increase his profits. 00:14:50.049 --> 00:14:52.490 It made the entire dairy market untrustworthy. 00:14:52.570 --> 00:14:55.240 Because anyone could cheat. Exactly. So the university 00:14:55.240 --> 00:14:58.440 developed a simple chemical test using sulfuric 00:14:58.440 --> 00:15:01.519 acid and a centrifuge. The acid dissolves everything 00:15:01.519 --> 00:15:04.360 in the milk except the fat and the centrifuge 00:15:04.360 --> 00:15:07.000 separates that pure fat so it can be precisely 00:15:07.000 --> 00:15:09.879 measured. That is brilliant. It immediately creates 00:15:09.879 --> 00:15:12.720 quality control. You can finally standardize 00:15:12.720 --> 00:15:15.039 the production of cheese and butter, transforming 00:15:15.039 --> 00:15:18.440 a chaotic local trade into a highly reliable 00:15:18.440 --> 00:15:21.000 mass market industry. And it works so well that 00:15:21.000 --> 00:15:24.299 by 1915, they are officially the leading producer 00:15:24.299 --> 00:15:27.580 of dairy in the U .S. Meanwhile, that massive 00:15:27.580 --> 00:15:29.820 influx of German immigrants we mentioned earlier 00:15:29.820 --> 00:15:32.539 brought an explosion of technical expertise in 00:15:32.539 --> 00:15:35.740 brewing. Ironically, the tragic Great Chicago 00:15:35.740 --> 00:15:39.200 Fire in 1871 actually helps Milwaukee breweries 00:15:39.200 --> 00:15:41.740 grow exponentially as they ramped up production 00:15:41.740 --> 00:15:43.759 to fill the void left by Chicago's destroyed 00:15:43.759 --> 00:15:46.240 infrastructure. It's all connected. It is. Speaking 00:15:46.240 --> 00:15:48.379 of fires, we have to talk about the logging industry 00:15:48.379 --> 00:15:51.240 up north. It was highly lucrative, but the environmental 00:15:51.240 --> 00:15:54.000 cost was devastating. The lumber companies used 00:15:54.000 --> 00:15:56.379 to slash and burn method, they would strip the 00:15:56.379 --> 00:15:59.080 valuable timber and leave behind massive sprawling 00:15:59.080 --> 00:16:02.019 piles of discarded dry brush, which created a 00:16:02.019 --> 00:16:06.230 ticking time bomb. In October 1871, a freak, 00:16:06.529 --> 00:16:08.970 low -pressure weather system rolled through the 00:16:08.970 --> 00:16:11.929 region, bringing hurricane -force winds. Those 00:16:11.929 --> 00:16:14.830 winds whipped small brushfires into an absolute 00:16:14.830 --> 00:16:18.309 firestorm. It sparked the Peshtigo fire. The 00:16:18.309 --> 00:16:20.730 scale of it is hard to comprehend. Just imagine 00:16:20.730 --> 00:16:23.250 a wall of flame so intense it creates its own 00:16:23.250 --> 00:16:26.830 weather system. It burned nearly 2 ,000 square 00:16:26.830 --> 00:16:29.509 miles of land and killed up to 2 ,500 people. 00:16:29.919 --> 00:16:33.080 It remains the absolute deadliest fire in U .S. 00:16:33.320 --> 00:16:36.139 history. It is a staggering tragedy. And sadly, 00:16:36.240 --> 00:16:38.539 it is completely overshadowed in the history 00:16:38.539 --> 00:16:40.399 books because it happened on the exact same night 00:16:40.399 --> 00:16:43.379 as the Great Chicago Fire. But it serves as a 00:16:43.379 --> 00:16:45.899 stark, horrifying reminder of the true mechanics 00:16:45.899 --> 00:16:48.940 and costs of rapid, unchecked resource extraction. 00:16:49.100 --> 00:16:51.500 It really does. And as we move into the 20th 00:16:51.500 --> 00:16:54.039 century, Wisconsin finds itself in a really strange, 00:16:54.379 --> 00:16:56.940 heavily scrutinized cultural position. When World 00:16:56.940 --> 00:16:59.299 War I breaks out, this state is suddenly labeled 00:16:59.299 --> 00:17:01.240 the traitor state by the rest of the country. 00:17:01.379 --> 00:17:03.559 Which was driven largely by its unique demographics 00:17:03.559 --> 00:17:05.960 and radical politics. A huge percentage of the 00:17:05.960 --> 00:17:08.279 population was ethnically German, and they were 00:17:08.279 --> 00:17:10.440 deeply hesitant to go to war against their homeland. 00:17:10.799 --> 00:17:13.589 Which makes sense. Right. And furthermore, Senator 00:17:13.589 --> 00:17:16.089 Robert La Follette led a powerful progressive 00:17:16.089 --> 00:17:18.769 movement demanding that the United States remain 00:17:18.769 --> 00:17:22.210 strictly neutral, viewing the conflict as a corrupt, 00:17:22.630 --> 00:17:26.210 imperialist war. I have to ask, how on earth 00:17:26.210 --> 00:17:29.049 does a state go from being nationally reviled 00:17:29.049 --> 00:17:32.529 as the traitor state during World War I to becoming 00:17:32.529 --> 00:17:35.769 the ultimate, wholesome symbol of heartland America? 00:17:36.659 --> 00:17:39.200 Literally putting America's dairy land on their 00:17:39.200 --> 00:17:42.140 license plates, just a few decades later, that 00:17:42.140 --> 00:17:44.299 has to be one of the greatest PR turnarounds 00:17:44.299 --> 00:17:46.319 in history. It really is. And it comes down to 00:17:46.319 --> 00:17:48.720 how economic utility and cultural assimilation 00:17:48.720 --> 00:17:51.299 work hand in hand. When a state is literally 00:17:51.299 --> 00:17:53.619 supplying the physical food that feeds the nation, 00:17:54.000 --> 00:17:55.960 and its university scholars are drafting the 00:17:55.960 --> 00:17:57.920 blueprints for the country's social safety net, 00:17:58.500 --> 00:18:00.609 its cements itself is indispensable. They made 00:18:00.609 --> 00:18:02.630 themselves too important to ignore. Exactly. 00:18:03.029 --> 00:18:05.490 For instance, Wisconsin pioneered the first unemployment 00:18:05.490 --> 00:18:08.450 compensation program in 1932, which directly 00:18:08.450 --> 00:18:10.529 served as the model for the National Social Security 00:18:10.529 --> 00:18:13.410 Act. You become the heartland when you are quite 00:18:13.410 --> 00:18:16.029 literally sustaining the heartland. That deep 00:18:16.029 --> 00:18:19.710 history of extreme reinvention, of shifting demographics, 00:18:20.109 --> 00:18:22.410 ecological disasters and bare -knuckle political 00:18:22.410 --> 00:18:25.049 battles brings us right into the Wisconsin of 00:18:25.049 --> 00:18:28.130 the 21st century. Reading the sources, it feels 00:18:28.130 --> 00:18:30.549 like all these historical forces are colliding 00:18:30.549 --> 00:18:33.849 in a modern crucible. We see that collision clearly 00:18:33.849 --> 00:18:36.190 in the state's modern ecology. On one hand, you 00:18:36.190 --> 00:18:38.950 have incredible conservation comebacks. Species 00:18:38.950 --> 00:18:41.049 that were completely wiped out during the logging 00:18:41.049 --> 00:18:44.509 era, like elk and gray wolves, have been successfully 00:18:44.509 --> 00:18:47.670 reintroduced. Bald eagles are thriving again. 00:18:47.890 --> 00:18:50.799 But the environment is still a battlefield. Climate 00:18:50.799 --> 00:18:53.039 change is actively accelerating the frequency 00:18:53.039 --> 00:18:55.859 of severe storms and devastating floods. The 00:18:55.859 --> 00:18:57.799 Great Lakes are constantly fighting off invasive 00:18:57.799 --> 00:19:00.420 species like quagga mussels, which fundamentally 00:19:00.420 --> 00:19:02.859 disrupt the aquatic food chain. And the economy 00:19:02.859 --> 00:19:04.759 is also in the middle of another massive pivot. 00:19:05.359 --> 00:19:07.380 Traditional manufacturing has steeply declined. 00:19:07.920 --> 00:19:10.880 In its place, you see a booming, highly lucrative 00:19:10.880 --> 00:19:13.660 biohealth and tech industry heavily concentrated 00:19:13.660 --> 00:19:16.440 around Madison. Companies like Epic Systems are 00:19:16.440 --> 00:19:19.069 redefining the region. And the human demographics 00:19:19.069 --> 00:19:21.990 are shifting right alongside it. Madison is seeing 00:19:21.990 --> 00:19:24.809 explosive population growth, while many rural 00:19:24.809 --> 00:19:26.829 populations are shrinking or changing. Right. 00:19:27.019 --> 00:19:29.460 The Latino population has green significantly, 00:19:29.680 --> 00:19:32.140 becoming the state's largest minority group. 00:19:32.460 --> 00:19:35.180 And they are now absolutely vital to sustaining 00:19:35.180 --> 00:19:37.539 that massive dairy industry we talked about earlier. 00:19:38.200 --> 00:19:40.980 Without that demographic shift, the modern agricultural 00:19:40.980 --> 00:19:43.740 economy would likely collapse. It's a huge structural 00:19:43.740 --> 00:19:46.700 change. It is. Now, before we dive into the recent 00:19:46.700 --> 00:19:48.380 political landscape, I need to make a quick note 00:19:48.380 --> 00:19:51.359 to you listening. Our mission here is to impartially 00:19:51.359 --> 00:19:53.500 report the historical account detailed in our 00:19:53.500 --> 00:19:55.880 source material without taking any sides whatsoever. 00:19:56.359 --> 00:19:58.299 We are simply looking at the facts on the ground 00:19:58.299 --> 00:20:00.819 as documented by the historians. And those facts 00:20:00.819 --> 00:20:03.940 show a state gripped by intense, almost unprecedented 00:20:03.940 --> 00:20:07.019 polarization. The modern turning point highlighted 00:20:07.019 --> 00:20:09.720 in the sources is the 2011 Act 10 legislation 00:20:09.720 --> 00:20:12.579 introduced under Governor Scott Walker. This 00:20:12.579 --> 00:20:15.119 act essentially stripped the majority of collective 00:20:15.119 --> 00:20:17.599 bargaining rights from most public sector employees, 00:20:18.180 --> 00:20:20.099 dismantling a labor tradition that had defined 00:20:20.099 --> 00:20:23.569 the state for decades. And the pushback was immense. 00:20:23.849 --> 00:20:26.690 It was. It sparked massive, sustained protests 00:20:26.690 --> 00:20:29.230 with tens of thousands of people occupying the 00:20:29.230 --> 00:20:32.210 state Capitol building. It triggered recall elections 00:20:32.210 --> 00:20:35.549 and initiated a fiercely partisan era. Following 00:20:35.549 --> 00:20:37.890 that census, the state saw the implementation 00:20:37.890 --> 00:20:40.609 of highly aggressive legislative gerrymandering. 00:20:41.180 --> 00:20:44.240 Using sophisticated mapping software, lawmakers 00:20:44.240 --> 00:20:47.099 drew district lines that essentially locked in 00:20:47.099 --> 00:20:49.359 legislative majorities, regardless of how the 00:20:49.359 --> 00:20:52.019 statewide popular vote shifted. Creating a massive 00:20:52.019 --> 00:20:54.180 political bottleneck. Exactly. It functioned 00:20:54.180 --> 00:20:56.400 like a structural firewall against changing voter 00:20:56.400 --> 00:20:59.000 demographics, which led to severe governmental 00:20:59.000 --> 00:21:02.539 paralysis. And then in 2020, that simmering tension 00:21:02.539 --> 00:21:05.359 exploded back into the streets. We saw civil 00:21:05.359 --> 00:21:07.960 unrest and intense protests over police shootings 00:21:07.960 --> 00:21:10.839 in places like Kenosha and Wauwatosa. reflecting 00:21:10.839 --> 00:21:13.319 the deepest, most painful divides currently facing 00:21:13.319 --> 00:21:15.480 the entire nation. It really mirrored the national 00:21:15.480 --> 00:21:19.279 mood. So what does this all mean? When I look 00:21:19.279 --> 00:21:21.740 at this recent history, I see a stark irony. 00:21:22.519 --> 00:21:24.700 The state that literally invented the direct 00:21:24.700 --> 00:21:27.740 primary, the state built entirely on the Wisconsin 00:21:27.740 --> 00:21:30.960 idea of open, expert -led government, recently 00:21:30.960 --> 00:21:33.740 operated with one of the most paralyzed, structurally 00:21:33.740 --> 00:21:35.799 insulated legislatures in the entire country. 00:21:36.009 --> 00:21:38.750 Is this a break from Wisconsin's progressive 00:21:38.750 --> 00:21:41.509 history or is it just the newest chapter of its 00:21:41.509 --> 00:21:44.210 combative DNA? If we connect this to the bigger 00:21:44.210 --> 00:21:47.119 picture, it is absolutely the latter. Wisconsin 00:21:47.119 --> 00:21:49.579 has never at any point in its history been a 00:21:49.579 --> 00:21:52.299 quiet, passive state. From the street brawls 00:21:52.299 --> 00:21:55.180 of the Milwaukee Bridge War to 5 ,000 abolitionists 00:21:55.180 --> 00:21:57.680 smashing down a jailhouse door to the massive 00:21:57.680 --> 00:22:00.500 Capitol protests over Act 10, Wisconsin is a 00:22:00.500 --> 00:22:02.740 place where competing visions of America violently 00:22:02.740 --> 00:22:05.140 and aggressively collide. It is a state that 00:22:05.140 --> 00:22:07.940 cares deeply, fights fiercely, and is constantly 00:22:07.940 --> 00:22:10.140 trying to hammer out the future in real time. 00:22:10.829 --> 00:22:13.009 The next time you are sitting on the couch watching 00:22:13.009 --> 00:22:15.309 a political map on election night, waiting for 00:22:15.309 --> 00:22:18.849 those razor thin Wisconsin returns to drop, or 00:22:18.849 --> 00:22:20.589 the next time you're simply enjoying a slice 00:22:20.589 --> 00:22:23.549 of sharp cheddar on a sandwich, remember what 00:22:23.549 --> 00:22:26.809 you are actually interacting with. You are experiencing 00:22:26.809 --> 00:22:29.730 the direct legacy of a centuries old laboratory 00:22:29.730 --> 00:22:32.890 of ecological and political R &D. And exploring 00:22:32.890 --> 00:22:35.410 that legacy leaves us with a critical, somewhat 00:22:35.410 --> 00:22:38.160 unsettling question for our own time. If the 00:22:38.160 --> 00:22:40.220 progressive Wisconsin idea was fundamentally 00:22:40.220 --> 00:22:42.119 built on the premise that university experts 00:22:42.119 --> 00:22:44.640 and shared verifiable data should drive public 00:22:44.640 --> 00:22:47.119 policy, well how exactly does a laboratory of 00:22:47.119 --> 00:22:50.000 democracy function in a modern era where society 00:22:50.000 --> 00:22:52.599 can no longer even agree on what the facts actually 00:22:52.599 --> 00:22:55.140 are? Now there's a thought to chew on. So the 00:22:55.140 --> 00:22:57.000 next time you see someone wearing my goofy foam 00:22:57.000 --> 00:22:59.700 cheese head, just remember underneath that wedge 00:22:59.700 --> 00:23:02.640 is a complex history of Macedon hunters, radical 00:23:02.640 --> 00:23:05.519 abolitionists, and political brawlers. The x 00:23:05.519 --> 00:23:07.779 -ray of this state is anything but clean. It 00:23:07.779 --> 00:23:10.920 is messy, it is loud, and it is endlessly fascinating. 00:23:11.619 --> 00:23:13.220 Thanks for taking this deep dive with us.