The Princeton Historical Society
630-632 West Water Street PO Box 71 Princeton, WI 54968
Phone: 920-295-9008 Email: PrincetonHistSociety@gmail.com
Step into the past and experience the richness of our local history, preserved through artifacts, photographs, documents, and engaging stories.
Join Us
All are welcome at our membership meetings, which take place on the third Monday of each month at 6pm, May - October. For now, we are meeting at the Princeton Library, 424 W. Water St.
We are funded entirely by donations, fundraisers, and membership dues. Please consider becoming a member and/or making a donation!
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Help us preserve history:
become or remain a
Historical Society member!
Use the safe online payment portal to the left or send a check for your
membership dues to
Princeton Historical Society
P.O. Box 71, Princeton WI 54968.
Please include your contact info.
Thank you!
Dues
Annual Student $2 (high school)
Annual Adult $10
Annual Family $15
Lifetime Adult $100
Lifetime Family $250
Charter Member $500
Donor Member $1,000
Patron Member $5,000
Founder Member $10,000
Members are invited to participate in occasional outings and organized events like our annual banquet. This photo shows members on a boat tour of Green Lake, led by local historian and yacht captain Mike Lehner.
Follow us on Facebook!
Click the "Follow" button on the right, and make sure to "like" and share our posts to help us reach more local history lovers.
Volunteer
Please call us at 920-295-9008 to see how you can help!
Help a great cause AND have a great time!
We need you!
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Our organization is
entirely run by volunteers.
We need people with a wide variety of skills.​
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Are you good at
home repairs?
Could you scan in photos?
Do you want to serve
on our board?
Are you good at doing research, or cleaning?
Do you love planning fundraisers or social events?
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Whatever your talent is, we'd love to have you!
You could run a game at our Halloween street party!
We can always use
some handy help.
Serve fun and food at one of our concessions events.
Projects we're currently working on, and could use help with, include:
- Scanning old Fire Department meeting minutes from the early 1900s- many in German!
- Gathering items and soliciting donations for the upcoming meat/basket raffle in August
- Scanning issues of the Fox River Patriot magazine
- Scraping and painting the Stone House Museum's front porch
- Signing people up for shifts at the flea market food booth fundraisers on August 2nd & 9th
Upcoming
Events
Meetings
& History Presentations
All are welcome at our short-and-sweet membership meetings, which take place on the third Monday of each month at 6pm,
May - October. Due to ongoing construction at the Folklore Museum, for now we are meeting at the Princeton Public Library, 424 W. Water St.
​Above: On April 21st, 2025, author Steve Rogstad's of the Sheboygan County Historical Research Center gave a talk about President Lincoln's ties to Wisconsin. He wrote the book, "Lincoln Among the Badgers: Rediscovering Sites Associated with Abraham and Mary Lincoln in Wisconsin."
After each meeting, we have guest speakers give talks about local history topics:
Mon. August 18th, 6pm: Pastor John Dolan Pastor will give us a presentation on the topic, "Princeton's Pioneer Lutheran Pastors Not Named Hoyer - St. John's Lutheran Church, Princeton, Wisconsin, the First Five Years, 1864-1869"
Mon. Sept. 15th, 6pm: Karl Stewart presents his book on the Green Berets, "The Green Light."
Mon. Oct. 20th, 6pm: To be determined.
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Flea Market Food Booth Fundraisers
We will be selling a delicious lunch at the flea market concessions stand Saturday August 2nd and Saturday August 9th from 8am until 1pm or until sold out. Stop by and get a burger, brat, or hot dog.
We are looking for volunteers to work a shift- please call us at 920-295-9008 if you can help us out!
Donations of baked goods we can sell would also be wonderful.
Meat & Basket Raffle Fundraiser
Come out to BeerBelly's,
512 W. Water Street, for a great time on Sat. Aug. 30th at 1pm.
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Have a good meal and get some great deals on top quality meats! There will also be a basket raffle. Donated items for this are gratefully accepted.
Grand Opening
You're invited to the grand (re)opening of our Folklore Museum on Sunday, Sept. 14th. We are so excited to show you what we've been working so hard on!
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The Folklore Museum has been closed for renovations this year as we have been building brand new exhibits to showcase even more of Princeton's history.
There will be a separate donor reception on September 13th- please stay tuned for more information and personal invitations to this VIP event.
News
PHS on Parade
Did you see our float in the 4th of July parade? We handed out lots of announcements about the upcoming grand opening in September.
Thank you to the parade organizers!
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Pictured here: Mike Goulet, Historical Society President, and his son-in-law Jake Stumpf.
PHS In the News
Some excellent articles just came out about the upcoming grand (re)opening of our Folklore Museum! Check out the Green Laker and Fox Cities Worth the Drive.
Dimensions for the wall where we would like the mural are:
Top: 80 feet long
North side wall: 16'6"
South side wall: 14'6"
The surface is cement block.
Mural Project- Artists Wanted!
We are working with the Princeton Art Collective - (PARC) to hire an artist to paint a mural on the side of our Folklore Museum.
The mural should feel like the best blend of Princeton’s past and future, with a fresh, bold, contemporary design.
To apply, email a pdf with your design, sample work, budget, and two references to hello@theparcdepartment.org.
We allocated $10,000 for this project. Budgets should include the cost of materials. PARC will provide lodging and any scaffolding or lifts.
Applications are open and will remain open until we find the right design.
Breaking news: The Oberreich Foundation has awarded us a $5,000 grant for this project!
The Princeton Art Collective recently hired an artist to paint a stunning mural on Pearl Street. Seven Whooping Cranes fly over scenes from Princeton's history, including the Busy Dollar steam launch on the Fox River, Tiger Brewery, excerpts from historic newspapers, and early pioneers.
Honoring Those Who Came Before
Could you help us with this effort?
Call us at 920-295-9008 if you're interested in volunteering.
We would love to continue working to clean, restore, and even repair or replace headstones in Princeton's three cemeteries. Ideally, we would like to have enough volunteers to do at least a dozen markers per year.
Many stones simply need a good scrubbing, but some need to be repaired with epoxy, many need to be straightened and reset, and a few are missing entirely and need to be replaced.
Videos
Presentations and meetings have been taking place at the Princeton Library while we continue renovating the Folklore Museum.
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Above: On April 21st, 2025, author Steve Rogstad's of the Sheboygan County Historical Research Center gave a talk about President Lincoln's ties to Wisconsin. He wrote the book, "Lincoln Aming the Badgers: Rediscovering Sites Associated with Abraham and Mary Lincoln in Wisconsin."
Each year, we ask a variety of engaging guest speakers to give talks about local history. We record these so you can watch from home.
Formerly, presentations happened after our membership meetings, but due to popular demand, we have been offering them even when we are not holding meetings.
Members as well as guests are welcome at these free presentations!
Presentations and meetings have been taking place at the Princeton Library while we continue renovating the Folklore Museum.
Below: At our most recent meeting, retired teacher Paul Doro talked about the teachers, administrators, and support staff at Princeton's school over the decades. He quizzed the audience and had many retired teachers in the audience laughing.
To see all of our videos, click here
to be taken to our YouTube page.
Below: at Grahn gave a presentation about her aunt, Ella Grahn Millbauer (stage name Ella Mills). Aunt Ella was one of the last circus "fat ladies," and Pat wrote a book about her,
“586 Pounds of Feminine Charm."
Yes, it’s true, we’re famous! Well, a little famous. We got our fifteen minutes of fame on in June 2022 when we were featured on WBAY Channel 2’s “Small Towns” segment. Host Jeff Alexander roams Wisconsin’s rural areas, bringing wholesome and funny stories to TV audiences across the state. He focused on our Folklore Museum’s mission to preserve the stories of individuals in our community, and the many people who have helped us in that endeavor.
Watch the video by clicking on this link:
https://www.wbay.com/2022/06/23/small-towns-princetons-history-comes-alive-through-folklore-museum/
Resources
The effort to digitize our newspapers took over a year to complete, and cost about seventeen thousand dollars.
98,563 individual microfilm images had to be scanned, cleaned up, coded, uploaded to a library system server, and made searchable.
This process involved the technical efforts of the Princeton Public Library staff, the Crowley Company of Frederick, Maryland, NMT Partners of Onalaska, Wisconsin, DC Johnson of Ripon, Wisconsin, and Keetra Baker of the Winnefox Library System. Winnefox hosts the database for us at no charge.
The digitization was made possible with contributions from the Princeton Historical Society, the Princeton Public Library, the Caestecker (Green Lake) Library's Tom Gnewuch Memorial Fund, the Wisconsin Humanities Endowment, and the Winnefox Library System.
Historic Newspapers Online
The Princeton Historical Society and the Princeton Public Library collaborated to digitize over 150 years of our city's newspapers.
Read and Search them Here!
Princeton had six newspapers over the years:
– Green Lake County Democrat 1879-1885
– Princeton Republic 1867-1937
– Princeton Republic-Star 1905-1906
– Princeton Star 1902-1905
– Princeton Times 1935-1937
– Princeton Times-Republic 1937-1993
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Princeton also hosted "The Fox River Patriot,"
an alternative tabloid/newspaper published by Dennis Kitchen and
Mike Jacobi from 1976 - 1980. The full series can be read at the museum.
We are hoping to digitize at least some of the Patriot's Princeton-related articles.
Note: we are in search of copies of "The Reformer,"
a very early and ephemeral newspaper first published in 1898.
Newsletters
Learn what we've been doing, read articles about local history, and- check out our newsletters!
Click on the links below to see printable PDF files.
Spring 2025 - Latest edition
Fall 2022
Spring 2022
Fall 2021
Spring 2021
Winter 2020
Fall 2020
Summer 2020
Spring 2020
Click on any of the pages above to be taken to the newsletters in which they were published.
Recommended Reading
Many excellent books, genealogies, and pamphlets have been written about the Princeton area and its residents.
These are available at the Princeton Public Library, although not all can be checked out due to their rarity.
"Small Potatoes: Vignettes from the Life of Emma Ellinger Mathews," by Emma Ellinger Mathews
"Come Back in Time" Volumes 1, 2, and 3 by Elaine Reetz
"Quas Qui Centennial" (Princeton's 125th anniversary book)
"Where Yesterday Meets Tomorrow" (Princeton's 175th anniversary book)
"St. John the Baptist Catholic Church, Princeton, Wisconsin : the 120th anniversary of dedication 1888 - 2008 : a Testament of Polish Immigrant Faith" by Roger Krentz
"Sister School: School Sisters of St. Francis in Princeton, WI" by Roger Krentz
"Faithful Servants: Pastors of St. John the Baptist Catholic Church, Princeton Wisconsin" by Roger Krentz
"The Canadian Club" by Joan Petruske Guckenberger
Service Record Book of Men & Women of Princeton, Wisconsin and Community
"Endless Echoes: From the Days of My Life" by Elmer V. Krueger
"Timeless Treasures" by Elmer V. Krueger
"Victor Mashuda: A Reflection of Nine Decades" by Victor Mashuda
"Bartel's History of Princeton Volume 1: From the New World to the New Deal" by Roger Bartel
"In Search of St. Marie & the Legend of the Cross" by Roger Bartel
"Petrusky Family History: The First Three Generations in the U.S." by Michael and Catherine Petrusky
"My Grandparent's Farm" by Edward J. Kuehn
"Brief Autobiography of Daniel G. Priske" by Dan & Carol Priske
"A Day in the Life of Princeton, Wisconsin" by Brian Swanson and Ryan Brzozowski
"Princeton 150 Years 1848-1998" By Brad Brzozowski, Jenny Otto, Michelle Hoffman, Paul Soda, Shannon Grffin, and Andy Pulvermacher.
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Museums
The Stone House (632 W. Water St.)
is an immersive historical living experience.
Walk through the parlor, dining room, kitchen, and bedrooms of a home once used by Princeton’s first mayor, and furnished with everything you'd need to live comfortably from about 1900-1930.
Try Victorian 3D technology with our stereoscope, see if you can recognize our early toasters, admire our collection of vintage clothing, see how the primitive stove and washing machine would have worked, and flip through catalogs and magazines of the period.
Many artifacts were donated from local Princeton families, and are labeled with their names. Take this opportunity to reflect on how much our lives have changed over the decades.
The Folklore Museum (630 W. Water St.)
is dedicated to preserving peoples’ lives by saving their stories and sharing them through artifacts, interactive displays, and innovative technology. It has over a dozen permanent exhibits, each one telling a story from Princeton's past.
Glimpse a general store, spy into a saloon, chug past our train tracks and gorgeous transportation mural, wade through a paddle steamer with a wheel that really turns, and see artifacts from every aspect of our history.
Notable objects include Native American stone tools,
uniforms and photos from our veterans (including Civil War memorabilia), the first television set in Princeton, the reconstructed office of local dentist Dr. Drill, and much more!
Along the way, you can pick up any of our crank telephone earpieces to hear an audio tour, or check out our slideshow screens.
Our museums are currently closed for renovation.
The Folklore Museum is expanding two twice its size,
allowing us to share even more of the Princeton area's history!
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Normally, our museums are open on Saturday afternoons from May-October and by appointment.
There is no charge for admission, but donations are gratefully accepted to help maintain our buildings and artifacts.
We also have a gift shop with Princeton-themed T-shirts, prints of historic photographs, tumblers, coasters, and more.
Stop at our Little Free Library, stocked with history books and historical fiction!
This bright blue box is open even when our museums are closed.​
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Take a sneak peek at our renovations in progress- check out the photos below!
About Us
Our organization was founded June 15th, 1982.
Our logo is a willow tree.
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The willow tree has been the inspiration of folklore and legend because it symbolizes strength, flexibility, power, spirituality, celebration, worship, and death.
The willow’s adaptability allows it to bend and not break. However, if it is broken,a single branch can develop roots and grow into a new tree. Accordingly, all of humanity relies on its past to grow its future.
Then, as now, we have made it our mission to preserve the history of Princeton. That includes the stories of its residents, past and present, as well as the traditions and culture of the area and artifacts relating to these. We have no paid staff, but lots of dedicated volunteers.
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Current Board Members:
Mike Goulet - President
Chris Frasier - Treasurer
Jim Frasier - Vice President & Museum Director
Chris Goulet - Secretary & Grant Writer
Laura Skalitzky - Marketing
Vicki Wielgosh - Phase II Museum Renovations
Officers' terms are two years. All paid-up members are eligible to hold office, make nominations, and vote for board members. Members elected to the board vote amongst themselves for positions. We hold elections at our annual meeting in December or January.
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Officers meet on the second Monday of each month at 3pm. Due to ongoing construction at the Folklore Museum, we are currently meeting at the Library.
Membership meetings take place on the third Monday of each month at 6pm, May - October.
Due to ongoing construction at the Folklore Museum,
for now we are meeting at the Princeton Public Library, 424 W. Water St.
We are a registered 501(c)3 non-profit organization.
Each year, we hold numerous fundraisers, including concession sales at Christmas in Princeton and the famous Princeton flea market, meat raffles, 50/50 raffles, souvenir sales, and a summer dinner lecture. Many individuals and businesses contribute so that we can stay afloat.
