Box 27, Folder 1: Geographical and Topographical Description of Wisconsin, 1844

[Typwritten Page: Population of Southport] 1843

Mr. McCabe has at last completed the census of Southport, from which it appears that the population of that village is 1820. Southport is one of the most flourishing villages on the Lake shore, with a country in its rear unsurpassed for agricultural purposes by any thing in the western country. The first permanent settlement at this place was commenced in 1836, when all the country west of it, and which is now well settled and well cultivated, was an uncultivated waste, inhabited by Indians and wild beasts.

Milwaukee, now grows to the size of a city, and Racine, another flourishing and beautiful village on the Lake shore, were settled a short time previous. At the first settlement of these places building was rather difficult, wages for labor were high, and lumber was obtained with much difficulty, a considerable porting being brought from Ohio and sold at from forty to sixty dollars per thousand. Up to 1840 the population of Southport amounted to 337, in January, 1842, it had nearly doubled, and now as appears from the census it contains 1820.

Soocheerah- Indian name of Fond du Lac river of Lake Winnebago.

Southport a town in Racine county ten miles south of Racine, in the Lake shore, being the most southerly point at which a harbor can be constructed north of Chicago, a distance of fifty six miles. [Racine] this town is next in size, and importance, and in the amount of business done to Milwaukee, contains three hundred to four hundred inhabitants. The country around it is mostly prairie, and is well settled. Some portions of Illinois receive their goods through the merchants of Southport.-Two weekly papers Incorporated 1841

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[Newspaper clippings covering bottom half of page]. [One from the Buffalo Commercial Advertiser]. 1843