Milwaukee Mayhem: Murder and Mystery in the Cream City's First Century
by Matthew J. Prigge
Wisconsin Historical Society Press, 2015 Paper: 978-0-87020-716-7 | eISBN: 978-0-87020-717-4 Library of Congress Classification HV6534.M65P75 2015 Dewey Decimal Classification 364.152309775951
ABOUT THIS BOOK | AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY | REVIEWS | TOC
ABOUT THIS BOOK
From murder and matchstick men to all-consuming fires, painted women, and Great Lakes disasters--and the wide-eyed public who could not help but gawk at it all--"Milwaukee Mayhem" uncovers the little-remembered and rarely told history of the underbelly of a Midwestern metropolis. "Milwaukee Mayhem" offers a new perspective on Milwaukee's early years, forgoing the major historical signposts found in traditional histories and focusing instead on the strange and brutal tales of mystery, vice, murder, and disaster that were born of the city's transformation from lakeside settlement to American metropolis. Author Matthew J. Prigge presents these stories as they were recounted to the public in the newspapers of the era, using the vivid and often grim language of the times to create an engaging and occasionally chilling narrative of a forgotten Milwaukee.
Through his thoughtful introduction, Prigge gives the work context, eschewing assumptions about "simpler times" and highlighting the mayhem that the growth and rise of a city can bring about. These stories are the orphans of Milwaukee's history, too unusual to register in broad historic narratives, too strange to qualify as nostalgia, but nevertheless essential to our understanding of this American city.
AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY
Matthew J. Prigge is a freelance author and historian from Milwaukee and the host of What Made Milwaukee Famous, a weekly local history segment on WMSE 91.7. His work has been featured in both local and national publications and has won multiple awards, including the 2013 William Best Hesseltine Award from the Wisconsin Historical Society Press. Since 2011, he has led sightseeing historical tours of Milwaukee’s rivers and harbor for the Milwaukee Boat Line. In 2013, he created the Mondo Milwaukee Boat Tour, an evening historical tour of some of the city’s most infamous sights. Milwaukee Mayhem is his second book.
REVIEWS
Milwaukee historian Prigge delves into the dark side of the Wisconsin metropolis in the 19th century through this collection of sordid stories... There are murderers, a “stout and moon-faced” bigamist named Jiggs Perry, and a bingo-addicted tenant with a grudge who bludgeoned her landlady; and tragedies like the 1883 fire at Newhall House...This history is teeming with interesting characters like Rosina Georg, a proprietor of a dance hall known for underage drinking and an interracial clientele, and Frank Blunt, a thieving womanizer who was raised as a girl but lived as a man. Other tales include a suicide by cannon, an antikissing crusade, roving bands of flirtatious fops, and the chilling account of a young woman picked up for a blind date and never seen alive again. Prigge plucks these stories from obscurity and vividly brings them to life. He also helpfully identifies the modern locations of settings should readers feel inclined to take a macabre Milwaukee tour. (Publisher's Weekly, September 2015)
A simply fascinating and fully absorbing read from begininning to end, Milwaukee Mayhem: Murder and Mystery in the Cream City's First Century is...exceptionally well researched, impressively well written, and deftly crafted with the inclusion of occasional black-and- white historical photos. Milwaukee Mayhem is highly recommended for both community and academic library American History refernce collections in general, and Wisconsin History supplemental studies lists in particular. (John Burroughs, Burroughs' Bookshelf, Midwest Book Review, Reviewer's Bookwatch, December 2015)
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Contents
Prologue: The Orphans of History
Murder
Slippers at the Cistern
“Bliss Not Long”
“Our coffins will arrive at your house today . . .”
Milwaukee Mayhem: Murder and Mystery in the Cream City's First Century
by Matthew J. Prigge
Wisconsin Historical Society Press, 2015 Paper: 978-0-87020-716-7 eISBN: 978-0-87020-717-4
From murder and matchstick men to all-consuming fires, painted women, and Great Lakes disasters--and the wide-eyed public who could not help but gawk at it all--"Milwaukee Mayhem" uncovers the little-remembered and rarely told history of the underbelly of a Midwestern metropolis. "Milwaukee Mayhem" offers a new perspective on Milwaukee's early years, forgoing the major historical signposts found in traditional histories and focusing instead on the strange and brutal tales of mystery, vice, murder, and disaster that were born of the city's transformation from lakeside settlement to American metropolis. Author Matthew J. Prigge presents these stories as they were recounted to the public in the newspapers of the era, using the vivid and often grim language of the times to create an engaging and occasionally chilling narrative of a forgotten Milwaukee.
Through his thoughtful introduction, Prigge gives the work context, eschewing assumptions about "simpler times" and highlighting the mayhem that the growth and rise of a city can bring about. These stories are the orphans of Milwaukee's history, too unusual to register in broad historic narratives, too strange to qualify as nostalgia, but nevertheless essential to our understanding of this American city.
AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY
Matthew J. Prigge is a freelance author and historian from Milwaukee and the host of What Made Milwaukee Famous, a weekly local history segment on WMSE 91.7. His work has been featured in both local and national publications and has won multiple awards, including the 2013 William Best Hesseltine Award from the Wisconsin Historical Society Press. Since 2011, he has led sightseeing historical tours of Milwaukee’s rivers and harbor for the Milwaukee Boat Line. In 2013, he created the Mondo Milwaukee Boat Tour, an evening historical tour of some of the city’s most infamous sights. Milwaukee Mayhem is his second book.
REVIEWS
Milwaukee historian Prigge delves into the dark side of the Wisconsin metropolis in the 19th century through this collection of sordid stories... There are murderers, a “stout and moon-faced” bigamist named Jiggs Perry, and a bingo-addicted tenant with a grudge who bludgeoned her landlady; and tragedies like the 1883 fire at Newhall House...This history is teeming with interesting characters like Rosina Georg, a proprietor of a dance hall known for underage drinking and an interracial clientele, and Frank Blunt, a thieving womanizer who was raised as a girl but lived as a man. Other tales include a suicide by cannon, an antikissing crusade, roving bands of flirtatious fops, and the chilling account of a young woman picked up for a blind date and never seen alive again. Prigge plucks these stories from obscurity and vividly brings them to life. He also helpfully identifies the modern locations of settings should readers feel inclined to take a macabre Milwaukee tour. (Publisher's Weekly, September 2015)
A simply fascinating and fully absorbing read from begininning to end, Milwaukee Mayhem: Murder and Mystery in the Cream City's First Century is...exceptionally well researched, impressively well written, and deftly crafted with the inclusion of occasional black-and- white historical photos. Milwaukee Mayhem is highly recommended for both community and academic library American History refernce collections in general, and Wisconsin History supplemental studies lists in particular. (John Burroughs, Burroughs' Bookshelf, Midwest Book Review, Reviewer's Bookwatch, December 2015)
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Contents
Prologue: The Orphans of History
Murder
Slippers at the Cistern
“Bliss Not Long”
“Our coffins will arrive at your house today . . .”
Straight Razor
“The Great Judge”
The Marrying Brakeman
Love with a Bullet
“Don’t do that, Harry!”
A.K.A. Marian Davis
Leave the Baby
Death by Cannon
Bingo
In a Violinist’s Hands
“Suicide Mania”
Mrs. Krimmer’s Son
Odors
“Blood Ends a Feud”
“He might have known . . .”
Accidents
“A Pitiless World”
Misfire
The Ten O’Clock Train
Switchman
Collapse
Fire in the Sky
Fire Wild
Horror on Main Street
Death’s Alley
Hell Pit at the Davidson
The Great Horror
Death on the Queen
The Alleghany
“An Ocean Graveyard”
Launch of the William H. Wolf
In the Crib
Vice
Games of Chance
Policy
Lonely Corners
The Queen of Nights
Raids
Protection
With Bells On
V-Girls and Trouble Boys
Spoons
“Kill the Kiss”
Dirty Books
Peppy Tales
Orgy at the Workhouse
Pajamas
Darkness in the Badlands
Black Jack
“Now, I don’t care.”
From Chicago
The Old Mother’s House
River Street Rivals
Mashers
Secrets
The Vanishers
The Runaways
“Am being kidnapped . . .”
Woman with a Cut Throat
The Hermit Suicides
On the Fringe
Blind Date
The Woman at the Breakwater
Blood Money
Black Hand
The Missing Head
Not John Dwyer
“Order of the Day"
Telling
Heart Failure
The Girl Who Couldn’t Move
The Flying Machine
The Old Jarvis House
The House on the Ravine
Incendiary
Crazy Fritz
Mr. Blunt
Epilogue: They Call It Home
Notes
Acknowledgments
Index
ABOUT THIS BOOK | AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY | REVIEWS | TOC