Kewaunee’s post office opened in 1852, and 42% of its homes were built before 1940
More historic than 87% of U.S. towns · #54 of 362 in Wisconsin. What drives it
5 places in town are on the National Register, among them a historic district with 43 buildings. Below: 3 old photos and papers, maps from 1885 on, and the census since 1880.
Founding year: the first Kewaunee post office (Blevins & Helbock, CC0).The full story ↓
History grade
What drives Kewaunee’s History grade
On its age, its old homes and the National Register, Kewaunee is more historic than 87% of U.S. towns, #54 of 362 in Wisconsin. Its share of homes from before 1940 holds the grade up; its age pulls it down.
A
HistoryA character grade: shown, never part of Kewaunee’s overall grade.
Wisconsin towns list more on the Register than most of the country (a typical Wisconsin town has 3.0 per 10,000 residents, the U.S. 2.4), so Kewaunee’s 164 sits above most of its state (97% of Wisconsin towns have fewer) while its 46 historic buildings outnumber those of 84% of U.S. towns.
How sure. Graded on any two of the three inputs instead, the letter would range from B+ to A+. The pre-1940 share is a Census survey estimate (±11.0 points). The founding year is the first post office, not a stated founding date.
Founding year: the first post office (other dates in Quick answers). Homes: Census ACS 2020–24. National Register: National Park Service, May 2026 list; each listing counted once (boundary changes and added documentation belong to their listing), and a historic district counts its contributing buildings. How TownRatings grades history →
What stands out about Kewaunee’s past
Read from the archive, the National Register and the record. The page puts what stands out first.
National Park Service, National Register of Historic Places. Photos from Wikimedia Commons, credited on each place’s page.
Every building
Kewaunee, building by building, 1885–1911
Fire insurance maps drew every building, what it was made of and what it was used for, so insurers could price the risk of fire. Pick a year, then a sheet.
Kewaunee was the site of a Potawatomi village at the time of European contact in the seventeenth century. French Jesuit missionary Jacques Marquette celebrated All Saints Day at the Potawatomi village in 1674. Later, French explorer René-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle visited the village in 1679, and Canadian Jesuit Jean-François Buisson de Saint-Cosme stopped in September 1698. The Potawatomis moved south and east along Lake Michigan in the eighteenth century, and the area was reclaimed by Menominee people. Trader Jacques Vieau established a short lived trading post for the North West Company in the area of Kewaunee in 1795. The United States acquired the land from the Menominee nation in the 1831 Treaty of Washington.
Passages that mention Kewaunee, cut from the printed page as they were published.
Commemorative biographical record of the counties of Brown, Kewaunee and Door, Wisconsin, and containing biographical sketches of prominent1895 · page 493Read the page →
Read the text
and returned to his home in Ahnapee, where he resumed the practice of his profession. On January i, 1869, he was appointed deputy county clerk of Kewaunee count)', and in March following removed with his family to Kewaunee, where he continued to reside up to his death, which occurred March i, 1889. During the
Text read by machine from the scan; it may contain errors.
Commemorative biographical record of the counties of Brown, Kewaunee and Door, Wisconsin, and containing biographical sketches of prominent1895 · page 754Read the page →
Read the text
the end of that time buying a farm at Sa.xonburg, Manitowoc county. He followed agriculture until 1854, when he came to Kewaunee, being one of the pioneers of the county, and he helped to build the first sawmill in Kewaunee, also assisting in erecting the first German Lutheran church of the same place, of
Text read by machine from the scan; it may contain errors.
Scans and text from the Internet Archive. Books published in 1930 or earlier, which are in the public domain.
Timeline
Kewaunee, 1852 to 1984
Woven from the archive, old maps, post office records, the National Register and the people born here.
Nothing in the archives for these yearsWeddings on Main Street, storms, parades, school pictures, the old store. If it’s in your family album, it belongs here.
The Kewaunee post office opened in 1852, the earliest record of the town by name (U.S. post office records).
How does Kewaunee rank for history?
Kewaunee is more historic than 87% of U.S. towns, #54 of 362 in Wisconsin. The History grade combines the town’s founding era, the share of homes built before 1940 and its National Register listings. It’s a character grade, so it isn’t part of the overall grade. How it works.
What is on the National Register in Kewaunee?
5 listings: 3 buildings, 1 historic district, the Marquette Historic District, with 43 contributing buildings, and 1 structure. 46 historic buildings in all.
How old are the homes in Kewaunee?
42% of Kewaunee’s homes were built before 1940 (Census estimate, ±11.0 points), against a typical 12% for a Wisconsin town; the median home was built in 1956.
Founding dates: Wikidata, Wikipedia, the U.S. post office records of Blevins & Helbock (CC0) and the Census. Homes by year built: Census ACS 2020–24. National Register of Historic Places: National Park Service (list of May 22, 2026). Old photos, postcards and papers: Wikimedia Commons, the Library of Congress and other public archives, credited on each item’s page. Maps: U.S. Geological Survey historical topographic maps (via Esri) and Sanborn fire-insurance maps (Library of Congress). History text and census tables: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0). Places that used to be: USGS Geographic Names Information System (2021).
From Wikimedia Commons (3), Wikidata (3), the National Register of Historic Places (5), Wikipedia, Wikidata and Wikipedia for famous people, U.S. Geological Survey historical maps, U.S. Census counts (via Wikipedia), the US Post Offices dataset (Blevins & Helbock), the USGS Geographic Names Information System, Sanborn fire insurance maps (Library of Congress) and old county and town histories (Internet Archive). Archive images are copied here with their credits and licenses, shown on each photo’s page. Refreshed monthly.
c. 1909
