Inhabited by Native Americans into the mid-1800s, Waubeka was named for a Potawatomi chief who was friendly with the first white settlers who arrived in the area in the 1840s. Waubeka was the site of the first formal observance of Flag Day in 1885, and today the community is home to the National Flag Day Foundation's Americanism Center, which serves as the organization's headquarters and contains a museum.
History
The land that became the Waubeka was originally inhabited by Native Americans, including the Potawatomi tribe, who surrendered the land to the United States government in the 1833 Treaty of Chicago. While many people moved west of the Mississippi River to Kansas, a few chose to remain, and were referred to as "strolling Potawatomi" in contemporary documents because many of them were migrants who subsisted by squatting on their former lands, now owned by White settlers. One such group was led by Chief Waubeka, who maintained a winter camp on the south bank of the Milwaukee River in present-day Waubeka as late as 1845.[4] The chief's wigwam was located near the present site of the Gerald Joose house. In the Potawatomi language, "Waubeka" means "metal."[5] Eventually the Potawatomi gathered in northern Wisconsin, where they formed the Forest County Potawatomi Community.[6]
In the 1840s, Waubeka was the largest settlement in the Town of Fredonia. The first European civilization was from settlers who were English, Irish, Scottish, and Yankees from the East Coast. In 1848, a group of German immigrants arrived from Prussia and settled in the northern part of Waubeka. Luxemburger and Belgian newcomers settled in eastern Waubeka, and others from Bavaria and Saxony settled in the northwest.[7]
Before Europeans arrived in and civilized the area, the Waubeka area was an upland forest dominated by American beech and sugar maple trees. There were also white cedars growing along the Milwaukee River, which flows along the community and provided a power source for the community's early industries. Much of the original forest was cleared to prepare the land for agriculture.[9]
In 1995, the National Flag Day Foundation constructed the Americanism Center in Waubeka. A 13,000-square-foot facility on fifteen acres of land, the center serves as the foundation's headquarters and also houses a museum with an extensive collection of patriotic memorabilia, military uniforms, and artifacts from the life of Bernard J. Cigrand. The foundation organizes a parade in Waubeka each Flag Day.[12]
