Guide
8 Sites for a People’s History of Milwaukee, Wisconsin
By Marianne Dhenin
Visitors to Milwaukee, Wisconsin, can enjoy famous breweries, bustling shopping districts, and world-class arts programming along Lake Michigan’s western shore. Those interested in the city’s past will find dozens of museums worth visiting and stunning examples of European-inspired architecture, like the Flemish Renaissance Revival-style Milwaukee City Hall and Pabst Mansion. There are also lesser-known histories worth exploring in Cream City, nicknamed for the pale yellow bricks on many of its historic buildings.
Follow along with this guide to discover a people’s history of Milwaukee, with eight sites centered on those who have shaped the city since its founding in the mid-nineteenth century and those who lived in the area before European colonization.
If you want to experience this city for yourself join us this fall in Milwaukee for PastForward 2025 and don't forget to sign up for our interest list.
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Photo By: Advanced Restoration
Bronzeville Cultural and Entertainment District
Early twentieth-century Bronzeville was an African American economic, social, and cultural hub where communities came together over jazz, blues, and the arts. Swathes of the district were razed, and Interstate 43 plowed through it during urban renewal from the 1960s through the ‘80s, displacing thousands of residents and erasing cultural and architectural heritage. Recent preservation and development projects have focused on honoring Bronzeville’s Black heritage and supporting Black-owned businesses. To join Bronzeville’s revival, start at Thrive On King, a community hub in the historic former Schuster’s and Gimbels department store on Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Drive.
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Photo By: Google Streetview
Central City Plaza
This three-building complex was Milwaukee’s first Black-owned shopping center. Its designer, Alonzo Robinson, was Wisconsin’s first Black licensed architect. Opened in 1973, the complex offered a commercial base for Black communities amid the era’s anti-Black urban renewal schemes. Robinson designed the plaza’s buildings with common features of New Formalism, including arched entryways and white concrete exteriors meant to mimic lux materials, such as marble. The disused complex is now the focus of a preservation campaign, and historians at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee are documenting Robinson’s work with support from the African American Cultural Heritage Action Fund.
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Photo By: Visit Milwaukee
Native Milwaukee at the Milwaukee Public Museum
Long before European settlers arrived on the shores of Lake Michigan, Native American tribes lived in the region, and today, many of their descendants call Milwaukee home. The US Government sought to force Native Americans from the Great Lakes region westward across the Mississippi River in the early nineteenth century, but many in Wisconsin remained or returned after removal. Eventually, through a series of treaties, eleven tribal reservations were established across the state. Today, each of these tribes governs its lands as a sovereign tribal nation. Milwaukee honors their histories at the Milwaukee Public Museum with a permanent exhibition called “A Tribute to Survival."
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Photo By: Visit Milwaukee
Historic Third Ward
This downtown district is packed with restaurants, cafés, galleries, and boutiques, making it a top destination for all Milwaukee visitors. Those interested in the past will also find lots to explore in this historic warehouse district, which earned a spot on the National Register of Historic Places in 1984. Part of its colorful past is as a home to some of Milwaukee’s most beloved gay bars and clubs, including the M&M Club. That bar, restaurant, and community hub opened in 1976 and anchored the local gay community through the HIV/AIDS crisis. It closed in 2006. Today, a locally-owned craft cocktail bar occupies the M&M Club’s former building and sometimes hosts events to honor the space’s gay history.
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Photo By: JMKE Photography
Walker’s Point
This district bordering the Milwaukee and Menomonee Rivers is one of Milwaukee’s three original settlements. German, Irish, and Yankee workers moved to Walker’s Point in the nineteenth century to work in factories like that of the Allis-Chalmers Corporation, once Milwaukee’s largest employer. Later, Mexican workers also came to staff the district’s industries. They built thriving communities, and today, the neighborhood is home to the largest concentration of Spanish speakers in Wisconsin. The district boasts a mix of architectural styles dating to Milwaukee’s earliest years. To tour it, start at Zócalo, a food truck park and event space whose name is a word for a public square in Mexico.
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Photo By: Michaelheysw
School Sisters of St. Francis
This religious congregation of Catholic sisters has been serving Wisconsinites for over 150 years. At its global headquarters in Milwaukee, established in 1886, the Sisters of St. Francis have operated a convent, education programs, and a sanitarium, which first offered medicinal baths and later warehoused patients diagnosed with nervous disorders or mental illness. The old sanitarium building is now gone, and with it, its outdated approach of institutionalizing disabled people. Parts of the convent have been remade as affordable housing where disabled people live independently. Visitors to this site can enjoy the historic St. Joseph Chapel and learn about the congregation’s long history.
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Photo By: Visit Milwaukee
Frank Lloyd Wright’s Burnham Block
Renowned American architect Frank Lloyd Wright is best known for grand works of organic architecture harmonizing building materials and design with their surrounding environment. Many of his designs came to house the nation’s elite. But throughout his career, Wright was also interested in making his work available to the everyday American. From 1911 to 1917, he designed a series of American System-Built Homes that embodied his unique vision for affordable housing. Six of these homes were built in Milwaukee at Burnham Block and are open for tours each weekend.
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Photo By: Sulfur via Wikedia CC BY-SA 3.0
Bay View’s Rolling Mill
Wisconsin’s bloodiest labor action took place in Milwaukee’s Bay View neighborhood on May 5, 1886. That morning, the state’s militia, under orders from Wisconsin’s Governor, opened fire on a crowd of over 1,000 striking workers marching toward the Milwaukee Iron Company’s rolling mill. The marching workers were demanding the enforcement of an eight-hour workday and an end to excesses and abuses of working time. Seven people were killed in the attack, now known as the Bay View Tragedy. The event galvanized the labor movement in Milwaukee and Wisconsin and is now commemorated with a historical marker and an annual memorial event sponsored by the Wisconsin Labor History Society.
Marianne Dhenin is an award-winning journalist and historian. View their portfolio and contact them at mariannedhenin.com..