Weird Wisconsin

I have friends throughout the country who regularly send me links to bizarre stories about something in Wisconsin. Nine times out of ten the weirdness won’t be news to me as I keep and eye out for the odd. 

These purveyors of weird tales seem to think Wisconsin has more than its share of bizarre events and attractions, and I’m not so sure they’re wrong. I take a bit of pride living in the land of the weird and home of the strange.

Elkhorn, Wisconsin’s Linda Godfrey, co-author of Weird Wisconsin, gave a great presentation entitled last Thursday at the .

Godfrey’s hour-long slide show began with a Milton farmer’s memorial to his Vietnam buddies who didn’t come home. The memorial featured ten skeletons including one along the roadside at the wheel of a tractor. 

While Godfrey highlights both mythical and tangible weirdness, she said she prefers the weird you can see such as the giant cheese mouse at Black River Falls Crossing, because “he is always going to be there.”  She noted “Wisconsin holds the record for giant cheese mice.” WEIRD.

Those statues and many others throughout the world are made in Sparta, Wisconsin at Fiberglass Animals, Shapes & Trademarks Corporation, aka F.A.S.T. Corp. The molds for many of the statues remain in a statue graveyard, which features giant octopi, sharks, Big Boys and other oversized advertisement molds.  The octopus’ garden is open to free tours year round…WEIRD.

The Whitefish Bay Library featured Godfrey as part of its Halloween season programming, so she also pointed out many of Wisconsin’s haunted highlights.  Madison has a couple including the Ohio Tavern, which has curios that mysteriously fly off shelves and bottles in the basement that curiously rearrange themselves.  The statue of a seated Abraham Lincoln in front of UW’s Bascom Hall is said to be haunted, and going back to the 1940s, folks have quipped that Abe will stand up whenever a virgin passes. Godfrey noted that Abe has yet to stand…WEIRD.

Wisconsin is home to at least two “gravity hills”. These are rural roads that appear to be uphill, but due to an optical illusion caused by the surrounding terrain are actually downhill.  One is in Shellsburg and the other is Joe Road east of Lake Winnebago. Cars stopped on these hills and put in neutral will appear to roll “uphill”…WEIRD!

Wisconsin is also home of many visionary artists whose work many consider weird.  Godfrey believes Burlington is one of Wisconsin’s weirdest places, as besides being home to celebs Tony Romo, Caitlin Morrall and James Strang, it’s also home to visionary artists as well as other oddities including the historic Mormon town of Voree including an early Mormon cemetery, a Liar’s Club and the Top Museum…WEIRD.

Many Wisconsin cities have underground labyrinths, but perhaps none as intricate as Oshkosh.  The Book Oshkosh Down Under gives an in depth look, so to speak, at the elaborate Oshkosh tunnel system…WEIRD.

Godfrey has also written four books about “upright canines” aka WEREWOLVES! She said Michigan and Wisconsin are hot spots for sightings of walking doglike creatures.  While some reports are certainly hoaxes and others are likely honest misinterpretations of other creatures, she makes a pretty good case for their existence. Bray Road, between Highways 11 and NN in Walworth County is famous for werewolf sightings as they apparently run across the road from cornfield to cornfield…WEIRD.

She also told us about a secret site in the state that recently had a credible Big Foot sighting, but she swore the two dozen attendees to keep it a secret to prevent locals from spooking the creature.  I will tell you that it is not in the town of Big Foot, because that is in Illinois just across the border from Walworth County, where he might have his own Big Foot supper club, but he’d be dead and buried here.

Plus, Wisconsin, not Illinois, is proudly, the land of the strange and home of the WEIRD!