1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Washburn

WASHBURN, a city and the county-seat of Bayfield county, Wisconsin, U.S.A ., about 52 m. E. of Superior, Wis., and about 6 m. N . of Ashland, on Chequamegon Bay, an arm of Lake Superior. Pop. (1910) 3830. Washburn is served by the Northern Pacific and the Chicago & North-Western railways, and by several lines of lake steamships. The city is finely situated on high land above the bay, and is a popular summer resort, being especially well known for its boating and fishing. It has a Carnegie library. Among its manufactures are staves, shingles, lumber, wooden ware and bricks. There is a powder and dynamite plant in the vicinity. In the city there are also grain elevators and large coal docks, and in the neighbourhood are valuable stone quarries. In 1659 Radisson and Groseilliers touched here on their trip along the south shore of Lake Superior. In 1665 Father Claude Allouez, the Jesuit, established on the shore of the bay, a short distance south of the present city, the first French mission in Wisconsin, which he named “La Pointe du Saint Esprit,” and which in 1669 was placed in charge of Father Jacques Marquette. The place was visited by Du Luth in 1681–1682, and here in 1693 Le Sueur, a fur trader, built a stockaded post. In 1718 a fort was erected and a French garrison placed in it. About 1820–1821 a trading post of the American Fur Company was established in the neighbourhood. The present city, named in honour of Governor C. C. Washburn, dates from about 1879, but its growth was slow until after 1888. It was chartered as a city in 1904.