We Live Up Here

Many Wisconsin State Parks have closed along with National Forest recreation areas, leaving many to seek different ways to enjoy the outdoors during the COVID-19 pandemic. The Wolf River, which starts in Forest County and runs through the entire length of Langlade County, offers opportunities to enjoy the beauty of the Northwoods while practicing social distancing.

Bill Kallner has been fishing the Wolf River for decades. Each time he visits the river he enjoys the beauty and solitude.

When we think of the Northwoods, one thing that comes to mind is the Supper Club. These iconic restaurants, along with all nonessential business, have been closed to in-person business as a result of the COVID-19 virus. These closures have supper club owners wondering about their future. They also have concerns about their laid off workers, the companies that supply them with food and beverages, and their patrons who are unable to enjoy the establishments that are part of their lives.

Each spring the hardwood forests of the Northwoods come alive with activity as the process of collecting maple sap begins. The people doing this work range from large commercial operations to single individuals tapping a few trees. As part of WXPR’s We Live Up Here series, we visited two very different operations before social distancing guidelines went into effect.

Instead of making its iconic Stormy Kromer hats, Ironwood-based Jacquart Fabrics is now making hospital masks and gowns.  Near Antigo, wildlife rehabilitators don’t have the luxury of staying away from work.  In this edition of We Live Up Here, we explore how COVID-19 has changed the landscape of businesses in our area.

Badger Minerals, a subsidiary of a Canadian mining company, wants to begin exploratory testing in eastern Oneida County near the headwaters of the Wolf River. The area sits on an ancient volcanic deposit that often contains high concentrations of zinc, lead, copper, gold, and silver. Recently, a group met in Mole Lake, which sits a few miles from the site, to express their concerns over the proposed mining.

Forest County Potawatomi Tribal Member Nick Shepard began his speech by saying, “I’m here today in support of protecting the Wolf River, again.”

If you say the name, “Stormy Kromer,” most people in the northwoods will know that you are referring to the iconic wool cap with earflaps that dates back to the early 1900s. What you may not know is that the hat is made in Ironwood, Michigan by Jacquart Fabric Products, a company that even has Rhinelander connections.

Our We Live Up Here series continues with a visit with John Kusz, the only current Ironwood resident who launched off Copper Peak, the highest artificial ski jump in the world. 

As part of the We Live Up Here series, Jim Skibo visited with Raptor Education Group Director, Marge Gibson. She moved back to Antigo to be closer to family, research and write about birds. She and her late husband, Don, soon discovered, however, that the northwoods lacked a facility for bird rehabilitation. In 1990 they opened a facility that takes in about a 1000 injured birds per year along with providing many educational opportunities.

A winter ritual in the northwoods is ice fishing. This time of year, anglers take to the lakes for pan fish, northern pike, and the prized walleye pike. Jim Skibo met up with some hardy anglers on White Lake to learn more about this cold weather sport.

Few people have the knowledge, tackle, and proper boat to fish the vast and often unpredictable waters of Lake Superior. For 56 years however, one Bessemer, Michigan resident has found his calling running a fishing charter out of Black River harbor, not only providing his customers with an experience of a lifetime, but also creating lifelong friendships off the shores of the largest freshwater lake in the world.   

For decades, families in southern Wisconsin have enjoyed Christmas trees and wreaths produced on a farm in Langlade County. Many of those families know their decorations come from a different family—one of four generations held together by boughs, traditions, and laughter.

Recent Study Finds that Lessons from Tribal Forestlands could Help to Improve the Health of Public Forests in the Northwoods.

Jim Skibo has the story

Birchbark canoes take a long time to make, but master artist Wayne Valliere from the Lac du Flambeau Band of Lake Superior Chippewa tells us that the process is an important one, and can serve as a metaphor for the value of teamwork.

Mackenzie Martin continues our We Live Up Here series with the story.

When someone lives to be a hundred years old, everyone asks them for the secrets to their longevity.

Trees, on the other hand, live to be hundreds and hundreds of years old. How do they survive?

Mackenzie Martin recently headed to an old-growth forest with naturalist John Bates to learn more.

Arts and crafts style furniture⁠—first produced in the early 1900s⁠—is considered by many to be the hallmark of American design and artisanship. Original pieces can go for millions of dollars at auction and furniture made in that style today can be sold for tens of thousands of dollars.

Today WXPR contributor Jim Skibo continues our We Live Up Here series with the story of a man in Antigo who has mastered the style at a unique time in his life.