South Germantown Village Tour
Scene 8 of 8

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Herman and Mary Seefeld Home

Seefeld Log Home: Coming north on Fond du Lac Avenue (highway 145) in the year 2002, after a slight jog, you encounter Mequon Road. At this point you have two options, you can proceed left to Pilgrim Road, then right past the post office on your left and Last Home Cemetery on your right, over the railroad tracks and you again encounter Hwy. 145. The other alternative is to go straight, swing to your left which then come out on Pilgrom Road just before the cemetery. Disregarding which route you take, years back, before the jog, you would have gone straight passed Ronnie's Tavern on your left, owned and operated by Ronald Detloff, go by Arnold Kannenburg home, also on your left, and up and over the railroad bridge which is no longer there. Seems that with so few trains, it was less expensive to reroute the road along Mequon Road than to rebuild the deteriorating bridge.

The timber railroad trestle/bridge was built by the railroad in 1923, 9 spans and a length of 142 feet. On 12 July 1920 Mrs Eva (Beuscher) Beck, the wife of John Beck, was killed in a train/automobile accident just to the west on Pilgrim Road. Killed along with Mrs. Beck were her three children Archie, age 14, Loraine, age 11, and Harvey, age 8. The primary emphasis to have the bridge constructed was probably this accident and the real possibility of more of the same. After the bridge became operational, Pilgrimn Road was closed to vehicle traffic over the railroad track. Vehicles coming from Menomonee Falls now had to use the bridge to get into the village.

In the late 1960s, just north of the bridge on the east side, was a cemented flat area where the vinery machines had been positioned. The view looking northeast saw only marshy land. Here in the fall could be found on Saturday mornings, several of the local inhabitants enjoying their beer and doing some trap shooting in preparation for the hunting season that was soon to open.

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