Blair, WI

Blair is a Trempealeau County city tucked along the Trempealeau River, where the valley carried both settlement and the former Green Bay and Western Railroad toward Winona. People began arriving in the 1850s, with Norwegian families making up most of the later residents and German families adding another thread. A dam built for a grist mill in 1873 created Lake Henry, changing the river edge into a 44-acre lake and giving the city a second center of gravity beside the downtown streets.

The lake is still part of Blair's everyday map. Riverside Memorial Park follows nearly 2.5 miles of city-owned shoreline and includes the municipal pool, boat landing, fishing piers, ball fields, shelters, and walking paths; Strand Park sits on the north shore. September brings the Blair Cheese Festival, which began as Egg Fest in 1938 and keeps a Norwegian accent in its traditions. Highways 53 and 95 connect the city across the valley, while the park, lake, and festival do the more local work of pulling people back into town. Blair is a river-and-rail settlement whose old mill dam is now the feature everyone can find.