By the late 1880s, over 20% of the population of Winnebago County was German-born. German-speaking immigrants had come here in three waves: from the rural Prussian province of Pomerania in the early 1850s, from villages along the border between Bavaria and Bohemia a few years later, and from German settlements along Russia’s Volga River around 1900. They forged tight-knit communities where they continued to speak their regional dialects, built churches of different denominations, printed German-language newspapers, and kept their traditions alive in clubs and other organizations.
Click on the links below and learn more about the German-American experience in Oshkosh, Wisconsin. Resources have been provided by Alan Lareau, Professor Emeritus of German at the University of Wisconsin–Oshkosh, and the Oshkosh Public Library.