Meeting Wisconsin
Cheese curds, dive bars, and a poignant life lesson
NEW AUBURN, Wis. — In numerous subtle ways, the rural Midwest signals to city dwellers that they’re out of their element: the hunting equipment on raffle at bars, the rumble strips laid along sleep-inducingly straight roads to signal a stop ahead.
Then there is the farm smell.
It strikes in mere milliseconds. Calling it pungent feels generous. It’s how I’d imagine bags of spoiled produce after rotting in a revolting dumpster and being feasted on by black flies. In short, it stinks.
Yet over the course of my week in Wisconsin, I trained myself to anticipate good things whenever I detected it. After all, my very first stop — the Klemish family farm, a fifth-generation operation in its 135th year — yielded both a hefty whiff of manure and fresh-as-it-gets ice cream1. Off-putting odors are a small price to pay for the good stuff.
On my first night, I partake in a sacred Badger State tradition, the Friday fish fry, at a bar that can only be described as a hunter’s hideaway. Set in an otherwise desolate area deep in rural Barron County, on a road no Street View car has ever traversed, it’s nonetheless hopping with gray-haired patrons inside. An oil painting of overjoyed outdoorsmen celebrating a Packers championship overlooks the bar. Plastered on a fridge is a poster detailing the state’s hunting seasons, which I didn’t fully appreciate the nuances of; there isn’t one “deer season” but distinct time periods where hunting is allowed depending on your weapon and region. With the bar fully occupied, I sit alone at a table; no matter, I chat up a multigenerational six-top near me who make a point to come here each year on, you guessed it, their annual hunting trip. The fish comes out with an almost tempura-like batter that sheds generously. As the bar clears up, I meet Marvin, a retired draftsman who explains this region used to have many more dairy farms than it does now. Many family farms fail to identify successors; automation has reduced the labor needed to make the same amount of stuff.
The next day I spend an afternoon exploring Eau Claire’s coffee shops, meeting a frisbee coach in town for his friend’s wedding and college freshmen who bonded over their taste in YouTube. On my approach into Mosinee, a small city in the state’s north-central region, I pass a bar with a jam-packed dirt parking lot; immediately after checking into my hotel I retrace my steps and go inside before asking any questions. The culprit is a casual wedding reception being held a side room; the bar still runs normally. Alex, whose mom is the bride in question, is the first to approach me. Upon hearing my story, he promises me the best night of my trip yet. In his party days, his friends nicknamed him “Chunky Love”; he assures me it was meant literally. Now, he’s settled down with kids and a pressure washing company in Milwaukee’s suburbs. Soon I’m getting a lesson in concrete finishing from his brother, who eagerly shows me Snapchat videos of driveways he’s poured at the feet of steep hills.2 He’s precisely the rough-around-the-edges trades background type — self-proclaimed “dumb muscle” — that’s getting very hard to find back home in Cambridge. They’re genuinely affectionate guys with big hearts.
Unlike most small-town bars I’ve visited, bodily heat is barely noticeable inside the Hammer Down. In fact, the high ceilings make it downright cavernous. People scurry between the gambling machines, dartboard, seating area, and patio, sometimes making small talk, sometimes taking in the scene. A single bartender commands the scene with an orchestra conductor’s confidence; I can’t deny I’m in awe.
In towns where new blood is scarce, bars need incentives to draw sizeable weeknight crowds. Enter the cash drawing, a phenomenon rural Wisconsin introduced me to. Each week, regulars pay a nominal fee to participate; if their name is chosen, the reward is a jackpot usually exceeding $1,000. The catch: if you’re not physically present when you win, you forfeit the prize and the jackpot grows.
I witness drawings on two successive nights. The first takes place on a Monday evening at Phil and Deb’s, a welcoming joint on the main street of La Farge, a village of just over 700. My conversation partner for the night was Bob, a Minnesotan attracted to the area by its “good land” and who has made a cabin in the woods his home for the last 45 years. His son’s girlfriend ends up winning the money, and he seemingly seriously invites me to his 80th birthday party next year in North Carolina. The interior is nondescript, but signs that this place is an order of magnitude smaller than anywhere I’ve been appear all over: the sympathy card for a recently departed village resident that makes its way around the bar, the five-player card game proceeding nonchalantly in a corner; the gossip about my out-of-state plates I overhear between a man on his smoke break and his significant other.
The next night, at Brenda’s in Melvina (a hamlet with a population under 100, but which draws a crowd from nearby Cashton), I meet Kevin, who won last week’s drawing but couldn’t claim it. In a humorous twist, he’s promptly let off the hook by Cashton’s high school athletic director, tending to duties at a volleyball game. Kevin and his wife Kathy are headed to the game anyway — she teaches second grade3 — and I earn an invitation to tag along. The couple have three daughters and no sons, but for a few hours I feel rather adopted. They reciprocate my genuine curiosity and soon we swap family stories. Like any good Midwestern conversation, football helps break the ice; Kevin loves Tom Brady and despises Aaron Rodgers, which endears me to him quickly. Between munching on cheese curds at the bar and getting settled in the bleachers, I meet the town Santa Claus, the school principal, and the county nurse. A hundred feet from where we’re sitting, Kevin points out the energetic local radio announcer who voiced his own football games more than four decades ago.
Cashton wins the game, 3-1. For a Tuesday, it’s quite a lively scene; there’s good turnout from the opposing team’s parents, the student section commits to the “pink out” theme; players and coaches are pumped up and emotionally invested.
The Driftless Area, where these rural bars are located, lives up to its reputation for uniqueness. Its physical geography is stunning. Driving east from La Crosse, meandering roads with miniature peaks and valleys carve through picturesque patches of farmland like a video game racecourse. Occasionally, a panoramic view opens up; annoyingly, there’s typically no shoulder to pull over and admire it. Cows greet you from the roadside, and they’ll stare if you stop to snap photos. The speed limit is 55, but that feels too hurried — no matter, since the roads are so sparsely trafficked you run little risk of getting tailgated. The skies above are the darkest I’ve seen this trip; heading back from La Farge, I simply couldn’t resist parking on the side of a county road, flipping my lights off, and dedicating a few minutes to taking in the overwhelming display of stars.4 If I grew up out there, I think I’d have been an astronomer.
Viroqua, a regional cultural capital, plays host to a fascinating blend of lifelong locals, organic farmers (many of whom are transplants), and Amish families. A curator at the county history museum tells me it’s a popular destination for Chicagoans disillusioned with city life; these modern back-to-the-landers, seeking simplicity and a spiritual bond with nature, lend this place an unmistakable quirkiness. To find it, you need look no further than the local gelato shop’s bulletin board, where one flyer promotes “a Sound Ceremony to create space in the internal landscape thru intentional uplift and raising a Joyful Sound.” I enjoy a killer mac and cheese at the locally renowned Driftless Cafe, where the emphasis on slow, farm-to-table food would make any Vermonter feel at home.
My time in Wisconsin ends how it began: at a dive bar, this one in sleepy Prairie du Chien. Mike, a beef farmer from nearby Wauzeka who rises at 4 a.m. each morning, educates me about grain bins and the practice of storing crops to avoid selling them at low prices. His girlfriend, a dental hygienist operating a private practice while also helping out in elementary schools, is a riot. Her voice is already hoarse when we shake hands, but she proceeds to offer zany anecdotes — her son eats everything he kills, including squirrels; an illegitimate child her uncle fathered now lives in Massachusetts — until Mike’s bedtime compels them to leave. They’ve been dating for a year, and have a comedically adversarial relationship; her catchphrase is “you’re dumb!” whenever he says something slightly off-color or inaccurate. The other men at the bar sit there amused, preoccupied by the baseball games on.
Now, to the most important question of all: do the cheese curds really squeak? The moment of truth arrives at Weber’s Farm Store, a local’s recommendation that does brisk business selling both soft serve and curds. The land nearby, still lush and green, slopes gently upward, has the subtle beauty of a Microsoft desktop background. The smallest bag on sale is a pound, but there’s no way I’m leaving empty-handed. I pop a curd into my mouth, chew a few times, and it’s clear as day: squeak. I relax in the driver’s seat, feeling satisfied. I have completed Wisconsin.
By 11 p.m. energy was gradually dissipating at the Hammer Down. The rushes of air from smoke breaks grew noticeably colder; the tables were now clear of wedding revelers.
Then, out of nowhere, a moment of magic.
The barrage of headbanging classic rock queued on the TouchTunes stops abruptly. In come the opening plucks of a slow, warm acoustic guitar. With it, a pleading, high-pitched male voice:5
Come a little bit closer, hear what I have to say
Just like children sleeping, we could dream this night away
It catches me completely off guard. But the three older couples opposite me at the bar know what to do. They lock eyes briefly, then slide off their stools in slow motion. Turning to face each other, their arms wrap around each other’s hips. And they start moving.
It’s an instinctual dance, simple and deeply affectionate, no rules to follow or technique to worry about. Knowing smiles appear on each of their faces. They love, caress, cherish each other, punctuate things with the occasional kiss. As the chorus kicks in, the bartender darts to retrieve her phone and snag photos.
By the second verse a goofy grin overspreads my face, tears threatening to well behind my glasses. Throughout the rural Midwest I’ve observed an earnestness that indicates a near-total lack of performative socializing. And this scene is so moving precisely because of how pure it is. You’d be hard-pressed to argue those couples didn’t win at life. They have a love nothing could steal from them, fulfillment that would make many unctuous young professionals cringe with envy; I wish everyone chasing endless accolades or social media fame could have witnessed how simple the ingredients for satisfaction really are. Eventually the bartender leaves her post to join her boyfriend in the proceedings.
Because I'm still in love with you, I want to see you dance again
Because I'm still in love with you, on this harvest moon
When it was over, I wanted to applaud. I knew nothing could top that moment, so I paid my tab. The next song felt akin to the piped-in music that plays out crowds filing out of a concert. Deeply affected and a tad shellshocked, I spent a few minutes reflecting before pulling out of the parking lot. The essence of life had stared me in the face — in the form of tipsy Cheeseheads.
Best thing I ate: the freshly fried cheese curds at Mullins Cheese in central Wisconsin. I think I could have kept popping them into my mouth until my stomach physically reached its capacity. The cheese is made right across the street; the curds, fried to order. They literally oozed with moisture and flavor.
I drove 90 minutes out of the way to try frozen custard in Oshkosh at Leon’s (it was good!), but the side trip was overshadowed by a funny mishap. At a bar where I caught the waning minutes of a Packers victory, I asked the bartender a question I’ve memorized throughout my time in the Midwest: “what kind of pop do you have?” He gruffly shot back immediately: “where the fuck are you from?” I’d committed a cardinal sin: not checking the dialect map before using regional slang. Eastern Wisconsin is a rare Midwestern locale where it’s soda, not pop.
Pull tabs are an extremely popular bar game. These are scratch-ticket-like games. You feed a machine a couple dollars, and it spits out a card. If a bunch of icons on the card match, it’s your lucky day.
Overheard at lunch in Viroqua: “The Midwest is the only place in America where overeating is still considered an act of heroism.”
Very few people move into the small farming towns, but I did encounter one exception: a man whose ink-making company (think ink for beer bottles and other consumer packaging) relocated him to La Farge.
I spotted several businesses that I’m confident sell no beverages with Coke-sponsored signage. I’m not sure how to explain this.
The Amish arrived in the Driftless Area very recently, only becoming a significant presence in the 1960s. They’ve generally been welcomed because they have helped blunt the trend of most farms are trending toward fewer laborers.
I spent two mornings in Wausau, a mid-sized city with hints of quirkiness to it, meeting a filmmaker, a nurse, and a nonprofit director.
In big cities, it’s not uncommon to see life coaches advertise services, teaching people how to find happiness and fulfillment. Career advisors promise to help align someone’s work time with a deeper meaning. But the Wisconsinites didn’t need to buy any courses to get them to this moment. Why not? I don’t think urbanites are born with less humanity. Something is stripping it away, distracting us from our essence.
I keep the promise I made to myself by visiting a Culver’s before leaving the state. I’m most impressed by the crispy, flavorful fish sandwich and the natural-tasting frozen custard, but the standard fast-food fare is quite good too. I can’t say I understand all the hullabaloo; I imagine it’s similar to how non-New Englanders can’t fathom our Dunkin pride.
The Klemish Creamery is yet another roadside honor-system business. My purchase marks the first time I’ve ever charged myself using a card reader.
I learn that many of his customers want newly poured concrete to look well-worn, so they do additional work after the pour to make it happen.
“We’re in Wisconsin, it’s always a long a sound,” she joked about teaching phonics.
Equally striking was the profound silence, disrupted only by the occasional faint animal noise.
I had never heard the song (Neil Young’s “Harvest Moon”) before, and I’ll indelibly associate it with this moment evermore.
wowowowow i love people watching its so cool that you were able to see the couples dance and connect :) did you learn the dance as well?
do you find people also talk differently / are more willing to talk to you when you initiate conversation?