Fort Defiance (Wisconsin)

The Prairie Spring Hotel, also known as the Daniel Morgan Parkinson House, was built in 1834 with Greek Revival elements. The structure is located in Lafayette County outside Willow Springs, Wisconsin It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1999. In 1827 Daniel Morgan Parkinson left his home in Tennessee and brought his family to Galena. He and his sons tried lead-mining but didn't like it. The family ran an inn in Mineral Point, with his wife Rebecca "...a most excellent and popular landlady...." When the Black Hawk War broke out, Daniel and his son Peter served under Henry Dodge, including in the decisive Battle of Wisconsin Heights. During the war, the Parkinsons spent some time in the stockade of Fort Defiance, five miles southeast of Mineral Point. In 1832 Daniel bought 80 acres of land a half mile from the fort, on the Military Road from Mineral Point to Galena. In 1833 he began building his hotel and home there on the hilltop. This was very early, before Wisconsin was a state. This area was still part of Michigan Territory. Most structures built in the lead-mining region at the time were simple and functional. Parkinson instead built a two-story I-house - a style he knew from Tennessee - with walls of hand-hewn oak joined by mortise and tenon. It was clad in white oak clapboard, with a two-story front porch. The house was originally heated by limestone fireplaces. Inside, walls are lath and plaster, and mantels from the fireplaces remain. Daniel Parkinson continued his public service after the war. He was elected a delegate to the territorial legislature in 1836 and again in 1840. In 1837 he was involved in incorporating the village of Mineral Point. In 1846 he represented Lafayette County at the first Constitutional Convention. In 1849 he served in the state of Wisconsin's second House of Representatives. He was one of the faction that was against banks and paper money, because of bad experiences during the territorial period. In the 1850s he served on the Lafayette county board, representing Willow Springs. Before the hotel was complete, the road from Mineral Point to Galena shifted west, and in the 1840s it shifted further, so the hotel business faded, but the Parkinson family lived in the house and farmed. Parkinsons lived in the house until 1928. It was eventually abandoned and near demolition when in 1994 Dean Connors and the Lead Region Historic Trust moved it 800 feet to the north and stabilized it.

The Mottley Family Farmstead on Ivey Road in Willow Springs in Lafayette County, Wisconsin is a 8 acres (3.2 ha) property which was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2001. The listing included three contributing buildings. It is an abandoned farm on an isolated ravine, begun in 1854 by English immigrants Abraham and Susan Motley. Remaining are a 1+1⁄2-story limestone farmhouse probably begun around 1860, a bank barn, and other structures. The Motleys raised milk cows, pigs, wheat, corn and potatoes. The farm stayed in their family until 1972.

Willow Springs is a town in Lafayette County, Wisconsin, United States. The population was 758 at the 2010 census, up from 632 at the 2000 census. The unincorporated community of Calamine is located in the town.

Calamine is an unincorporated community in the town of Willow Springs in Lafayette County, Wisconsin, United States. The Cheese Country Trail runs through the community, as does the Pecatonica River. The community is home to 100 year old St. Michael Church, within the Roman Catholic Diocese of Madison. Next to the church is the Willow Springs township hall which was the former one room school house until 1961, when the new Willow Springs school opened. Many scholars were produced between its walls. Formerly Calamine was a bustling community with prosperous mines and farms with an active rail road. The rail road was operated by the Milwaukee Road RR and switched at Calamine, either going north to Slateford and Mineral Point or West to Belmont, Ipswich and Platteville. In the 50’s and 60’s large cattle trains would unload Texas cattle in the spring at Calamine and Slateford to be hauled to Kenyon Cattle Company’s pastures. Stores, hotels, blacksmiths, and taverns thrived. For many years local farmers hauled their milk to the Calamine cheese factory to be made into famous Swiss cheese with holes in it. Later the Cornland fertilizer plant was built and supplied farmers for miles around with granular and liquid fertilizer, making the nearby Pecatonica River bottoms top producers in non flood yearsNorth of Calamine there was a popular swimming hole known as the “Mill” on the Pecatonica River named after a prehistoric grist Mill which was burned to the ground during the Blackhawk war. Fourth Cavalry troopers from Fort Defiance were unable to extinguish it and through the procedure somehow discovered this great swimming hole.

Mineral Point is a town in Iowa County, Wisconsin, United States. The population was 1,033 at the 2010 census. The City of Mineral Point is located within the town.

Mineral Point Hill is a hill and former mining site in Mineral Point, Wisconsin, bounded by Wisconsin Highway 23, Shake Rag Street, Copper Street, and Dodge Street. It is the site of the 1825 discovery of lead ore in Mineral Point, which drew settlers to the region over the next decade. Many of these new residents were Cornish immigrants, and they settled in a community called Pendarvis at the base of the hill. The wave of settlement led to Mineral Point's establishment in the 1830s, making it the third-oldest city in Wisconsin. The hill was also the site of the Merry Christmas zinc mine, which operated from 1906 to 1912; by this point, zinc had supplanted lead as the area's most plentiful resource. The site includes a mine office building, the shaft of the Merry Christmas mine, and several filled mine sites. The hill was added to the National Register of Historic Places on October 26, 1972.

The Walker House is an inn and restaurant in Mineral Point, in Iowa County, Wisconsin. It is one of the oldest inns in the state.

Fort Jackson was a frontier fort located in Mineral Point, Michigan Territory, and constructed during the 1832 Black Hawk War.

Pendarvis is a historic site located in Mineral Point, Iowa County, Wisconsin, United States. The site, which is listed on the National Register of Historic Places, is made up of several 19th century stone and timber cabins built by Cornish immigrants who came to Mineral Point to mine lead and zinc. Today the site is owned by the Wisconsin Historical Society and serves as a museum of Wisconsin's early lead mining history. Programs at the site also interpret the groundbreaking preservation work by Robert Neal and Edgar Hellum, begun during the Great Depression.

Mineral Point is a city in Iowa County, Wisconsin, United States. The population was 2,581 at the 2020 census. The city is located within the Town of Mineral Point. Mineral Point is part of the Madison Metropolitan Statistical Area. Mineral Point was settled in 1827, becoming a lead and zinc mining center, and commercial town in the 19th and early 20th centuries. It initially drew a considerable number of Cornish-immigrant miners and their families. In the mid-20th century it attracted artists and an artist's colony and its tourism industry began to grow. The city's well-preserved historical character within the varied natural topography of the driftless area has made it a regional tourist destination. Mineral Point is sometimes called Wisconsin's third oldest city, but the Wisconsin Historical Society notes several older colonial settlements.

The Yellowstone River is a 42.0-kilometre (26.1 mi) river in Iowa and Lafayette counties in the U.S. state of Wisconsin. The river's source is in rural Iowa County east of Mineral Point, and its mouth is at the East Branch Pecatonica River northwest of Argyle. The river is dammed at Yellowstone Lake, a popular fishing area which is protected as Yellowstone Lake State Park. An additional 4,000 acres (1,600 ha) of its watershed is part of the Yellowstone Wildlife Area.

Fayette is an unincorporated community located in the town of Fayette, Lafayette County, Wisconsin, United States. Deriving its name from Lafayette County, the post office was established in August 1849 with Martin W. Anderson as the first postmaster.