Tag: childhood memories

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Another Boulder Boy – Renny Ohlsson, My Story

My story really begins with my grandparents – August and Anna Ohlsson. They emigrated from Sweden about 1905, first to Minneapolis, then to Boulder Junction around 1917. He was a Master Cabinetmaker, she an accomplished agriculturist. After some years in a Twin Cities machine shop, he elected to buy land in Boulder Junction, said to be almost a square mile, cutover priced at a dollar an acre. His property included about 600 feet of frontage on Oswego Lake, extended north to Allen Road on the High Lake Road, close to the Fishtrap Road intersection. Over the years, certain parcels were acquired by the town and county and August did donate land and timber for the High Lake School. On the Oswego site they built a residence, later named Shaham Lodge (after sale to Shaw and Hammond), several cabins, and a barn.

My father Andrew was born there in 1919, their youngest son; at age 14 he built his own cabin a 1/4-mile distance south. I was born there in January 1941, and am listed in various notes as a “Doctor Kate” baby, though this may be in some question. Some family stories are that the doctor was contacted, arrived at the cabin, but from exhaustion and other factors, went to sleep on the couch awaiting my arrival; when the event occurred, Grandma Anna did the delivery, as she was well acquainted with the process having cows, sheep and goats at the Oswego property. Dr. Kate’s contribution was to later send a bill for $25 to “cover attendance for mother and child.” Somewhere I still have that bill.

Shortly after that, WWII began, Andy, my father, entered the USMC, only to be invalidated out due to a broken limb. He then began carpentry and construction for various government projects. I was quite small and was farmed out to live with the grandparents while my parents moved between those government jobs.

My schooling began in Lake Tomahawk in 1945-an uncle was the principal, allowing me to enter despite my age insufficiency. I then came to the Boulder school for a couple years, but then began to accompany the parents’ travels. As a result, in 12 years of schooling, I attended 10 schools. After graduation from LUHS in 1958, I went to Madison, attempted to study engineering, but just couldn’t compete, lasting only two years there. I then went into the USAF in 1960, served as a radar technician in several fighter groups, leaving active duty in June 1964. At that point, returned home for the summer, then went down to Milwaukee for work in a foundry. Married Judy Schauss in 1966, she put me through school at UW-Oshkosh, two degrees and I went to work in the paper industry for 30 years. At that point, leaving the industry, I went back to doing carpentry and home repairs for a living, but am now retired. We continue to live in Oshkosh, but spend time at our properties in Taylor County.

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Eric Johnson “Not that you asked, but…” “A taste of Up North”

This article was published in the Vilas County News Review on Wednesday, September 17, 2025 and is reprinted here with permission of the author.

“…I realized very early the power of food to evoke memory … to transport you to other places …” – Spanish-American chef, restauranteur, and philanthropist Jose Andres (1969-)

Referencing the title of this column, maybe not a gourmet taste of Up North, but a taste of the North Woods nonetheless.

Jose Andres was right, food – taste – can indeed evoke memories and transport you to other places.

A sale at the grocery store the other day offered a deal too good to pass up, and, enticed by a taste of nostalgia for old times’ sake, I purchased a six-pack of bottled Squirt soda.

Today owned and bottled by Keurig Dr. Pepper, for the uninitiated, Squirt is a caffeine-free, grapefruit-flavored soft drink created by Edward Mehren and Herb Bishop in 1938 in Phoenix, Arizona. Necessity, being the mother of invention, inspired the creation of the carbonated citrus soda to creatively deal with a bumper crop of grapefruit in Arizona, one of four U.S. states that grow the subtropical fruit alongside Florida, Texas, and California.

As a child – and still today more than five decades later – the distinctive scent and flavor of grapefruit-infused Squirt remains curiously intertwined in my memories with, of all things, the North Woods – and in particular, Boulder Junction. When on thinks of the Musky Capital of the World and Wisconsin’s “Up North” region, grapefruit doesn’t typically spring to mind.

For whatever reason, for my family and I in the late 1960s, 1970s, and early 1980s, Squirt was an exclusively “Up North” soda, the effervescent liquid nectar inside the icy-cold green glass Squirt bottles being a staple of fishing in the North Woods. Squirt vending machines were seemingly everywhere in the North Woods in those days – outside stores, gas stations, and motel offices – unlike anywhere else I ever experienced.

Once I was home from the supermarket the other day, I popped open a Squirt, took a swig, and was instantly transported back 56 years and 291 miles north to Boulder Junction in the summer of 1969 for my first visit to the North Woods, my folks and I went tent camping at the Wisconsin DNR’s South Trout Lake campground in a semi-remote walk-in site on the banks of gurgling Allequash Creek as it meandered westerly from Allequash Lake down to Trout.

My mind was instantaneously awash in a mélange of happy, formative early memories of Boulder Junction – curious raccoons, blinking fireflies, the sound of the wind in the forest, the scent of pines, drawing pictures in the sand, gathering twigs and branches for kindling, and roasting Campfire marshmallows and Ironwood-made Walter Meyer hot dogs on whittled sticks over crackling campfires in our campsite’s boulder-edged fire ring.

We spent many of our days that summer angling out on 279-acre seepage lake Lost Canoe off Rustic Road Hwy. K East in an azure blue rowboat rented from ol’ Reuben Schauss in Boulder Junction, my mom and I reeling in panfish and the occasional walleye, bass, or northern pike for dinner while my dad, doing his best Captain Ahab wannabe, maniacally sought to land his elusive Moby Dick prey – a leviathan musky he dubbed “Old Granddad” that hovered tauntingly within eyeshot in the shade of a wooden fish crib off the lake’s southern shore. Bait in those days meant a visit to “Old Man Monahan” in downtown Boulder Junction to buy paperboard cups of wriggling ‘nite crawlers’ and nets of darting minnows scooped into our galvanized steel bait bucket.

Daily lunch in the boat out on the lake included bologna sandwiches, Geiser’s potato chips and fresh summer stone fruits, washed down with iced bottles of Squirt, the provisions gathered at Long’s Hillbilly Supermarket and George’s Super Valu in downtown Boulder Junction, a long-ago era when tiny downtown Boulder also supported five filling stations bearing the Standard, Mobil, Citgo, Phillips 66, and Texaco banners.

Back in camp at the end of the day, we’d fry up our fishing bounty for supper on a skillet over the hissing propane camp stove, followed by a leisurely evening of songs, stories, and conversation around the snap, crackle, and pops of the dancing campfire.

And so summers Up North in Boulder Junction continued throughout my childhood.

While tent camping later pivoted to the Crystal, Muskie, and Firefly campgrounds, and angling went decidedly upscale on Allequash, Muskellunge, Trout, and Plum lakes thanks to the use of my Uncle Ronnie’s succession of Mercury-powered SeaNymph fishing boats, that one constant out on the lakes remained Squirt, the official soft drink of North Woods fishing – at least for the Johnson family.

Cracking open that grapefruit-infused Squirt the other day vividly brought back my childhood Up North memories in all their Kodachrome glory, without ever cracking open a photo album. It was, as the Carpenters would sing in the same era, yesterday once more.

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Hank Haag letter dated June 30, 2000

Dearest Shirley,

Yes I did receive a nice letter from you – thanks very much – best wishes to all of yours and to you!!

I am now 80 years old – still in fair condition – mowed the lawn this A.M.

I am cursed the the Haag Brothers Malady – sciatica and heart problems! But getting by.

Yes of course I know lots of B.J. History. I was taught in High Lake School for 8 years so you know I am smart.

I remember many “boyhood” and “youthhood” experiences around B.J. but I only have 6 sheets of paper so will not tell you too much.. I remember in 1935 caddying at Dairyman’s CC when Charley Ashton told me of my Dad’s death in an auto wreck. My name is still carved in an old pomp house at Dairyman’s!!

I remember several years in my early teens working at “Resort of the Woods.”

I remember pumping 40 buckets of water a day to have “running water” in your mom’s kitchen and also one of my jobs was keeping an eye on you: which was no easy task.

I remember skiing and snowshoeing to High Lake School and one morning finding that it was 50 below on the school house thermometer.

I remember shooting snowshoe hares after school and what good eating that was.

Sure; I remember Arnie Berg and Dale Waller and Ed Walters and Mel Major and many, many more – forgive me for not getting them all.

I remember lighting the fires in the cabins, cleaning boats, packing fish for shipment; running errands to BJ in Sid’s “Model T” Ford!

I remember eating in the mess halls at CCC Camps and at Camp 3 with my dad.

I remember Mom Haag sewing pillow and mattress ticks and delivering them to Camp 3 by horse and sleigh or buggy.

I remember brother Fred Haag driving the “Steam Hauler” and the first cletrac “cat” hauling logs at Camp 3.

I remember our team of horses who loved to run and how the snow balls flew from their feet and bombarded us as we drove them frantically home after picking up supplies at the depot or the store in BJ.

I remember that Mom and Dad ordered our bulk groceries by mail from Merrill – 100 lbs of flour – 100 lbs of sugar etc. etc. These we picked up by horse drawn sleigh at the depot.

I remember delivering by horseback a gallon or 2 of milk to Williams Store and receiving in exchange 10 cents or a ear of corn.

I remember when we bought food at Bill Pacquette’s store we were “on the book” and paid up once a month. On that day Bill or Clara would give us some “pilon” a sack of candy or mints.

I remember riding the snow plow all night with brother Fred as we tried to open the road “B” to Land O Lakes; at 2am in L.O.L. we stopped for a cup of coffee and a hamburger but had only money for one cup of coffee!!

I remember getting kicked in the face by our wild indian pony and riding with my head wrapped in a towel so as not to bloody Roland Cary’s brand new 1928 Chevrolet 4 door with roll up windows.

I remember helping “put up ice” and of falling into the hole in the lake and being pulled out by Norm Drewson and Ed Alt using an ice tongs and a cant hook!!

It was 10 below zero but I stayed on the job and worked myself dry so I could finish the day and get my fifty cents.

I remember “Dad” Best snowshoeing into BJ once a week to get his mail always stopped at our house for a cup of tea.

I remember the logging train getting stuck across our road and the train crew came to our house and ate and drank coffee and told stories – oh yes I wanted to be an engineer.

I remember Ed Alt coming by to plow out our road and eating breakfast – 12 eggs and a whole “spider” full of potatoes, bread, and coffee.

I remember skiing behind a car all the way to Woodruff and only meeting one or two cars.

I remember when brother Walt (4 years old)dumped a 10 quart pot of hot coffee on himself and the months of patient care rendered by Doc Newcomb as she worked to save his life.

I remember forest fires and my dad Fred Haag being gone for weeks with a crew fighting them including the one that burned all the way to our west fence. We kept our house “wet down” with wet gunny sacks.

I could go on and on but you are very bored and my finger is numb – so – God bless – best wishes to all and may the Good Lord bless you and yours –

Fond Memories,

Hank Haag

The book “Boulder Junction” is really great.

P.S. I remember youth and adults dancing at High Lake School – we’d stack the student’s seats and desks on one side of the school room and dance to the music of hand cranked victrola record player which I frequently operated.

I remember square dancing at the town hall. Ralph Hammond played the violin, called the dances, stoked the big pot bellied stove and spat his “chawin’ tobacco” all without missing a beat.

I remember box socials and cake socials (fund raising events) where beautifully boxed, wrapped, and ribboned boxes full of food were auctioned off to the highest bidder. I was heart broken on night because Fran Hammond outbid me for Dona Boudreaux’s box.

I remember Will Alt starting up his saw mill on what had been our south forty.

I remember Sunday School and church at High Lake School and the town hall with Mom Haag playing the old pump organ or leading the singing.

I remember her inviting a visiting pastor home for Sunday dinner and “making do” with the old red rooster with dumplings etc. etc. etc.

Nuff said!!

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Joy Johanek Blueberry Princess Contest

In 1963 I competed in the Blueberry Princess Contest. We had to dress like we were picking berries. We also had to pick some blueberries. The amount of berries picked determined who would be the Blueberry Princess. Nancy Marsh was the winner and the 1963 Blueberry Princess. We rode in the Musky Jamboree Parade. It was fun!

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Jayne Blaisdell Growing Up in Boulder Junction

I have lived in Boulder Junction all my life. It was a great place to live and grow up in, but now things are changing some with all the new people and their city ways of life.

I started school at what they called Play Day run by the mothers who had kids there. It was located across from St. Anne Church. Then onto grade school at the site of the old community center for 3 1/2 years. Those were the best years of school. We got to do so many fun things and the teachers had the time to help all of us learn, but all good things come to an end. Then it was on to North Lakeland. I was not fond of going to school there.

Another memory was visiting with Santa every year. We would gather outside by the town Christmas tree; the kids all had some time to play with each other and the parents visited or sang Christmas songs. It was like an old fashioned gathering. No one seemed to care what the weather was like, just time for the town to get together and have some family and town fun.

I have more I could share with you but I will make it short for now and just say that I’m glad my parents picked this area as the place they wanted to call home and grow their family. I can’t think of any other place that I would be glad to call home.

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Janet’s first visit to Boulder Junction

Making the turn onto Hwy M, I always was eagerly anticipating the first sight of Boulder Junction. It always seemed to represent familiarity; it never seemed to change.

My first visit to the Northwoods was in the summer of 1964. The week was filled with boat rides on the lake, fishing, hiking, and of course several night time visits to the bears at the dump! There was also the fun of feeding animals at Aqualand – animals I had never seen in the “wild.”

Of course there have been changes over the years, but somehow the area has maintained its Northwoods character. After many years of one or two week visits, we were lucky enough to move here in 2001. And to get involved more in the community and the Historical Society.

Congratulations on 100 years!

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Josie Blaisdell-Allen Early Memories

I lived in BJ all of my life. My sisters and I are the 5th generation of Blaisdells in BJ/Trout Lake. My two great-grandchildren Jack and Marli are 8th generation.

My great-great-grandparents, Augusta (Smoke) and Jack (John) Blaisdell moved to BJ/Trout Lake in 1888 from Pardeeville. As a teenager I thought it quite amusing: “Party-ville.”

As a little girl my first boat ride was on Trout Lake. Most likely, Uncle Enoch, who with Aunt Myrtle owned and operated the Trout Lake Pavilion, drove the boat. Uncle Enoch rented boats, as well as having a grocery store, ice cream parlor, post office, and dance hall.

The boat ride was amazing and fun for a little five year old. The breeze blew my hair against my face. I watched as the waves came up even with the back of the boat. Mom held tightly to my little three year old brother, Jack, and had an arm around me. Perhaps mom would have enjoyed the boat ride better if she wasn’t concerned with the safety of her kids.

Aunt Myrtle would give us kids a “snowball cupcake.” A chocolate cupcake with cream filling, marshmallow frosting, pink or white, covered with coconut. They were huge. Over the years they seem to have gotten smaller but maybe because I am bigger!

I loved visits to Uncle Enoch and Aunt Myrtle’s, they were great people! Uncle Enoch Blaisdell was the youngest of four sons born to Augusta and Jack Blaisdell.