Government.— The elective city officers are the common council, mayor, city attorney, city treasurer and city comptroller. In addi tion to these are the various appointive officials, including the commissioner of public works, commissioner of public health, tax commis sioner, inspector of buildings and the chiefs of the fire and police departments. The common council, as constituted in 1918, consists of 37 members, 25 of whom are elected by wards for a term of two years. Twelve are elected for terms of four years by the city at large. In 1920, according to an amendment to the city charter adopted in April 1918, the council will be reorganized to consist of 25 aldermen, elected by wards for a term of four years each. The distinctive feature of the government of Milwaukee is the board or commission An increasing number of these boards have been created with broad administrative powers, in most cases entirely independent of the com mon council, except in the matter of financial supervision. Chief of these is the school board, which consists of 15 members elected by the people at large, and entirely independent of the common council even in its financial trans actions. Other boards are the park board, library board, sewerage commission, museum board, central purchasing hoard and the board of city service commissioners, all of which con trol the city activities indicated by their The members of these boards are in most cases appointed by the mayor subject to the approval of the council.
Public Works.—The water works prop erty valued at $8,906,170 is owned by the city, the entire cost of construction and mainte nance having been paid out of its proceeds, and its surplus revenues aid in defraying other municipal expenses. Following a comprehen sive survey of street lighting systems and problems, a system of electric light distribution, unique both in practical efficiency and artistic beauty, has been designed and is now being in stalled. An incinerator for consuming gar bage, which is collected by the city without charge, is in operation. A free emergency hospital, originally a private benefaction, is maintained at public expense, likewise six large natatoriums throughout the year, and in the summer two free public bath-houses on the lake beach. In addition to triangles, squares and boulevards, there are 13 parks of which the total acreage is 939. These parks vary in size from 6 to 180 acres. During the winter months free public evening lectures for adults are given in public school halls, the expense being borne by the school extension fund. A city hall was completed in 1896 at a cost of $1,016,935, and the library and museum build ing is valued at over $2,000,000, with contents. The library contains 351,848 volumes. There are 397.607 specimens in the museum, as well as 24,565 books, pamphlets and maps, and 17,310 lantern slides. The city is constructing a system of intercepting sewers and the sewage commission is conducting extensive experiments in the activated sludge system of sewage disposal.
Milwaukee is splendidly equipped with educational facilities. Its pub lic school system is composed of six high schools, 64 district schools, a trade school for girls, a boy's technical high school and a day school for the deaf. There is an open•window school for children who are below normal. Special classes are provided for blind and crippled children. The girls' trade school, with classes in sewing, dressmaking and cooking, has an average membership of 421. In addi tion to the public school system, there are, including Lutheran and Catholic institutions, 58 private parochial schools. Marquette Uni versity for men includes in its curriculum not only general academic courses but fine schools of medicine, law and engineering. Milwaukee Downer College, for women, has a well-de served reputation throughout the Middle West. The State of Wisconsin has located a normal school in the city, which offers regulation courses for teachers as well as training for kindergarteners, music teachers and teachers of art. The Extension Division of the University of Wisconsin maintains an office in Milwaukee which offers unusual opportunities to the student.
The first permanent settlement of Milwaukee is usually dated from 1818, when Solomon Juneau erected his little log cabin on the east side of the Milwaukee River.
French and English traders had been here be fore that date, and a procession of Jesuit priests and French voyageurs had preceded them. The first recorded visit of a white man on the site of the future city is in the journal of Father on his memorable exploratory trip from Lake Erie to the Illinois country in 1679. He notes that both Mascoutens and Foxes were dwellers aon the banks of the river called Melleoki.* John Francois Buisson de Saint Cosme jour neyed in 1699 along the west shore of Lake Michigan from Michilimackinac to the Mis sissippi. °On the seventh,* he wrote, °we arrived at Melwarik (Milwaukee). This is a river where there is a village which has been considerable and inhabited by the Mascoutens and Foxes, and even some Pottawattamies.* The word Melleoki and its numerous variants, which by a process of evolution has become Milwaukee, is of Pottawattamie origin and sig nifies °good land.* Another definition accepted by some historians is °council place,* this hav ing been regarded as neutral territory by different tribes of Indians. The dwellers in the old Indian village were evidently a tur bulent set, for Col. Arent de Peyster, com mandant at Michilimackinac, wrote of them in the early years of the Revolutionary War as arunagates —a horrid set of refractory In dians.* Lieutenant James Gorrell, whose British regulars occupied the stockade at Green Bay in 1762 and gave it the high-sounding title of Fort Edward Augustus, wrote the name of the place as °Milwacky." An English trader lived among the Indians at this place in that year. Fur traders made brief stays in the village from time to time. Alexander Lafromboise and his brother were located as traders here in 1785, with a large stock ofgoods. In 1795 Jean Baptiste Marandeau, a Canadian black smith who had married an Indian woman, built a cabin and made himself useful to the Indians by mending their firearms. He received as compensation game and furs. He died in 1819, being survived by a family of 10 children, who joined the Indians when the Milwaukee band was removed. Thomas Gummersall Anderson, the son of a Loyalist, was a resident upon the site of the future city of Milwaukee from 1803 till 1806. He took an active part in the capture of Prairie du Chien by the British during the War of 1812. When Solomon Juneau arrived in 1818 he found a Pottawattamie village. He settled on the east side of the Milwaukee River, which later was called Juneautown; the west side of the river became Kilbourntown, after Byton Kilbourn (1834), and George H. Wal ker gave the name of Walker's Point (1834) to the region south of the Menomonee River. Each of the three natural geographical divisions became the nucleus of a little community, and acrimonious rivalry was a natural resultant. The different names of streets on opposite sides of the rivers, now connected by 28 bridges, are a survival of the bitter feelings then en gendered. The village of Milwaukee, now the East Side, was organized 27 Feb. 1837; Kil bourntown, now the West Side, was annexed 11 March 1839; and Walker's Point, now the South Side, 5 Feb. 1845. The city was incor porated 5 Feb. 1845, and Solomon Juneau chosen first mayor.
and Bleyer. waukee's Great Industries' (1892) ; Barton, 'Industrial History of Milwaukee' Buck, 'Pioneer History of Milwaukee' (4 vols., 1876, 1881, 1884, 1886) • Chapman, 'In and Around Milwaukee' (1846); Conrad, 'History of Milwaukee from its first Settlement to 1895' (1895); Flower, 'History of Milwaukee, Wis consin, from Prehistoric Times to the Present Date' (1881); Frank, 'Medical History of Milwaukee' (1915); Gregory, 'Early Political History' (1895) ; Holton, 'Commercial His tory of Milwaukee' (1858); La Piana, ir. Milwaukee' (1915) ; Lapham, 'Documentary History of the Milwaukee and Rock River Canal' (1840); Larson, 'Financial and Admin istrative History of Milwaukee' (1908); Mor rison, 'Milwaukee's History' (1892); Odell, 'Industrial Milwaukee' (1903); 'Sentinel Al manac and Book of Facts; a cyclopedia of his tory and statistical facts' (1897-1900); Wheeler, 'Chronicles of Milwaukee' (1861); Wight, 'Annals of Milwautiee College' (1848-91).