In 1850, the Milwaukee and Mississippi Rail Road Company began building a line to span the lower third of Wisconsin between Milwaukee and Prairie du Chien. Chief Engineer Edward Brodhead concluded that this area's topographical features were ideal for constructing a railroad servicing station and a commercial trading village. In 1855, he platted the village and named it "Mazomanie," an Indian name he believed to mean "Iron Horse." Mazomanie developed quickly after a dam and millrace were built to harness the water power of Black Earth Creek. The new railroad village revitalized the lagging farm economy of the early settlers, who arrived in the 1840s under the auspices of the British Temperance Emigration Society. By the mid-1870s Mazomanie was a thriving commercial and industrial center of over 1100 people. The village eventually supported two flour mills, two creameries, a brewery, four blacksmith shops, a foundry, and factories which produced knitted goods, cabinets, carriages, wagons, and agricultural implements. Many of Mazomanie's 19th-century buildings remain in the village today
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