Pinto Pony Pleadure Prospects

Just south of town is a historic marker for the Half-Way Tree, a bur oak supposedly identified by Native Americans as the halfway point on a foot trail between Lake Michigan and the Mississippi River. The railroad track that runs east and west thru town features a small museum with a train and army tank on display, adjacent to the park and bandstand pavilion. The museum curator said that the railroad was being wooed by two different towns and decided to split the difference and created Brodhead. A nearby branch of the Sugar River was diverted along a canal to a small hydroelectric generator supplied by a small holding pond. This supposedly gave Brodhead the distinction of having electrical service before other larger cities such as Chicago, and perhaps the first electrical service in Wisconsin.