Welcome to the Town of Amberg! We are located in Marinette County about 75 miles north of Green Bay, Wisconsin, United States. The latitude of is 45.503N. The longitude is -87.993W. It is in the Central Standard time zone. Elevation is 817 feet. Our total township area consists of 72.7 square miles, of which, 71.8 square miles of it is land and 0.9 square miles of it (1.21%) is water. The unincorporated community of Amberg, population 728 is located within the township community.
The area is rich in history and scenic beauty. The Menominee and Potawatomi Indians frequented the area for hunting and fishing until Isaac Stephenson who began logging operations in the mid 1800’s. In 1883 Warren Buckman, the first permanent settler, arrived with supplies and set up a trading post west of the Pike River. A year later Charles Dahl, a surveyor for the railroad became the second permanent settler. By 1887 William Amberg, a Chicago businessman established the area granite quarries. In 1890 he was responsible for platting the village and the town now known as Amberg (formerly called Pike by white settlers) was named after him. The village of Amberg was destroyed by fire in 1903 and rebuilt. Its population was estimated to be 500. The Town of Amberg includes the village, and areas formerly known as Coles, Marek (was Cota), Miscauno Island, and Pike. The areas where the towns of Beecher, Pembine, and Niagara are located were all part of Amberg at one time but as their populations grew they broke away between 1910 and 1023 and established themselves as separate communities.
Granite Quarry History
The Amberg-Athelstane Granite is part of the Wisconsin Magmatic Terrane formed by a tectonic plate collision about 1859 mya. It is one of the most extensive geological areas of its kind in Wisconsin. The granite is well known for its great variety of color and texture. The two most common types are a fine-grained gray granite and a course-grained red granite known as “Amberg red”. These granites were a valuable commodity in the late 19th century and early 20th century, causing quarries to be started in the area. There were several main companies in the Amberg area during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The Amberg Granite Company was the first in the area and later, the Pike River Granite Company, which was formed in large part due to poor working conditions at the Amberg Granite Company. The Amberg Granite Company was owned by William Amberg of Chicago and consisted of quarry operations in Amberg, Argyle, Martindale, Athelstane and Aberdeen. The Argyle and the Martindale quarries produced the fine-grained gray granite and the Aberdeen quarry produced the “Amberg red”. The Athelstane quarry produced a gray granite, but course grained, similar in texture to the Amberg red. Much of their granite was used in Chicago for curbing blocks and street paving. It was also used for buildings such as, the Minnesota State Capitol, and buildings in Chicago and Cincinnati. The Pike River company produced primarily the fine-grained gray granite and much of it was sold as monumental stone because of its strength and attractiveness. However in 1929, 500-600 cars of this stone was sold to the Universal Granite Company of Milwaukee to be used as breakwater stone. Although, once a thriving, profitable businesses, there are no longer any active quarries operating in the Amberg area. More about the history of these quarries and the surrounding area can be found at the Amberg Museum complex , located in Amberg on Marinette County V, right off of Highway 141.
Reference Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org)
Town of Amberg 