History
5
In 1848, William Horner of Warren County, Virginia, and his former slaves, the Shepard family, traveled west to Wisconsin by ox-drawn wagons and arrived at this place, later known as Pleasant Ridge. The Shepards bought land from Horner for $1.50 an acre, becoming the first recorded African-American family to live in the area. Pleasant Ridge grew into a community of more than 100 free or escaped slaves and at one time had a church and a school. Today, only the one-acre cemetery remains.
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Beetown, Wisconsin · United States
