Waterville centered on this crossroads and grew into a busy settlement before declining after a railroad bypassed it in 1881. A stone general store built in 1876 once stood here and was later moved to Old World Wisconsin and restored in 1992. Across the road to the north stood a house built in 1845 that once had a blacksmith shop. Diagonally across the road stood the Waterville House, built in 1849, which served as a stopping place between Milwaukee and Madison on the old Jefferson Plank Road and had a ballroom on the second floor in the rear above the wagon shelter. A small store built in 1843 stood to the west and housed the first post office, and the store owner's home, built in 1843 or earlier, still stands as part of the house on the knoll to the southwest. By 1850, about eighteen homes lay within a half mile radius of this center, and today Waterville remains an active community bearing its old name.