Fred Beckmann: from the Clark House to the Wisconsin House (24 Apr 2026)

Fri, 24 Apr 2026 18:00:00 GMT

Start Time: 1:00 PM Central - Member meeting precedes Program

Event Title: Fred Beckmann: from the Clark House to the Wisconsin House

Presenter Name: Reed Perkins

Description of Event: In this illustrated talk, historian and genealogist Reed Perkins will show how he combines genealogy with a wide variety of other historical sources to make informative, illustrated stories that serve as a great way to organize and share one’s ideas, and guide further research and discovery.

Reed Perkins has a life-long love of history and a passion for separating fact from legend. In 2006, he began focusing his research on a some of his Wisconsin ancestors and their stories. In 2012, he began an ongoing collaboration with the newly-formed Jonathan Clark House Museum in Mequon, Wisconsin, and shortly afterwards became the museum’s official historian, As Historian, Reed investigates and shares the family histories and activities of the Clarks, their relatives, neighbors and friends, and the day-to-day details of the world in which they lived. Since 2016, he has chronicled those stories in over 450 illustrated and annotated posts to his blog, Clark House Historian. Along the way, Reed has become unexpectedly well-informed on a number of more specialized topics including the first Erie Canal, early Great Lakes steamboat travel, the settlement of Lower Canada’s Eastern Townships, the California Gold Rush, army life at Forts Howard and Winnebago, and early federal and local road construction in Wisconsin Territory.

Reed was born and raised in the Land of Lincoln, and has had the good fortune to live and work there, and in other history-rich places such as Williamsburg, Virginia, and Amherst, Massachusetts. He now lives in Kenosha, Wisconsin, with his wife, Dr. Laura Rexroth.

Reed Perkins’ website: Clark House Historian https://jchmhistorian.com/

His blog postings incorporate primary and secondary sources, public-domain visual images, and links to other CHH blog posts and additional—sometimes obscure—sources, all to tell a more complete and interesting story of the life and times of our early Wisconsin pioneers.

The Jonathan Clark House website: https://jonathanclarkhouse.com/

IN PERSON Location: Milwaukee Central Public Library 814 W. Wisconsin Avenue Milwaukee, WI 1st floor Rotary Club of Milwaukee Community Room

ONLINE Registration: https://zoom.us/meeting/register/IK-KZo7tRGOUKs5owQCKTw#/registration

Wisconsin State Genealogical Society upcoming events

Fred Beckmann: from the Clark House to the Wisconsin House (24 Apr 2026)