LANNON COULD HAVE BEEN ‘STONE CITY’
The Village of Lannon had four different names, although two of them existed only as crossed out suggestions on a post office application.
RETROSPECTby Fred H. Keller , Sussex Village Historian;
Printed Sussex Sun, March 16, 2005
Originally Lannon Springs, the community was known for awhile before 1890 as Hadfield. Thatwas the name that initially appeared on a June 18, 1890, post officeapplication, but crossed out when quarry baron Joe Hadfield went bankrupt. Thepowers-to-be put in Stone City, but that was crossed out, too. Lannon became thefinal choice.
Hadfield owned several major quarries in Lannon, most notably the vast quarrythat today is Menomonee Park and its swimming-fishing quarry. When he ran thisquarry, he built a number of homes on the quarry’s south edge.
Thiscollection of homes for his Polish and Italian workers was called Stone City,and that’s how Lannon almost ended up with that name. In time many of thesehomes were jacked up and moved to old Hadfield, now Lannon.
It took until Aug. 2, 1890, for Lannon to be officially OK’d, first as an unincorporatedvillage and then in 1930 as an incorporated village. That makes Lannon almost115 years old.
Lannon got its final name from an Irishman, William N. Lannon. Born Oct. 20,1814, in County Louth, he arrived in the Town of Menomonee in 1842 for toclaim a parcel of land north and south of Highway 74, with the western edgebeing Town Line Road. He died April 13, 1897, and is buried at St. JamesCatholic Church Cemetery.
On this bisected 220-acre parcel, he had two springs that are part of theheadwaters of the Fox River. That homestead became known as Lannon Springs.
In short order, Willow Springs School was carved from his land and he gave landto the emerging St. James Catholic Church.
The 1873 “Atlas of Waukesha County, Wis.” by Harrison and Warnershows that William’s holdings were still 217 acres and prominently noted the”Lannon Springs P.O.” (post office).
According to this map, there was virtually no development in what is nowLannon’s Good Hope-Main Street-Lannon Road triangle.
By 1891, however, in the “Plat Book of Waukesha Co. Wis.” by C.M.Foote & Co., that triangle of Good Hope (then called Vail Street), LannonRoad (called Menomonee Avenue) and Main Street (called Milwaukee Avenue) hadbecome heavily developed and had its own map on the plat book, under the name ofHadfield.
The community now included the streets of Bay, State, Lake and Vine and theMilwaukee, Menomonee Falls and Western Railroad Line (the Bug Line), on itsnorthern border.
This map was already out of date by then, however, because the Hadfield name haddisappeared with the Aug. 2, 1890, certification of the Lannon Post Officeunder that name.
William Lannon had started a post office of sorts way back in 1854, andsuccessfully applied for a postal designation June 11, 1864.
Back in the early chaotic settlement days, there was a password for the area,”Take the mail to Lannon,” because William Lannon knew everyone in thearea. The unofficial, and later official, Lannon-Spring farm post office areapersisted until William Lannon gave it up in 1873, with later mails going toSussex and Duplainville to be further distributed to the western Town ofMenomonee.
With the development of the triangle area then known as Hadfield by 1890, therewas a need for a proper local post office. The postal application was made byOlavius Olsen, who served as the first postmaster, 1890-91.
Here’s the officially recognized succession of Lannon postmasters for the next115 years: Abraham Hadfield, 1891-93; John Flanagan Sr., 1893-97; August Hinner,1897-1905; George Loos, 1905-12; John (Jack) Flanagan Jr. (son of John Sr.),1912-49; John Walsh, 1949-57; Keith Gissal, 1957-84; William S. Galbraith(officer in charge), 1984; John P. Eldridge, 1984-90; Susan E. Lierman (OIC),1990-91; Susan E. Thiel, 1991-96; Gail Becker (OIC), 1996; Mark S. Kluge,1996-97; Dale W. Nook, 1997-2003; Linda Balister (OIC), 2003-04; and currentpostmaster since 2004, Cassandra McGhee.
Jack Flanagan Jr. served the longest, 37 years. Keith Gissal 27-year term wasthe second longest. Together, they served 64 out of the post office’s 115 years.
There have been two notable philatelic events in Lannon. One was a specialenvelope canceled Jan. 23, 1966, when Lannon established its present postoffice, and the other was a special 100-year one-day cancellation Aug. 2, 1990.
The 75th anniversary committee for Lannon is planning another specialone-day cancellation for some appropriate date in 2005.
©Sussex Sun 2005