Mailahn Farm

Ep. 1 - The Mailahn Family Massacre

According to an 1889 Plat Map of Black Creek Township (T23N, R17E), and an 1890 Deed for this property, the Louis Mailahn farm was 20 acres and located in the northern half of the NW quarter of the SW quarter of Section 26. On the map his name was incorrectly written as "Louis Weylahn", but a broad search of all of Outagamie County confirm that there was no one by the name of Weylahn, or any spelling variant, in Outagamie County at the time. The closest match was the "van der Wielen" family who did not arrive in Outagamie County from Lithoijen, Netherlands until 1923. And, of course, the Deed for the property correctly lists his name as Louis Mailahn. The 1889 map was either actually drawn up in 1890, or Louis may have already been there on a term of mortgage prior to Feb 1890, and only completely the final payment on that date.

Below you will see a copy of the 1889 Plat map with the Luthern Cemetery, the 20 acre Louis Mailahn farm, and the 40 acres Ludwig Mailahn farm marked for reference. Next are the modern Google maps and Google satellite view of the same area with the same three locations marked for reference.

1889 Plat Map of Black Creek Township, Wisconsin (T23N, R17E). Marked in green are the Lultheran Cemetery, the Louis Mailahn farm (written Louis Weylahn), and the 40 acre farm of his father Ludwig Mailahn.

Google maps image showing the 20 acre Louis Mailahn farm to the right, the 40 acres farm of his father Ludwig Mailahn at bottom left and the Luthern Cemetery

Satellite view of the same Google map and plat map area with the same three points marked in green.

1955 Plat Map of Black Creek Township, Sections 26 and 27. The 20 acre Mailahn farm is in green, now combined with the 20 acre farm just south of it and owned by "Ed Holz", who also owned the 80 acres across the street and likely a descendant of the Charles Holz in the 1889 map of the same property. This suggests that it likely was the Holz family that eventually purchased the farm from the Edward Mailahn. All of this property is still owned by the Holz family today.

Google Street View of the Mailahn Farm taken in 2008.

A close up satellite view of the farm to compare to the 1912 diagram. Any sign of the farm buildings are long gone.

A diagram of the Mailahn farm as printed in the Appleton Post-Crescent in 1912. We should assume that this is not to scale, and there appears to be an error with the "East" and "West" as they are out of correct alignment with "North" and "South" - but a written description noted that the smokehouse was about 50 yards from the rear of the house, which would make sense with the street being along the west side of the property in front of the barn. The barn being in front also matches the description by Edward that he saw his brother and father headed into the barn as he left to pick up his brothers.