Milwaukee was a very different city at the turn of the last century. It was a bustling metropolis with crowded streets and a district dedicated to vice in the heart of the city. Known as “The Line,” the district was an area where sex work, gambling, and other illegal activities were done out in the open.
Historian Matthew Prigge explores this history in an article in this month’s Milwaukee Magazine. He explains that the district was East and West of the Milwaukee River. A smaller portion was East of the river around where Red Arrow Park is today and west of the river, centered right around where Fiserv Forum currently stands.
Although many of the activities that often took place here were illegal at the time, the mindset from city officials was one of containing it rather than preventing it. When the Socialist Party began gaining a foothold in city governance, the activity in the area became a premier focus. As a result, much of the activity dispersed into other areas around the city.
Few relics of that time are still present in the area today. "Really into the 1930s and beyond, a lot of those buildings were torn down in the way of something that still continues today," says Prigge.
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