For Women’s History Month, we’re highlighting one of the most significant community leaders in the early history of the Milwaukee neighborhood of Bay View.
Beulah Brinton and her family moved to Bay View in the 1870s. She was an author, midwife, and teacher who opened her home to recent immigrants as a library and community gathering place.
For a long time, Bay View was primarily a farming community. Then in the 1860s, an iron mill was established on the lake shore, bringing in a wave of immigrant workers. It also brought Warren Brinton and his wife, Beulah Brinton to the neighborhood. They moved from Michigan and built what is now known as the Beulah Brinton House on Superior Street.
While her husband worked at the mill, Beulah spent most of her time in the home, but her house was more than just a place to live. WUWM visited the house and talked to tour guide and history buff Bill O'Brien about Beulah's impact on Bay View. He is joined by Nancy Tawney, a member of the Bay View Historical Society.
The first stop on our tour is Brinton's parlor. O'Brien explains that when Warren Brinton was working in the iron mill, Beulah stayed at home and was a wife, mother, author, poet and publisher. She taught cooking classes, sewing classes, she read to kids, and she started a lending library in the parlor that would eventually become the city's first branch library.
Tawney explains that when the Bay View Historical Society purchased the house in 2005, they named it the Beulah Brinton House because Beulah opened the house to the community. At its peak, the iron mill employed 1,500 people. Many people were coming to Bay View from Europe to work, so Brinton wanted to make them feel welcome in their new community.
One of Brinton's favorite pastimes was playing tennis. There used to be a tennis court outside of her house, and Brinton would often invite others to play with her. She would keep a box of rackets in her house so anyone could join her.
The next stop on the tour is Brinton's kitchen, which she also used to help newly-arrived immigrants acclimate. She held cooking classes where she taught people who were to the United States how to use American appliances and American systems of measurement. Her cooking classes also included information about which foods come raw, canned, or already cooked or prepared.
A tennis racket hangs in the pantry as a nod to the time Beulah spent playing tennis with her neighbors.
The last stop on the tour is Brinton’s dining room. The dining room holds two of the items in the house that were actually owned by Beulah. One is a large tea set sitting in a glass case. The other is a quilt made in 1912. It’s filled with hundreds of signatures from people who went to Beulah’s church, including Beulah. They’re signed in pink thread.
O’Brien says that Beulah’s community efforts were driven by her religious faith and a personal duty to help others.
"To her, this was part of being a good person in the world," O'Brien says. "You met everyone where they were and helped them where you could."
The house itself now serves as the headquarters for the Bay View Historical Society. A large part of her legacy lives on through the Beulah Brinton Community Center, where people can play sports, take language classes and participate in other recreational activities. It’s a reminder of one of the influential women who helped shape Milwaukee into the city it is today.
