The Barbed Wire Museum

Location:  South edge of La Crosse

Hours:  Open Monday-Saturday 10 to 4:30, Sunday 1-4:30 in Summer, Winter by appointment.

Contact:  Phone--   785-222-9900

Admission:  Free will donation.

Photos Copyright H. Schuster.  Please do not use without permission.

More than 2000 types of barbed wire are cataloged at the largest collection of such wire in the world, the Barbed Wire Museum in La Crosse.  The land is flat here. Grain  elevators appear on the horizon like giant stick pins in some huge road map of Kansas.  The  concrete towers grow larger as the miles speed by, until finally a town appears.  A few houses, a couple pickups, and the grain elevator which holds the wheat this area produces in such  abundance; enough to feed the whole world.  In an area dominated by the endless skyline and country roads lined with limestone fence posts, perhaps it's as fitting place as any to house such an impressive collection of wire.

You may have been led to believe by all those old Westerns the six-shooter won the West, but in reality it was barbed wire that tamed the western frontier.  Barbed wire saw it's first use by homesteaders on the Plains, and, since they and their "Devils String" threatened the rancher's free range, it was detested by cowboys.  Wire cutters took their place along with the six gun for a time when cowboys rode the range.  Range wars were waged, tempers flared, and blood was shed.  There really was a "Wild West", and it was here.

Times would soon change, and so would the attitude of cattlemen towards barbed wire.  It was becoming evident that if a cattleman improved the genetics of his cow herd, he could make more money from the improved cattle he would raise.  Cattle would have to be fenced to make this possible.  A cheap, easily erected, and long lasting solution to all these requirements was barbed wire.  Prior to barbed wire, fences were made of stone or split wooden rail.  Since wood was scarce and rock fence was labor intensive, barbed wire was the clear choice.

Soon, manufactures couldn't keep up with demand.   Literally hundreds of companies manufactured barbed wire during the late 1800's.   Each company had a distinct and patented design, sometimes several designs from the same company, and they were churning out new designs all the time to keep one step ahead of the competition.  Thus, it's easy to see why there are so many variations on the same basic principal.

Barbed wire must be stretched tight in order to provide an effective barrier to cattle.  In addition to barbed wire, the museum also houses tools used to stretch wire (photo, left), tools used to dig and set fence posts, and some items related to the western way of life.

Inevitably, barbed wire has been used to fence people,too--both in and out.  It was used in the bloody and futile trench warfare of the First World War.  Many a soldier from both sides lost his life by being caught in the wire and then mowed down by the deadly machine gun fire.

The "War to End All Wars", as World War I was called--didn't--and in less than a generation, another even bloodier war , World War II, erupted.  After World War II, Europe was divided into East and West, and the nation of Germany was split into two countries:  East and West.   The former capital, Berlin, was itself divided.  For those seeking the freedom of the West, it was a relatively easy task to cross the border from East Berlin to West Berlin--before the building of the Berlin Wall in the early 1960's.  This barbed wire topped concrete wall was constructed by East Germany as much to keep their citizens from leaving as it was to keep Western ideas from entering the East.  No wall separating people or holding out ideas can long stand, and so it was with the Berlin Wall separating East and West.  Down it came in the late 1980's, and some of the wire on which freedom seekers had shed their blood for nearly thirty years is now housed in the Barbed Wire Museum (photo above, left).

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