Madison tourist information

Madison was created in 1836 when a former federal judge named James Duane Doty purchased over a thousand acres (4 km²) of swamp and forest land surrounding lakes Mendota, Monona, Kegonsa, and Waubesa, then known as the Four Lakes region, with the intention of building a new city on the site. Wisconsin Territory had been created earlier in the year, and the territorial legislature had convened in Belmont, Wisconsin. One of the legislature's tasks was to choose a permanent location for the territory's capital city. Doty lobbied aggressively for the legislature to select Madison as the new capital, offering buffalo robes to the freezing legislators and promising choice Madison lots at discount prices to undecided voters.

He had James Slaughter plat two cities in the area, Madison and "The City of Four Lakes", near present-day Middleton. Despite the fact that Madison was still only a city on paper, the territorial legislature voted on November 28 in favor of choosing Madison for its capital largely because of its location halfway between the new and growing cities around Milwaukee in the east and the long established strategic post of Prairie du Chien in the west, and because of its location between the highly populated lead mining regions in the southwest and Wisconsin's oldest city, Green Bay in the northeast. Being named for a much-admired founding father who had just died, and having streets named after every founding father, also helped attract votes.

The cornerstone for the Wisconsin capitol building was laid in 1837, and the legislature first met there in 1838. Madison was incorporated as a village in 1846, with a population of 626. When Wisconsin became a state in 1848, Madison remained the capital city, and it became host to the University of Wisconsin. The Milwaukee & Mississippi Railroad (a predecessor of what would become known as the Milwaukee Road) connected to Madison in 1854. Madison became a city in 1856, with a population of 6,863. The original capitol burned in 1904 and construction on the current capitol building began in 1906.

During the American Civil War, Madison served as a center of the Union Army in Wisconsin. The intersection of Milwaukee, East Washington, Winnebego, and North Streets are known as Union Corners, as a tavern located there was the last stop for Union soldiers before heading to fight the Confederates. Camp Randall was built and was used as a training camp, a military hospital, and a prison camp for captured Confederate soldiers. After the war ended, Camp Randall was absorbed into the grounds of the University of Wisconsin. Camp Randall Stadium was built over the site in 1917.

Madison continued its growth throughout the 20th century. Today Madison is the second largest city in Wisconsin, and continues to grow steadily.

In 1996 Money magazine identified Madison as the best place to live in the United States. It has consistently ranked near the top of the best-places list in subsequent years, with the city's low unemployment rate a major contributor.

The main downtown thoroughfare is State Street, which links the University of Wisconsin campus with the State Capitol square, and is lined with restaurants, espresso cafes, and shops. Only pedestrians, buses, police, delivery vehicles and bikes are allowed on State Street (though it was originally an ordinary commercial street), which is an east-west street in contrast to the diagonal streets of the Isthmus and Capitol Square.

Continuing on the other side of Capitol Square is King Street, which is now developing along the lines that State Street has, but with less of a student character, and more appeal to the growing young white-collar high-tech population in Madison (whose residents jokingly refer to the post-graduate crowd). Thus King Street has more upper-end restaurants and cafes than are found on the more student-budget State Street.

In the summer time, on Saturday mornings, the Dane County Farmers' Market is held around the Capitol Square. On Wednesday evenings on the same square in summer, the Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra performs free concerts to people picnicking on the Capitol's lawn. The Great Taste of the Midwest craft beer festival, the second longest running such event in North America, is the second Saturday in August and the highly coveted tickets sell out within a few hours when they go on sale in May.

Madison is host to Rhythm and Booms, a massive fireworks celebration (coordinated to music) that begins with a fly-over by several F16s from the local Wisconsin Air National Guard that break the sound barrier over the city (the only time that this is allowed). This celebration is the largest fireworks display in the Midwest in terms of the length of the show, number of shells fired and the size of its annual budget.

During the winter months, Madison hosts Kites on Ice, a gathering of kite-flying enthusiasts on the ice of local Lake Monona near the state capitol.

In 2004 Madison was named the healthiest city in America by Men's Journal magazine. Many major streets in Madison have designated bike lanes and the city has one of the most extensive bike trail systems in the nation. Due to this, Madison has a very active cyclist culture and it is common place to see groups of friends bicycling together throughout the city on nice days. Bicycle tourism is an $800 million industry in Wisconsin, which has 20 percent of the nation's bicycling industry manufacturing capacity.