- I think that this is going to be a fair for the ages.

It's just amazing how people are backing us.

And I think that we will, that we are going to be able to put on a program and give them things the likes of which they've never seen before.

- [Narrator] Lydia Ely Hewitt and Fanny Berling-Buttrick of the West Side Soldiers Aid Society are talking about the Soldiers Home Fair.

A huge fundraiser to help build a permanent home for Wisconsin's disabled and homeless veterans, now called the Milwaukee Soldiers Home.

They had been working out of temporary storefronts along Water Street, but it wasn't enough.

A new permanent home required money, lots of it.

So in the summer of 1865, they would throw a fair.

(bright music) - I think the support that we've gotten from the people from Wisconsin is just amazing.

I knew that they would all back our cause.

- You were more confident than I, I thought it would take a lot more work.

People are so generous.

I was down in Beloit, they are going to donate all manner of flowers, not just native here, but even a few tropicals.

Can you imagine how beautiful that's going to make the exhibit?

- [Narrator] The fair opened on June 28th, 1865.

It was originally scheduled for a 10 day run but it stretched until mid-July in what is now downtown Milwaukee.

Renowned local architect Edward Townsend Mix designed the main fair structure.

The fair was a resounding success.

- What did they do at the fair to bring in a hundred thousand dollars?

I'm almost afraid to ask.

- Selling food, of course.

Dances, raffles, exhibits of exotic animals.

The first public display of art in Milwaukee.

- [Interviewer] Really?

You said exotic animals, what did they have?

- Well, Tangle McCracken was a local entrepreneur who mostly sold oysters, but he also collected animals and the.

- I'm sorry, exotic oysters.

(laughing) - They were called monumental, so they must have been quite something.

- I would think so.

- But anyway, the feature was, it was called "Tangles Feature."

And it featured "Old Abe," the mascot of the eighth Wisconsin.

He was in the middle of this exhibit and he was surrounded by four Union general eagles.

- And for the one or two people out there who don't know who "Old Abe" was, who was he?

- The mascot of the eighth Wisconsin who went with them into battle.

- [Interviewer] And he was a?

- American eagle.

- [Interviewer] A bald eagle.

Yeah.

- Yes.

- And the stories that were told, during battles, he was tethered, but he would fly up to the end of his tether and scream his eagle screams, whatever eagles scream.

- [Patricia] He would.

He was the favorite target of the Confederates.

- And they never got him?

- They never got him.

- [Interviewer] They always wanted to shoot him?

Because that was "On Wisconsin."

Wow.

- So before the fair, the ladies had been selling cards with his image, and if you wanted to pay a little bit more, he would autograph it for you.

You would throw the card into the cage and he would peck at it or scratch at it.

There's one of these cards in the Veterans Museum.

- [Narrator] In the archives of the Milwaukee VA Hospital, we found a letter from Em Ronnesville from Wapon, Wisconsin, who attended the fair on the 4th of July.

- [Narrator] Festoons of evergreens are suspended from the arch and the walls and the base of the gallery are ornamented with evergreens.

Near the rear of the hall, forming an arch, are the words, "The only national debt which we can never repay is the debt we owe to our brave union soldiers."

The band is playing, battle flags waving, flowers and evergreens mingling their colors with the soft hues of the fancy articles suspended from the wall, the pictures illuminated by the gas light and the crowds of gaily-dressed, happy-looking people almost gives one to think himself in fairyland.

And for a moment, we imagine it all a dream.

- [Narrator] In the end, the grand total raised was over $110,000, which is nearly $2 million in today's currency.

The majority from the fair itself, in addition to contributions from across the state.

- We were so successful.

I never dreamed that we could raise that much money.

$110,000.

- I don't even know what that would look like.

(both laughing) - Our storefront has done so well but we're just overwhelmed with soldiers coming back.

We need to build to get going on that home for them to live in permanently.

- So our West Side Soldiers Aid Society moves to the next step, a permanent home for these heroes.

- [Narrator] That permanent home would be built, but there's a twist.

Remember, these women were married to prominent businessmen and they persuaded their wives to hand over the fair earnings for their Wisconsin Soldiers' Home to the federal government to land one of the first national homes as promised years ago by President Lincoln.

Begrudgingly, they did so because they knew we would bring the Northwestern branch of National Home for Disabled Volunteer Soldiers, or what today we call Milwaukee Soldiers Home.

- We put so many months, years into planning for a soldier's home, and now it hasn't been taken from us, it's just been moved to another agency that will facilitate it.

And I think that we can console ourselves with the fact that we just are taking a different path to get the same results.

- And probably better in the end.

But again, not without a heavy heart.

- But we can be proud of all that we accomplished.

- [Narrator] Veterans already began moving on campus as the first building of the Milwaukee Soldiers Home opened in 1867.

We still have modern day women to thank for their dedication to the soldiers home.

That's in our next episode of "The Women Founders: Milwaukee Soldiers Home."

(bright epic music)