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Community Corner

Wauwatosa Past and Present Come Together on New Historic Directory

New database allows users to search the history of Wauwatosa homes and businesses

Have you have ever wondered who lived in your house in 1946? If so, you are now just a few mouse-clicks away from the answer. A new historic directory found on the Wauwatosa Public Library’s website will give you this information and much more.

The information available on the directory came from volumes and volumes of very old and fragile books located in the Wauwatosa Library. Because the books were so old and in such delicate condition, the library received a preservation grant in 1993.

Everything that was listed in the directories was transferred to a digital format. The library’s assistant director Robert Trunley said that the library had stacks of CD-ROMs sitting around before they were sure what the outcome of the project would be.

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That all changed in 2009. Wauwatosa received another grant from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, called a Brownfields Grant. A brownfield site is a real property that may be complicated by the presence of a hazardous substance, pollutant or contaminant.

The grant was funded by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009.

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The Wauwatosa brownfield project consultant used the CD-ROMs from the library to search the history of Wauwatosa property land use.

How to search and what to search for

The search engine is set to recognize the first three characters of a listing. If an address is being searched, the first three letters of the street name are entered. Results can be narrowed to a specific year range anywhere between 1892 and 1992 by using the drop-down menu that is provided on the search page.

If a user is searching a person, the first three letters of the last name are used in the directory. Users can also search phone numbers by entering the first three digits.

An advanced search lets users search old advertisements that were scanned in from the city’s old directories. Again, using a three-character search, advertisements for blacksmiths, for example, can be traced all the way back to 1926.

“It’s kind of obscure,” Trunley said, “but really interesting.”

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