William J. Fisk

William Justan Fisk (June 25, 1833 – March 1, 1909) was an American businessman, Republican politician, and Wisconsin pioneer. Shortly after his birth, his father Joel Fisk went to Green Bay, Wisconsin Territory, and found work before returning to bring young William and his mother to Wisconsin in 1836. William was raised and educated in the Green Bay area, attending school until age 14 and then going to work alongside his father, who was by that time register of the U.S. land office in Green Bay. In his role in the land office, he made extensive maps of the Indian reservation lands and lands for navigability improvements on the Fox and Wisconsin rivers. He retired in 1902, due to deteriorating health.

Political career Politically, Fisk was originally affiliated with the Democratic Party, but joined the Republican Party shortly after its creation, voting for Abraham Lincoln in the 1860 United States presidential election. Under Lincoln, Fisk was appointed postmaster and was elected alderman and city treasurer in Fort Howard. By the 1870s, he also strongly opposed Democratic Party efforts to regulate railroads in Wisconsin. He was elected to his first term in the Wisconsin State Assembly in 1874, running against the railroad regulations that had passed earlier that year.

In the 1875 legislative term, Fiske was chairman of the Assembly committee on railroads, which drafted the repeal of the railroad regulating Potter Law.