Our family moved around a lot when I was a kid. We lived in Appleton and Green Bay, Wisconsin, and Marquette, Michigan, but Manawa's where most of my 'hometown memories' come from.

From the southern edge of town, where our family lived, to the millpond on the north, Manawa isn't much more than a kink in the road, but there was apparently a huge fad for post cards back in the 1900's, post cards that featured pictures of everyday life in even the smallest towns, so that there is a jaw-dropping number of picture post cards floating around out there featuring the streets and landmarks, such as they are, of the Manawa. It's hard for me to imagine that anybody could have ever been so photographically captivated by the place, but there you are.

What I get the biggest kick out of is that not much appeared to have changed from the early 1900's, when most of these pictures were taken, up to and including the ten years I lived there in the 70's. Anybody sucked through a time warp from the 1908 postcard view of the new High School into my fourth-grade class would probably have recognized the room, certainly recognized the building and, if he had stepped out the door, would have found that most of the town was familiar, if not entirely the same. The biggest change looks to be that the street was paved.

Although I have included, at no extra cost, my own commentary, reminiscences, explanitary notes, and the occassional odd fact, I do not intend any of this to be a historical work. I'm not a history buff, I'm a compulsive collector. I just collect post cards. What little I know about Manawa I got from reading a book and pestering the few people I know who would talk about it until they got sick and tired of me. And anything I say that stars with the phrase, "from what I remember..." you should treat as highly suspect.

I am, as I said, a collector, but I'm not much of an organizer, so these photos are sort of lumping themselves together as best as they can. I'm open to any suggestions.

Where the Heck is Manawa?