Hotels near Fitchburg, Wisconsin

A little about Fitchburg...

Fitchburg is a city in Dane County, Wisconsin, United States. The population was 20,501 at the 2000 census.

Fitchburg is a suburb of Madison.

Irish heritage figures prominently in Fitchburg’s history and settlement as well. Many descendants of those first families can still be found in Fitchburg...the Kinneys, Gormans, Lacys, O’Briens, Foxs, Purcells and Barrys.

In addition to remnants of history found in family names and along Fitchburg roads, the City has five sites on the National Register of Historic Places. They include Fox Hall, a Greek revival style stone house built by the Fox family in 1856; it is located along County Highway "M". Other sites are the Mann House (Quivey’s Grove restaurant), built in 1855, the Italianate McCoy House on Syene Road built between 1857 and 1861 by tobacco farmer Benjamin Brown, plus 13 original buildings of the Wisconsin Industrial School for Girls built in 1932, currently known as Oakhill Correctional Institute. Spooner’s 1852 Swan Creek Farm is the most recent addition to the National Register; it is located along Lacy Road, close to County Highway "MM".

Several other buildings and sites in Fitchburg, not on the National Register, but of historic interest include the Oscar Mayer Observatory now located on the hilltop property of Fitchburg Research Park Associates. This little observatory was originally located next to the Washburn Observatory on the UW-campus. Built in 1878, it was used as a student observatory, and was moved to Fitchburg in 1960.

Many of Fitchburg’s one room schoolhouses are still standing, and many can be located by the historical markers along the roadsides in the vicinity of Syene and Lacy, Grandview Road, Fish Hatchery and Whalen, County M and Fitchburg Road.

Fitchburg officially became a city on April 26, 1983. Driven by Madison’s continued encroachment into its boundaries and annexations of Fitchburg lands, the township government pursued a method of petitions signed by a percentage of Fitchburg’s residents in order to declare itself a city. The fight to become a City was finally determined by a Wisconsin Supreme Court decision which allowed incorporation to proceed.