Upon telling people of this project, I usually have to field a number of questions about what I'm doing. I've included this page so that everyone might have a better understanding of my mission.

I'm currently in the process of personally visiting and photographing each one of Wisconsin's near 500 official historical markers. I've lived in Wisconsin all my life, and I've logged thousands upon thousands of miles driving its roads, but I rarely took the time to stop and read the historical markers scattered throughout. Although I wouldn't exactly call myself a "history buff," it's always been an interesting topic for me, so I felt like I was really missing out. One day, I had the earth-shattering idea to, over summer break, take a road trip and visit them all in one shot. I sat down with a Microsoft Streets and Trips and started planning a route, but after only getting 100 or so markers into the plan, I realized that it would take thousands of miles of driving and several weeks to do it. So, I scrapped the idea and decided that I would work on it slowly but surely.

Not surprisingly, I found myself regularly driving past the markers and not stopping, telling myself each time, "I really oughtta stop at one pretty soon." That went on for some time until one day in February of 2005, I was driving through Portage and saw the Fort Winnebago and Marquette markers right next to each other and decided it would be a perfect time. Since then, I've gone on streaks of visiting 10 or so at a time and then going weeks without any, but I'm currently up to about 100 markers visited.

At each marker I visit, I take one close-up of the marker itself, so as to have a readable photo, one photo of myself standing near it to prove my presence, and, if applicable, a photo of whatever is that the marker is marking. I then turn the marker green on my online map and link to the location of the aforementioned photos.

So there you have it. I know I haven't answered everything, so I'll conclude this section with some responses to the most frequently asked questions/statements:

Q: How long is this going to take you?
A: Probably a few more years yet. Once the convenient markers are taken care of (such as the ones that are remotely close to frequently travelled routes), I'm going to have to take it up a notch to keep up the pace. But that's ok -- I really do enjoy it. So yeah, give me a few years.

Q: What are your favorite markers?
A: I'm a big fan of the Village of Dover and the Lost City of Newport. The Rustic Road marker really tickled my fancy too . . .

Q: What will you do when you're finished?
A: Well, I plan to save the marker in my home town of East Troy (East Troy Electric Railroad) for last, and have a bottle of champagne on the lawn in front of the trolley museum. Maybe have a tortoise at Lauber's. I think my next project will be to drive down every rustic road. That would be pretty sweet. I also plan to make a mosaic picture of an historical marker using all the individual pictures -- A nice big poster to hang right in my living room. That would also be sweet.

Q: OMG! You should write a book!
A: Well, someone already did, sort of. Check it out. They didn't actually visit each one, but they've made a nice collection. It's a little outdated now, but I keep a copy in my car for emergency directions. Who knows, maybe I'll do something with all my stuff when I'm done. I don't really know what the demand would be though.