Saturday, June 26, 2010
Last week, Steve Mech had passed on to me a documentary on the development of Sheboygan. It was created sometime in the mid-fifties. If you get an opportunity, rent it from Sheboygan’s Mead Public Library. You won’t regret it. As a matter of fact, it will make you laugh, it will make you cry and it will help you appreciate the creativity, thoughtfulness and work ethic of those who created the foundation of one of Wisconsin’s best kept secrets. Sheboygan. More importantly, it will instill in you a measure of hope that this great city we live in will continue to get better and better and perhaps even one day, become a symbol of Wisconsin pride.
Sheboygan is good at a lot of things. Perhaps that’s one of the reasons why we find it so difficult to hang our hat on any one of them. And so, we find this great city of ours regularly keeping promises it’s never made or broadcast.
Nearly 200 years ago, those who settled here recognized that Sheboygan had without doubt the most beautiful geography in the state of Wisconsin. Bar none. There is no other city with the diversity of geography that we have. Its the reason why when standing at the epicenter of Sheboygan County, you’re less than 10 minutes away from world class golf, world class sailing and our state’s most beautiful beaches, rivers and hiking trails. And that doesn’t even scratch the surface. How about Italian cooking so good that people drive all the way from Chicago to taste it. Hats off to Stefano Viglietti!
So unofficially, I’m making a promise for Sheboygan. I promise that “No other city offers so much, so near”. You might say, “Well so what?”
What’s important about what Sheboygan has to offer is that it all comes down to a quality of life that is probably the finest anywhere in the Midwest. You may recall a few years back that a variety of well-known national publications ranked Sheboygan as the number one place to live/raise a family....and one of the top then places in America to retire. That hasn’t changed. Not at all.
It’s the quality of life that Sheboygan has to offer that will ultimately attract a strong creative class, the muscle of a new economy that will help our country preserve its position as the greatest nation in the world.
I love this town. I love my family, my friends and my home. I love where we’ve come from. I love where we’re headed. Together, we’re going to do great things in a great way.
