Senator Isaac Stephenson

Isaac Stephenson (June 18, 1829 – March 15, 1918) was an American businessman, Republican politician, and Wisconsin pioneer who became a prominent lumber magnate and influential figure in state and national politics. He represented Wisconsin as a United States senator from 1907 to 1915 and served three terms in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1883 to 1889. Over the course of a long public career, he also served two terms in the Wisconsin State Assembly and was an important financial backer of Wisconsin progressive leader Robert M. La Follette in his early campaigns for governor. A major employer and philanthropist in Marinette County, Wisconsin, Stephenson left his name on several local institutions and communities, including the town of Stephenson, Wisconsin, and the Stephenson Public Library in Marinette.

Stephenson was born in the community of Yorkton, near Fredericton, in the colony of New Brunswick, then part of British North America and now in Canada. His parents were Isaac Stephenson (1791–1874), a lumberman and farmer of Scotch-Irish ancestry who had been born in Ireland, and Elizabeth (Watson) Stephenson (1793–1838), who was born in London, England. Growing up in a family already engaged in lumbering and agriculture, he was introduced early to the timber trade that would later form the basis of his fortune. As a young man he worked in lumbering activities in the eastern United States, principally in Maine near the Canadian border, gaining practical experience in an industry that was rapidly expanding with the growth of the American interior.

In 1845 Stephenson moved west to Wisconsin, then a frontier region, where he initially managed absentee timber properties for eastern owners. Before long he entered the lumber business on his own account. In 1858 he settled permanently in Marinette, on the Menominee River at the head of Green Bay, and steadily expanded his lumbering operations, particularly during the Civil War, when demand for timber increased sharply. Although he suffered heavy losses in the devastating Peshtigo Fire of 1871, which destroyed vast tracts of timber and property in northeastern Wisconsin, he was able to recoup and rebuild his enterprises. By the late nineteenth century he was one of the wealthiest lumbermen in the Great Lakes region, with extensive real-estate holdings in Marinette, Green Bay, Milwaukee, Chicago, and other communities around the Great Lakes, as well as vast acreages of pine lands in northern Wisconsin and Michigan that had yet to be harvested.

Stephenson’s economic success made him a leading figure in local affairs and drew him into politics. He joined the Republican Party, which was dominant in the northern tier of states after the Civil War and aligned with many of the economic interests of lumber and industry. In Marinette County he held several local offices, including town supervisor, county board chairman, and justice of the peace, roles that gave him experience in public administration and strengthened his influence in regional politics. Building on this base, he was elected to the Wisconsin State Assembly, serving two nonconsecutive terms in 1866 and 1868. In the Assembly he represented a large, sparsely settled district encompassing the area now comprising Marinette, Oconto, and Shawano counties, reflecting his close ties to the developing communities of northern Wisconsin.

Stephenson advanced to national office in 1882, when he was elected as a Republican to the Forty-eighth Congress from Wisconsin’s newly created 9th congressional district. He was reelected to the Forty-ninth and Fiftieth Congresses and served in the U.S. House of Representatives from March 4, 1883, to March 3, 1889. During his three terms in the House he participated in the legislative process at a time of rapid industrialization and expansion in the United States, representing the interests of his constituents in northern Wisconsin. He chose not to be a candidate for reelection in 1888. In 1899 he sought election to the United States Senate through the Wisconsin legislature, as was then the method of selection, but his bid was unsuccessful, illustrating the factional and competitive nature of Republican politics in the state at the turn of the century.

At the dawn of the twentieth century, Stephenson became closely associated with the Progressive movement within the Republican Party in Wisconsin. In 1900 he provided substantial financial backing to Robert M. La Follette in his successful campaign for the governorship, and for a number of years he was a prominent adviser to the Progressive faction and a liberal contributor to its campaign funds. In 1901 he founded the Milwaukee Free Press, a metropolitan newspaper that gave the Progressive Republicans an important voice and a counterweight to the Stalwart-controlled Milwaukee Sentinel. During the 1904 split between Progressive and Stalwart Republicans, Stephenson was chosen by the so-called “gymnasium convention” as one of the Progressive delegates to the Republican National Convention, alongside La Follette and William D. Connor. Although the national convention refused to seat the Progressive delegation, the Wisconsin Supreme Court later recognized the La Follette forces as the legal Republican ticket in the state, underscoring the strength of the Progressive movement that Stephenson had helped to finance and organize.

Stephenson’s long-sought elevation to the United States Senate came in 1907, when he sought the seat left vacant by the resignation of Senator John C. Spooner. After a brief deadlock in the Progressive-controlled Wisconsin legislature, he was elected and took his seat in May 1907. At age 77 he became the oldest freshman senator ever elected to the United States Senate, a distinction he retains. In 1908 he ran for renomination in the Republican primary and faced opposition from his former ally La Follette, but, aided by state party chairman William D. Connor and by lavish use of his personal wealth, he secured the nomination and was re-elected by the legislature in 1909. His election was twice subjected to fraud investigations, first in the Wisconsin legislature and then in the U.S. Senate, amid charges concerning the use of money in his campaign. Ultimately he was vindicated in both inquiries and continued to serve in the Senate until March 3, 1915, representing Wisconsin during a significant period in American history that included the rise of Progressivism and the approach of World War I. He is also noted as the last senator from Wisconsin’s Class 3 Senate seat to have retired from office; his successor, Paul Husting, died in office, and every subsequent holder of that seat has been defeated for reelection either in a primary or general election.

During his Senate service, Stephenson remained a visible public figure and occasionally engaged in symbolic gestures that attracted national attention. In 1909 he purchased a prized Holstein cow, Pauline Wayne, as a gift for President William Howard Taft. Pauline Wayne became the last presidential pet cow and was a familiar sight grazing on the White House lawn, a reminder of the agrarian roots that still underlay much of the American economy. Stephenson’s wealth and influence also continued to shape public life in Wisconsin, even as his relationship with the Progressive movement evolved and some former allies, including La Follette, turned against him over questions of political patronage and campaign practices.

After leaving the Senate in 1915, Stephenson retired from active political life and returned to his home in Marinette. That same year he published his memoir, “Recollections of a Long Life,” in which he reflected on his experiences in business and politics over several decades of dramatic change in Wisconsin and the nation. In retirement he continued to be known for his local philanthropies in Marinette, where a park, a street, and a memorial library were named in his honor, and where his earlier role as a major employer and civic benefactor was widely recognized. The town of Stephenson, Wisconsin, in neighboring Marinette County, also bears his name, testifying to his lasting impact on the region’s development. Stephenson died at his home in Marinette on March 15, 1918. His family’s political legacy extended beyond Wisconsin; his younger brother, Samuel Merritt Stephenson, served as a member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Michigan, further linking the Stephenson name to the political history of the upper Great Lakes.