Second Friday Lecture Series: The Women Founders and History of the Milwaukee Soldiers Home

Friday, March 8  |  12:00pm – 1:00pm  |  Speaker: Terry Arliskas

The Milwaukee VA Soldiers Home was one of the first soldiers’ homes in the country, and the only one where it’s still possible to experience the buildings and designed landscape together in something close to their original form. The 90-acre campus has served veterans continuously since shortly after the Civil War and includes some of the oldest buildings in the entire VA system.   But this special site would not have been possible in the first place without the dedicated efforts of the West Side Soldiers’ Aid Society, a group of Milwaukee women who during the Civil War were committed to creating a place for veterans to heal and recuperate.  Terry Arliskas will discuss who these women were, what they accomplished, and how their legacy lives on the grounds of the Milwaukee VA yet today.