(Taken from New London Buyers' Guide/Hortonville Centennial, August 16, 1994. Posted with permission from the Press-Star, New London/Hortonville, Wisconsin.)
By Leona Mech
In 1852, William W. Briggs, a lumberman, came from Maine, and went into the lumbering business when he arrived in Hortonville. It took $50 to start house-keeping and his remaining $100 went into his business, when along with David Briggs and H. B. Sanborn, they secured the unsold portion of the village plat, and the saw mills.