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General-store days long gone

Chris Hardie For Agri-View
Jan 17, 2022
Jan 17, 2022

1 of 10

The former Beach Store is shown in 2021; the building is currently empty. Chris Hardie

Chris Hardie/For Agri-View

The Beach Store offers merchandise in the 1920s.

Courtesy of the Trempealeau County Historical Society

None of the buildings shown in 1916 in downtown Disco remain today.

Courtesy of the Jackson County Historical Society.

The Disco Store stands at the corner of Jackson County roads C and X.

Courtesy of the Jackson County Historical Society.

The building that was once Franklin Store is shown in 2021; it’s now used as a residence.

Chris Hardie/For Agri-View

The building that was once the Hegg Store is shown in 2021; it’s now used as a residence.

Chris Hardie/For Agri-View

The Hegg Mercantile Store is shown in 2009.

Chris Hardie/For Agri-View

An undated photo shows the Hegg Store, which was built in 1888.

Courtesy of Trempealeau County Historical Society

Longtime Franklin Store proprietor Ted Fosse poses in front of a now-classic car.

Courtesy of the Taylor Museum

Longtime Hegg Store proprietor Lars Underheim sits for a portrait with his family.

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Chris Hardie For Agri-View

Traveling along Jackson County Road C from the unincorporated community of Disco in Jackson County, Wisconsin, to the unincorporated hamlet of Beach Corners in Trempealeau County takes about 15 minutes.

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Chris Hardie and his wife, Sherry, raise animals and crops on his great-grandparents’ Jackson County farm. Nominated for a Pulitzer Prize in 2001, he’s a former member of the Wisconsin Freedom of Information Council and past-president of the Wisconsin Newspaper Association. Email chardie1963@gmail.com with comments.