Larkin Street

Larkin Street is the first street west of the Mineral Point-Speedway-Glenway intersection near Glenway Golf Course. The land west of Glenway was originally purchased from the federal government by Alanson Sweet, a Territorial Council member from Milwaukee, just days before Madison was named the capital in November 1836. Sweet was one of the legislators who worked closely with James Duane Doty to ensure Madison became the capital. The following June, Sweet sold the land to Charles Henry Larkin, with whom he was involved in several business deals in Milwaukee. In October Charles sold the land to his brother William, who was living in New York at the time. Shortly thereafter, William came to Madison, along with his parents and siblings, and farmed the land until his death in 1889.

William Larkin was a town assessor in 1846, and helped A.A. Bird build South Hall - the second building on the UW-Madison campus - in 1854-55. In 1891 his heirs sold the farm to E.C. Hammersley (Hammersley Street intersects Larkin Street, and is named for him).

Hammersley then entered into a partnership with John Olin and in 1916 they sold the farm to the Owen Park Land Co. Within a decade the farmland was platted and houses were erected.

When William came west, so did the whole Larkin clan. His father, Jonathan, had been engaged in the Newfoundland fisheries in his youth; later, he was a prominent farmer in Erie County, N.Y. He, his wife Nancy, and their children arrived in Madison in 1837.

Jonathan, his son Jonathan Jr., and A.A. Bird built Madison's first jail and the Milwaukee & Mississippi Railroad depot in 1853. Jonathan's funeral was held in the Capitol in December 1846.

As for the women of the Larkin clan, the white house at 938 Woodrow St., on the shore of Lake Wingra, was built by Jonathan's daughter Helen in 1873 and is still standing.

Two of Jonathan's granddaughters, Ella and Irene, were teachers in Madison schools. Irene taught the primary grades from 1872 to 1899. "Hundreds of pupils were her loyal friends. She made a place in the hearts of many with her eager interest and quick sympathy," according to her obituary.

Ella taught from 1868 to 1906. She was in the third female class to graduate from the UW normal school (1867). As a teacher she presided over numerous grades and schools.

Ella started the juvenile library by having each child bring 2 cents to school every week. At the time of her retirement she was the senior teacher in the district by eight years, at a time when the citizenry was decrying the lack of experienced teachers.

According to Madison resident Henry Casson, who eulogized Ella when she died, "One of the real primary education centers of Madison was known as Little Brick, and Miss Ella Larkin was its teacher. What a teacher she was!

"The thousands of little ones who passed through the first and second grades with her will always hold her in the fondest of memories. We had no juvenile courts in those days, but even if such things existed at that time there would have been no need to send Ella Larkin's pupils to see the judge. In simple language, she taught us.

"Madison has had good primary teachers but never any better than Ella Larkin, and never did a finer-grained, better woman ever have charge of a school of youngsters."

Five of her former students served as pallbearers at her funeral.