Merrill Springs
There were once high hopes for Madison becoming the “Saratoga of the West.”
Like Saratoga Springs and the other great spa-resorts of the northern East Coast, Madison had
numerous artesian wells bubbling near its lakes. The best-known of those wells began producing
water on the lawn of the Capitol in1873.The water contained minerals similar to those in the
Bethesda Springs, in Waukesha, which was then the most famous spa-resort in Wisconsin. Its
promoters claimed the water from the lawn of the Capitol was a “tonic for the weak,”
“eradicated... chronic diseases” and “restores... manhood. “And as a result, guests at the Park
Hotel across the street began guzzling 24 gallons a week. It was sold elsewhere as well.
At what is now Olin Park, on Lake Monona, a hospital and spa known as the “Water Cure,” which
offered hydrotherapy, was built in 1854. Among those who came to Madison's spas in the summers
were southerners escaping yellow fever, cholera and the blistering heat of cities such as New
Orleans and St. Louis.
After the Water Cure failed, its building, in 1866, became a prominent resort known as Lakeside
House. It attracted well-known people, including a son of Abraham Lincoln and various beer
barons, until it burned 11 years later.
Farther east on Lake Monona was another spa- resort called the Tonyawatha Hotel. There were
springs on its property, at what is now Winnequah Road and Dean Avenue in Monona. Tonyawatha
means “healing waters,” and water from the springs was bottled and sold. But in 1895 it, too,
burned.
Madison's early efforts to become a summer resort community failed, and most of its artesian
springs either stopped producing or were paved over.
