Lawson Canal

From 1999’s Memories of Doty Island : A Link Between Two Cities, Caryl Chandler Herziger and Pawlowski, Winifred Anderson Pawlowski, editors

There is a body of water out of the north branch of the Fox River just west of Riverway in Menasha. It runs behind the Banta Company and on south to the Gilbert Paper Company. This is the Lawson Canal which was constructed in 1882. It was to be "about 2,000 feet long and 200 feet wide and of the uniform depth of four feet below the bottom of the river to the north." The purpose of the project was to add eighteen new power sites. In 1886 William Gilbert built a new paper mill on the canal. At that time there was a paper mill located north of Banta- closer to the dam. It was the first paper mill in Menasha and had changed hands many times. Lawson was one of the owners, thus the name of the canal.  In the late 1920's and early '30's, the piece of land which jutted into the river on the northeast side of the Lawson Canal, east of the bridge, was covered with trees, brush, and wild flowers. Most people were unaware of this area and never gave much thought as to its owner. But no one was positively told that it should not be explored. There were no NO TRESPASSING signs visible.