Burr Oak Methodist Church

written by Amanda Lambert

Located west of Burr Oak, in the Town of Farmington on Highway 108, Burr Oak Methodist Cemetery is situated around the remnants of what was once a small Methodist Church. Burr Oak was a mission church of the Salzer Memorial Methodist Church in La Crosse until 1872.

From Emil J. Bernet's article titled "Beginnings of the Salzer Memorial Methodist Church" in the La Crosse County Historical Sketches (series 7) published in 1945, described:

the "people in Chipmunk Coulee and on Brecken Ridge [later called Brinkman Ridge bordering La Crosse and Vernon counties] were largely German Bohemians, most of whom were Catholics. In Mormon Coulee there were chiefly Swiss and in other places there were German Lutherans.

These settlers were pious, God-fearing people with religious training in school in youth; but even with this religious background they had been entirely neglected by their churches before this time. There was an occasional priest in the towns who could be called upon to baptize, marry, or bury. The Methodist circuit riders were ready to pray with a penitent sinner under a tree in the woods or on the lee side of a hay stack, and administer all religious rites when necessary. Literally left as 'sheep without a shepherd' by their own churches, there was an immediate response to the earnest, sincere preaching of the gospel according to Methodist principles. Meetings were held in homes and schoolhouses whenever anyone would listen."

While the main La Crosse church began to have regular preaching services in 1858 and a small church building was erected, missionary work outside La Crosse was growing. Revival meetings during the winter season and camp meetings in the summer time to which people came from long distances were popular. Spiritual interest was shown and the preaching of the gospel became more widespread. The missionary societies were established by 1860. These included La Crosse (main church), Brecken Ridge [Brinkman Ridge], Chipmunk Coulee, Mormon Coulee, Burr Oak and Jacksonville (Monroe Co.).

In the [Record of] Church Organization, vol. 1, p. 39 [La Crosse County Register of Deeds Office] dated Dec. 15, 1865, organizers Georg Heinack, John Pfaff, John Jung, John Voelker, August Strangman filed with the county as a church congregation. Rev. Herman Richter was listed as being in charge of both the La Crosse and Burr Oak congregations. A deed recorded June 26, 1866, notes a transaction between John Pfaff and the Methodist Episcopal Church of Burr Oak [La Crosse County Register of Deeds, volume 29 page 301]. Early family names that joined the Burr Oak church included Heinack, Jung, Pfaff, Voelker and Strongman/Strangman. In 1872 the society or mission church became its own church and separated from the main church in La Crosse.

The farm of Ed Rhyme borders the cemetery. Because of the interest of the Rhymes family and Herman Harder, the cemetery was saved from total disintegration in 1966, when it was brought to the public's attention that two Civil War soldiers were buried there. The two soldiers were John Pfaff, born November 17, 1825, and died December 6, 1880, who served as a private in Company F, 25th Regiment Wisconsin Infantry and Christian Arttus. A fence was soon erected as the law suggested, and eventually proper care of the site and markers resumed.

We don't know much about this cemetery or the church after 1872 when it broke away from the Salzer Methodist Church in La Crosse.

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