Biohazard and Pathogen Disinfection in Combined Locks, WI

Combined Locks is a village in Outagamie County, Wisconsin, part of the Appleton metropolitan area, with a population of 3,634 at the 2020 census.

The village takes its distinctive name from the canal locks built on the Fox River near the town site to help boats past the river's rapids.

A post office named Combined Locks has operated since 1892, and the village itself was founded in 1920.

Papermaking has defined Combined Locks since 1889, when a mill opened on the Fox River; the plant later became Appleton Coated, a maker of glossy printing and writing papers.

In September 2017 the Appleton Coated mill shut down in receivership, idling most of its roughly 600 employees and threatening the village's economic core.

The mill was bought at auction and restarted by Midwest Paper Group, which converted it from white printing papers to brown packaging paper for cardboard boxes; by mid-2018 all three paper machines were running around the clock with about 310 workers, most of them former Appleton Coated employees.

Combined Locks grew rapidly after World War II, rising from just 545 residents in 1930 to 2,771 by 1970, as the paper industry expanded along the Fox River.

The 2010 census counted 3,328 people in 1,232 households in Combined Locks, and the village grew another 9.2% to reach 3,634 people in 2020.

The village covers only about 1.88 square miles, of which roughly 0.17 square miles is water from the Fox River.

Combined Locks sits in Wisconsin's "Paper Valley" along the lower Fox River, in the state that leads the nation in paper production.