24/7 Biohazard and Crime Scene Cleanup in Peshtigo, WI

Peshtigo is a city in Marinette County, Wisconsin, on the Peshtigo River about 45 miles northeast of Green Bay, with a population of 3,420 at the 2020 census.

The site of Peshtigo was first settled about 1838, and it was incorporated as a village in 1887 and as a city in 1903.

The name Peshtigo comes from the nearby river, and its origin is uncertain — explanations include an Ojibwe phrase meaning 'river of the wild goose' and a Menominee word for 'snapping turtle.'

On October 8, 1871 — the very same night as the Great Chicago Fire — the Peshtigo Fire swept through the town, burning about 1.2 million acres across northeastern Wisconsin and Michigan's Upper Peninsula.

The Peshtigo Fire remains the deadliest wildfire in recorded history, with the death toll estimated between 1,200 and 2,500 people — at least five times as many as died in Chicago that night.

Peshtigo itself had about 1,700 residents in 1871, and the almost entirely wooden town, its streets covered in sawdust from a huge woodworking factory, was consumed by the firestorm in about an hour.

Because every town record burned in the fire, the exact number of victims can never be known; some 350 unidentified victims were buried in a mass grave in the Peshtigo Fire Cemetery.

The historical marker erected at the Peshtigo Fire Cemetery in 1951 was the first official state historical marker authorized by the Wisconsin Historical Society.

The Peshtigo Fire Museum, housed in a former church beside the fire cemetery, preserves artifacts and first-person accounts of the 1871 disaster.

Peshtigo's economy still rests on forest products, including lumber, paper, and other wood products.