e ssential landmark
Shorewood Hills Home to Historic Districts BY JEANNE ENGLE When one looks out on the Dane County landscape today, it’s hard to imagine that a community like the Village of Shorewood Hills, just to the west of Madison, was once farmland a little over a century ago. But a young man, John Charles McKenna Sr., who came from a family of community builders, looked out on the land and saw a place to build a home for himself and others. McKenna Sr. had moved to Madison with his family in 1901. The story is told that one Sunday afternoon, being homesick for the rolling hills on the Pecatonica River in his native Iowa County, he walked west. McKenna Sr. came upon a rustic bridge over a ravine that led to Lake Mendota. It was here that the 23-year-old envisioned a new community. 10 | m a d i s o n e s s e n t i a l s
