The Wisconsin magazine of history: Volume 17, number 1, September 1933

              memoirs of william george bruce chapter iii alt-milwaukee to typical american city dreamers and idealists the stream of german immi gration which poured into the united states between the fifties and eighties of the last century and which during that period assumed considerable momentum and propor tion in wisconsin and particularly in milwaukee brought also those with peculiar conceptions and notions of new world opportunities and possibilities the german is es sentially a dreamer his inner life is accentuated with strong idealism which at times transgresses the domain of the probable and reasonable intellectuals of that type found their way to milwaukee among the german students who fled from their native country in 1848 was found also the idealist the dreamer his love for liberty in thought and action led him to dream of the fulfillment of his plans and purposes he saw in the great number of his countrymen which he found on every hand here the foundation of a new german empire on the american continent he saw the rise of splendid institutions founded upon the fraternity justice and liberty whose halls would echo and reecho with the glorious achievement of a teutonic race in every field of human endeavor but alas his dream was but an air castle the free in stitutions of the new world were too securely founded to permit the rearing of a new empire or even a new republic within a republic the latter had been wrested from an op