Harley-Davidson Honors Juneau Avenue Factory in New Exhibit
New Harley-Davidson Museum exhibit includes original drawings and archival photos of MoCo’s first factory.
Harley-Davidson’s come a long way since the first motorcycles left its factory on Juneau Avenue in Milwaukee in 1909. Changes in styles, power, ownership, trends, through them all, the MoCo kept on going while other competitors have come and gone. Every model sold today is a tribute to all that has come and gone.
What better way to share the love, then, by paying tribute to the factory where all of the MoCo’s greatest hits rolled out between 1909 and 1973. Local ABC affiliate WISN-TV recently paid a visit to the Harley-Davidson Museum to learn more about its newest exhibit, “Building a Milwaukee Icon: Harley-Davidson’s Juneau Avenue Factory,” which opened September 6.
“We’re really excited about this,” said the museum’s curatorial director, Jim Fricke. “Obviously, it’s really something that these buildings were built in 1910, ’12, ’13, are still there. The company is still using those buildings. They were built as factories; they’re now corporate headquarters, but for over a century, we’ve been occupying these buildings, and they have become a local icon.”
According to Milwaukee Business Journal the Harley exhibit is one of four exhibits put on by local museums in a collaboration with the Visit Milwaukee tourism board, called Milwaukee Made. The collaboration, as explained by the board’s communication’s chief, Kristin Settle, was designed “in a way that allows someone to experience the breadth and depth of things that were made in Milwaukee.”
“A lot of the architectural historians, amateur historians here in Milwaukee are excited to learn that these buildings were designed by an architect, Alexander C. Eschweiler, who is really well-known here in the city,” said Fricke, “and a lot of people didn’t realize that.”
The Harley exhibit has a direct tie to one of the other exhibits in the Milwaukee Made collaboration. Per the Milwaukee Business Journal, the University of Wisconsin – Madison Union Art Gallery is showing the art of Michael and Willie G. Davidson through September 13, titled MKE Generations. The latter was the styling chief for the MoCo, and was a watercolor artist in his spare time.
“One of the things you’re seeing here, the first buildings…among the constraints they had, they were building them narrow with lots of windows because windows were providing both light and ventilation. So, you’re seeing the history of manufacturing along with the history of Milwaukee, and buildings that still stand today; you can go over to 35th and Juneau Avenue and see these buildings.”
The Harley Juneau Avenue exhibit is scheduled to run through next September.
Photos: Harley-Davidson Museum
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