Margie Inscore has a rather large spot in her heart for the quiet streets, miles of farmland, shimmering lake waters and flocks of geese that kept her company as a young girl.
“I loved growing up here in the Town of Summit, and wherever I went, I never quite felt like I was home,” said Inscore. “Silver Lake is beautiful and clean, it’s still country out here, and the quiet–I love the quiet.”
Inscore lives so close to Silver Lake that she can hear fish jumping. But the changing face of the town she loves has her worried that Summit is changing too fast.
“My bike rides through this area aren’t what they used to be anymore,” said Inscore. “Change has to come, I know that, but I hate it.”
That Summit is poised on the edge of a development that will forever change its face is indisputable. The 1,662-acre Pabst Farms, located in Summit along Wisconsin Highway 67 and Interstate Highway 94, is on track for a project that will include homes, apartments, retail shops and offices.
Even though an agreement reached between Oconomowoc and Summit will allow the city to eventually annex 1,100 acres of the farm, the Pabst project will affect the entire area.
That development and the huge Target Distribution Center that sits just off Highway 67 and down the road from a popular restaurant and bar, Mr. Slow’s, have booted Summit from its sleepy, small town past into a future that promises to be bustling.
Summit residents say they know change is inevitable but are hoping the rolling hills, herds of traveling deer and the touch of nature that attracted them to the area will remain.
Historical records describe Summit as a “mystical wilderness” that sits on the western border of Waukesha County. English settlers struggled up the old Military Road that ran along what is now known as Valley Road. They staked their land claims and began farming.
The area retained its sleepy charm when the railroads bypassed the area, allowing agriculture to remain the prime use of the town’s 55 square miles.
Betty Dow, town clerk, said 4,300 people live inside those borders.
Her office mate, Janet Price, deputy clerk, said she remembers driving out to Summit as a young girl just like hundreds of other people who lived close to Milwaukee and wanted a breath of fresh air and a chance to dip their toes into one of the town’s 17 lakes.
“We would get just past Goerkes Corners and you could smell the difference,” said Price. “It was country out here and wonderful and quiet.”
Dorothy Gartzke, who has owned a home on Lower Genesse Lake since 1973, said it’s still pretty quiet in her neck of the woods but the new subdivisions and news of more development make her wonder how long the town will stay as it is.
“Oh, there’s a new subdivision across the street and you can see it all over. But here, right on this lake, it’s still quiet and peaceful,” she said. “That’s why we came out here and that’s why we stayed.”
The lake is still a place where the locals can hang out their wash, lean over the fence and talk to their neighbors about hosta plants and wonder what to grill next weekend.
All those lakes and highways have brought numerous new subdivisions and country homes to Summit. Dow said it’s tough to find a home for sale anywhere in the town for less than $150,000 and many homes are worth close to $1 million.
Summit is a unique mix of lake and country and farm, all close enough to the freeway and to Milwaukee and Waukesha to lure new residents.
Katy and Phillip Kazik moved to Summit six years ago from nearby Delafield. Heaven to Katy, she said, is sipping on a cold Corona, watching the sun set and hearing nothing but a few frogs chirping.
“Just hearing nothing out here is heaven,” said Katy, who lives in the Lincolnwood subdivision just off U.S. Highway 18. “We wanted the space and the quiet, and this is absolutely wonderful.”
Kazik said she loves driving into Dousman for a few groceries, catching up on the latest gossip and then racing back home to ramble around her three-ace lot.
“Everybody knows your name around here and people are friendly, and I feel really fortunate to be able to live in such a wonderful spot,” said Kazik.
Many of the subdivisions that dot the roads in the town were once parts of large family farms. While many of the farms have stopped producing, bowing to the changing economy and the high demand for residential development, there are still working farms in Summit.
Pat Kummrow, a town supervisor, has lived for 17 years on her husband’s family farm two miles west of Highway 67 on Delafield Road. She said the family has no plans to sell the farm.
“I suppose everyone wants to be the last one to move into an area like this,” said Kummrow. “The rural feeling then and the rural feeling now are really two different things.”
The Kummrow’s 200-acre farm has been in the family since 1886. Although the Kummrows switched from crops to livestock, including buffalo, several years ago, Kummrow said she’s proud the farm is still operating. There are no plans for development on her end of town.
“The primary goal of the town is to try and keep this rural image. The definition of rural might change a little but it’s still going to be rural out here,” she said. “That’s important to all of us.”
She also said one of her children is planning to stay on the farm and keep it running, which has given everyone in the family reason to sigh several times a day.
