In the midst of Wisconsin’s lovely, dense, and mysterious forests, a mere hour drive away from the city of Green Bay lies architectural relic that is a gutted slump of its former self. The halls that were once filled with grand chandeliers, children running to and fro, and young Christian men whose only concern in life was the word of God, have are now gutted and are slowly decaying by the day. 
This ‘Mansion in the Woods’ or as it would be called by the Alexian Brother’s, The Novitiate, was once a slice of royalty for those living near it. An architectural masterpiece that would be hard to find in Wisconsin’s more ritzy areas such as Lake Geneva, Door County, or the Madison area suburbs, let alone on the banks of the Red River, where men and women made a hard living in the factories, the farms, or in the woods. However, this mansion of beauty which transformed into a house of God, was in of itself surrounded by a shadow of past wrongs and current prejudices; a history of invasion and seclusion of those who settled the land first. For when beauty is held by some and not shared with all, those who have been shorted will begin to desire and eventually will take what they believe is theirs.
When this happens the object of desire is caught in-between and left useless to all; often times becoming so unrecognizable that its beauty is forgotten. Consequently all sides forget the catalyst that started the conflict and issues become convoluted, so convoluted that brother and sister begin fighting with each other, and tension turns into self-fulfilling turmoil. This all amounts to is a cycle of hate and wrongful prejudice that is passed down from generation to generation, with little or no room for improvement, or room for forgiveness. Those who have staked their claim for one camp or another are only perpetuating the cycle and not learning from the now decaying mansion. All sides are refusing to rebuild what had been lost.
There inlies the rub. Extremes are reached and when this happens no side is willing to admit their wrong doing. The tension eventually dies down and although there is a blanket of hostility between factions, there is little quarrels about what was destroyed. It is simple; no one wants to remember what had been done. This results in two devastating consequences. The first being that few will learn from what was lost, because it has simply been forgotten, and an issue between the belligerent parties will flair, with nothing to remind them of the consequences of their past hostility towards one another. In short, history is cyclical and will in some way repeat itself; unless prevented by those who learn from it. Second, what meant so much to the community around it, this ‘Mansion in the Woods’ will be lost forever, and all that will be remembered is the tragedy that it now manifests.
Wisconsin Rediscovered 