Kennan, WI: Things to Do, History & Local Guide

A Village That the Railroad Built and the Farms Sustained

Kennan sits on Wisconsin Highway 13 roughly halfway between Phillips and Prentice, a village of 143 people surrounded by farmland and scattered lakes. It is one of three incorporated villages in Price County (the others being Catawba and Prentice), and like both of those, Kennan exists because of the railroad and survives because of agriculture.

The 2020 Census counted 143 residents, up slightly from 135 in 2010 but far below the village’s peak of 319 in 1920, when the lumber industry was still running hot. The population has been declining for a century, dropping steadily from that 1920 high through the decades as the timber played out and young people left. The median age is now 51.5 years. The village covers just under 2 square miles, all land, no water, at an elevation of 1,332 feet. Village President Jill Arndt oversees a municipal government that meets in the village hall.

Railroad Roots

Like most communities in Price County, Kennan exists where the railroad decided to put a stop. The Wisconsin Central Railroad pushed through the northern forest in the 1870s and 1880s, and Kennan grew up around the tracks. The Sanborn Fire Insurance Company mapped the village in 1909, documenting a community that already had a main street, commercial buildings, and residential blocks laid out along the rail line.

The railroad brought lumber camps, and the lumber camps brought workers and their families. When the timber was gone, the farmland remained. The soil around Kennan, like neighboring Catawba to the north, supports dairy operations and crop farming in a county where most of the land is too sandy or too forested for agriculture. The transition from logging to farming was not easy anywhere in Price County, but Kennan and Catawba had something most of the county did not: arable land.

The Catawba-Kennan Connection

Kennan and Catawba share more than geography. The two villages are linked through the Catawba-Kennan Joint Sewage Commission, a shared infrastructure system that ties their budgets and decision-making together. In 2025, the Village of Catawba loaned $7,500 to the Sewage Commission, and most of a $14,377 county property sale payout from Catawba went straight to the commission as well. When one village’s sewer costs change, both villages feel it.

The sewage commission is a practical reality of small-town government in Wisconsin. Villages too small to maintain separate systems pool resources and share the overhead. But it also means that infrastructure decisions in one village directly affect the other. Catawba’s recent road funding challenges and property decisions have implications for Kennan, and vice versa.

Kennan Park Pond

Kennan has a small park with a pond that is stocked with panfish. It is not a destination fishery. Price County’s real fishing lakes are elsewhere. But the pond serves a purpose: it is a low-stakes place to take a kid who is just learning to cast. No boat needed. No expensive gear. Just a rod, some worms, and a bench. In a county where most waterfront access requires a truck and a forest road, a pond in the village park is worth something.

Nearby Lakes and Recreation

While Kennan itself sits on dry ground, the surrounding Town of Kennan and neighboring townships have lake access within a short drive. The area between Kennan and Phillips has scattered lakes that support fishing and quiet recreation. For swimming, Price County’s swimming holes are scattered throughout the county and reachable within 20 to 30 minutes. For camping, free and cheap campsites in the county forest and Chequamegon-Nicolet National Forest are within driving distance.

The Price County Fairgrounds at N9130 Forest Lane in Phillips hosts the Price County Fair each August, a 20-minute drive south on Highway 13. The fair is one of the biggest community events in the county, and Kennan residents are among the regulars.

Living in Kennan

The village is small enough that daily life revolves around a few key points: the highway, the farm fields, the village hall where the board meets, and the bar. The median household income from the last detailed census was $41,786, and the per capita income was $18,701. About 8% of the population lives below the poverty line. The housing stock is a mix of single-family homes and mobile homes. In the broader Town of Kennan, 81% of housing is single-unit and 19% mobile homes.

There is no grocery store in Kennan, no gas station, no clinic. Phillips, 10 minutes south on Highway 13, provides those services. The village’s identity is agricultural. The fields that surround it are working farmland, not decorative, and the people who live here are tied to the land and to each other through shared institutions like the sewage commission and the school district.

Getting There

Kennan sits on Wisconsin Highway 13, the main north-south route through Price County. From Phillips, drive north on Highway 13 for about 10 miles. From Prentice, head south on Highway 13 for about 15 miles. From Park Falls, take Highway 13 south through Fifield and Phillips, then continue north. Kennan is about 25 miles total. The village is visible from the highway with farmland on both sides.

What’s Nearby

• Catawba, 5 miles north on local roads, the neighboring village sharing the sewage commission and agricultural identity
• Phillips, 10 minutes south on Highway 13, the county seat with full services
• Prentice, 15 minutes south on Highway 13, the nearest village with additional services
• Price County Fairgrounds, 20 minutes south in Phillips, home of the annual county fair

The Bottom Line

Kennan is not going to show up on a list of Wisconsin tourism hotspots. There is no museum on the National Register, no historic fire tower, no scenic waterfall. What there is instead is a working agricultural village of 143 people that has been here since the 1880s and has no plans to leave. The farmland is real. The pond in the park catches fish. The sewage commission ties Kennan to its neighbor Catawba in a way that neither village can ignore. And if you are driving Highway 13 between Phillips and Prentice and you see open fields instead of forest, you have found the part of Price County that feeds the rest of it.

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