Two Rivers Says It Served the First Ice Cream Sundae in 1881

The ice cream sundae has a birthplace claim, and Wisconsin holds it. Two Rivers says the first one was served there in 1881.

The man behind it was Ed Berners. He took the chocolate sauce that was only meant for sodas and poured it over a dish of ice cream. He charged a nickel for it, and he only sold it on Sundays.

Ithaca says otherwise

Ithaca, New York claims the sundae was invented there in 1892, eleven years after the Two Rivers date. The two towns have gone back and forth about it for a long time.

In 2006 the mayor of Ithaca declared her city the birthplace of the sundae. Two Rivers delivered an inflatable cow to her office.

Wisconsin claims a lot of firsts

Seymour, Wisconsin claims the hamburger. The story is that in 1885 a 15 year old named Charlie Nagreen could not sell meatballs to fairgoers who wanted to walk around and eat, so he flattened one between bread and named it after the Hamburg steak. He came back to that same fair every year until he died in 1951. Seymour built a Hamburger Hall of Fame and throws Burger Fest every August. Other towns claim the burger too, and none of them built a statue for it.

Brick cheese is a Wisconsin invention as well. John Jossi created it in Dodge County in 1877, and it is called brick because he pressed it with actual bricks.

The dairy behind all of it

The reason any of this happened here traces back to one professor. In 1890 Stephen Babcock at UW invented a simple butterfat test that changed the whole milk industry, and the university had already started the first dairy school in the country.

Babcock Hall has been making ice cream on campus since 1951 with the same mix recipe, about 75,000 gallons a year.

Two Rivers has held its claim since 1881, and the town is still defending it.