Altoona, Wisconsin

Altoona exists because a railroad needed flat land and a water source. In eighteen eighty-one the Chicago, Saint Paul, Minneapolis and Omaha Railway was looking to replace its cramped terminal in Eau Claire and chose a site about three miles east on the Eau Claire River. The company platted a town, workers moved in, and the terminal opened in eighteen eighty-two.

The town was briefly called East Eau Claire, then renamed Altoona in October of that year after Altoona, Pennsylvania, to avoid confusion at the rail dispatchers' office. The city incorporated in eighteen eighty-seven. It grew as a railroad community and later as an eastern suburb of Eau Claire, and today the two cities effectively form one continuous urban area along Interstate Ninety-Four.