John Latsch State Park

About John Latsch State Park

Today, the half-mile hike deep into the gorge is worth exploring the summit. From this vantage point, visitors can enjoy views of John Latsch State Park and the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. I love the view from the top of St Helens, and today it is worth taking another look at it from that top!

John Latsch State Park offers visitors access to Great Smoky Mountains National Park and Mississippi River Gorge. From this vantage point you can enjoy a view of Mississippi and watch bald eagles in Mississippi from the top of St. Helens.

John Latsch is located in the Blufflands Landscape Region, a driftless area, and when Europeans settled in this area they experienced oak forests. Many different bird species cross John Latch State Park and you can find white-tailed deer in and around the park as well as bald eagles.

The captain of the Mississippi steamship relied on three rocky cliffs named Faith, Hope and Charity to move up and down the Mississippi. The cliffs rise over 500 feet above the river and in the 1850s a busy steamboat dock and lumberjack town was built on the steep walls.

A timber yard supplied sawn timber to the sawmills and the new town of Winona.

Local businessman John A. Latsch bought the Blufflands and convinced the neighboring landowners to donate 350 hectares as a park to him in 1925. The area has been visited for many years by some ambitious hikers who explore the steep hills from a bird's eye view.

The land was later added to the state of Wisconsin to flow into Perrot State Park, which is downstream from Winona. Drive approximately 12 miles northwest of winona on US Highway 61 and past Blufflands and the Latsch family home. Mountain pine loved to fish in the water off the cliffs with faith, hope and charity.