Hayward is and always will be a land filled with natural beauty, but, area historian Andrea Wittwer says in the beginning it was the trees that took center stage.

“Hayward began around 1880's, early part of the 1880's when Anthony Judson Hayward came up the Chippewa river and he came up to this area, he saw all of these huge pines, it was just a huge pine forest here,” Wittwer said. And a prime location for a lumber mill.

Wittwer says AJ Hayward, the towns founder joined another man, Robert Laird McCormick, to establish the North Wisconsin Lumber Company.

“AJ Hayward left his name here with the city and Robert Laird McCormick built most of the buildings in the region,” she said.

The first school, library and courthouse are all attributed to him.

“It really boomed, it grew rapidly in a short period of time so that it was a real boom town, all of a sudden Hayward was here,” Sawyer county historian John Detloff said.

Detloff has written several books about the area and says during that period Hayward had a rowdy reputation.

“There was the old expression Hayward, Hurly and hell, you know because these were wild north woods logging towns,” he said.

And after dark, it could be a dangerous place.

“Hayward started out as a mans world, this village of Hayward was a romping, stomping, crazy place in its beginning,” Wittwer said.

She says as the logging industry faded, Hayward became a tourist destination, a place to have fun and enjoy all nature has to offer.

“The lakes were filled with fish, the woods were filled with animals, so hunting and fishing was a natural,” she said.

But, the town’s wild ways didn't end with the lumberjacks, Wittwer says during the 1930's and 40's Hayward was a summer hideout for gangsters like Al Capone, who got his haircut at the historic Grey’s Barbershop.

“They would post guards at the front and the back and they were very clear with Mr. Grey what would happen to him if anything went wrong with the haircut,” Wittwer said.

Today, she says little has changed. “It's the same two thousand people it's always been,” Wittwer said.

As the town that first grew from the trees, continues to honor its resources.

“What we have here is very unique and very special,” Detloff said.

Sharing and preserving the natural beauty for all who come to see.