Oshkosh, city, seat (1848) of Winnebago county, east-central Wisconsin, U.S. It lies on the western shore of Lake Winnebago where the Fox River enters, some 80 miles (130 km) northwest of Milwaukee. Potawatomi, Menominee, Ho-Chunk Nation (Winnebago), Fox, and Ojibwa Indians were early inhabitants of the region, which the French explorer Jean Nicolet visited in 1634. In the 1670s the Jesuit missionary Claude-Jean Allouez and the French explorers Jacques Marquette and Louis Jolliet traveled through the area. French fur traders were active in the area from the late 17th century, and the lake and river formed an important link in a trade route from the Great Lakes to the Mississippi River. A trading post was established in 1818, and permanent settlement began in 1836, when the Menominee ceded their claims to the area. First called Athens, it was renamed in 1839 for a Menominee chief. Much of the city was destroyed by fires in 1859, 1866, and 1875. In its early years, lumbering was the main occupation.
Oshkosh’s main manufactures include trucks and transportation equipment, plastic packaging, paper products, and apparel; it is the headquarters of OshKosh B’Gosh (founded 1895), which produces a world-famous line of children’s wear. The city is the seat of the University of Wisconsin–Oshkosh, founded in 1871 as a state normal school, and a campus of the Fox Valley Technical College. Each summer the Oshkosh-based Experimental Aircraft Association (EAA) hosts a weeklong fly-in that attracts thousands of aircraft to the city’s Wittman Regional Airport. The EAA also maintains an aviation museum in the city. Oshkosh features an opera house (built in 1883), a symphony orchestra, a municipal zoo, a local history museum, an art museum, and an arboretum. Inc. 1853. Pop. (2000) 62,916; Oshkosh-Neenah Metro Area, 156,763; (2010) 66,083; Oshkosh-Neenah Metro Area, 166,994.