The Lumberjack Conference is a former high school athletic conference with its membership concentrated in north central Wisconsin. Originating as a football-only conference in 1946, the Lumberjack Conference competed as an all-sport conference from 1953 to 2008. All member schools belonged to the Wisconsin Interscholastic Athletic Association.
The Lumberjack Conference was organized in 1946 as a football-only conference by a group of small- to medium-sized schools in north central Wisconsin.[1] Original members were Medford, Mosinee, Stanley, Tomahawk and the "B" team from Wausau High School. In 1948, Wausau "B" left the conference and were replaced by Nekoosa High School, formerly of the Wisconsin Valley Conference.[2] Stanley left the league in 1950 and were replaced by Park Falls and Phillips.[3] By 1951, conference officials began discussing sponsorship of sports other than football, contingent upon Nekoosa and Tomahawk leaving the larger Wisconsin Valley Conference.[4] Park Falls left the Lumberjack Conference in 1952 to become an all-sport member of the Michigan-Wisconsin Conference (which they already belonged to for basketball).[5] Nekoosa followed them out to join the South Central Conference, and the Lumberjack was down to four members for the 1952 football season.[6] In 1953, the newly opened D.C. Everest High School in Schofield was accepted into the Lumberjack Conference as its fifth football member.[7]
A few months after D.C. Everest was welcomed into the Lumberjack Conference, the loop elected to sponsor additional sports, starting with basketball in the 1953-54 school year.[8] Four of the football members (D.C. Everest, Medford, Mosinee and Phillips) would compete in the inaugural season. The fifth football member, Tomahawk, joined the Lumberjack the next year as a full member after leaving the Wisconsin Valley Conference.[9] Park Falls joined the conference in 1955 after their exit from the Michigan-Wisconsin Conference.[10] D.C. Everest left the Lumberjack Conference in 1957 when they were invited to join the Wisconsin Valley Conference.[11] They were replaced by Lakeland Union High School in Minocqua (formerly of the Northern Lakes Conference) in 1958,[12] and the conference remained a six-member circuit for fifteen years. Ashland and Hurley joined the Lumberjack in 1973, leading to the dissolution of the Michigan-Wisconsin Conference.[13]
In 1976, the Lumberjack Conference added four schools: Auburndale, Colby,Nekoosa and Northland Pines in Eagle River. Auburndale and Nekoosa were former members of the Marawood Conference, Colby came from the Cloverbelt Conference, and Northland Pines was late of the Northern Lakes Conference. To accommodate the expansion of the Lumberjack to twelve member schools, the conference subdivided into North and South Divisions:[14][15]
North Division
South Division
Ashland
Auburndale
Hurley
Colby
Lakeland Union
Medford
Northland Pines
Mosinee
Park Falls
Nekoosa
Phillips
Tomahawk
This alignment would be short-lived, as four schools left the Lumberjack to join the Cloverbelt Conference in 1978: Auburndale, Colby, Mosinee and Nekoosa. Mosinee had long wanted out of the Lumberjack because of the long travel distances they experienced as members of the conference and were closer to their new rivals in the Cloverbelt.[16] The conference went back down to a single division and continued as an eight-member conference until Hurley left in 1980.[17][18] The remaining seven members continued until Ashland left the Lumberjack Conference in 2006 to join the Lake Superior Conference, a Minnesota-based conference that included nearby Superior High School as members.[19] The Lumberjack played on with six members until 2008, when the conference was dissolved. Four of its member schools (Lakeland Union, Medford, Northland Pines and Tomahawk) went on to help form the Great Northern Conference,[20] and the other two schools (Park Falls and Phillips) joined the Marawood Conference. Park Falls High School would close in 2009 after consolidation with Glidden to form Chequamegon High School.[21]
