The Wisconsin Roadside Council was organized in January 1940, as the Wisconsin Roadside Development Council by the following charter organizations: the Wisconsin Garden Club Federation, the American Legion, the American Legion Auxiliary, the Wisconsin Friends of Our Native Landscape, the Wisconsin Federation of Women's Clubs, and the Wisconsin Federation of Business and Professional Women's Clubs. These organizations all shared an interest in conservation, although the Wisconsin Garden Club Federation and its president Mrs. Charles Schuelte had taken a lead in organizing the council early in 1939. Given this diverse background it is not surprising that throughout its history the council tapped a broad range of interests and concerns: landscape architecture, rural planning, conservation, tourism promotion, and outdoor advertising. Purposes of the organization included coordination of the efforts of all groups interested in the conservation, preservation, and improvement of the beauty and safety of Wisconsin roadsides and highways. In 1950 the word development was eliminated from the name of the organization.
The major efforts of the council were directed toward public education and the passage and enforcement of billboard control legislation and toward the passage of roadside improvement legislation. The activities of the organization included co-sponsorship with the University of Wisconsin Department of Horticulture and the College of Agriculture of several institutes and short courses, public education programs such as photography contests, activity in support of billboard regulation on the interstate highways in Wisconsin in 1959, the promotion of natural snow barriers, and increasing appropriations for state roadside part acquisition and maintenance. The WRC was especially active in the passage of the National Highway Beautification Act of 1965. In 1977 after a period of near dormancy the council used its remaining funds for a landscaping and planting project and then disbanded.
