Town of Bern, Marathon County, Wisconsin: Place Profile

Bern is governed as a Wisconsin town, with a town board and an elected or appointed town clerk; a current roster of the chair and supervisors was not found in any source fetched this session.

No official Town of Bern website was found. The clerk's email domain (tn.bern.wi.gov) did not resolve as a website when probed on 2026-09-19.

The Town of Bern's board meeting schedule and where it posts agendas and notices were not found in any source fetched this session.

No list of major employers located in the Town of Bern was found in a primary source.

No local news outlet specific to the Town of Bern was confirmed. The Record-Review, the Central Wisconsin Publications weekly covering Athens, is the nearest paper on Wausau Wire's roster, but no Bern town-government story was found in a site search.

No library, hospital, or clinic located in the Town of Bern was confirmed from a source fetched this session.

No recurring community event specific to the Town of Bern was found in a source fetched this session.

The municipality is the Town of Bern, a civil town in Marathon County, Wisconsin (Census county subdivision GEOID 5507307000; WI DOA municipal code 37006).

Bern is a town (civil town), not a city or village, and has no incorporated village of the same name; it should not be confused with Bern, Switzerland, or with other places named Bern.

The Town of Bern covers 34.038 square miles of land and 0.009 square miles of water.

The town's Census internal point is near 45.100607, -90.122229, in northwestern Marathon County.

A 1913 county history says the town consists of township 30, range 3 east, except the east half of the east half of section 36, which remained attached to the village of Athens.

The 2020 Census counted 614 residents in the Town of Bern.

The Wisconsin DOA estimates Bern's population at 625 as of January 1, 2025.

The ACS 2019-2023 5-year estimate of Bern's population is 590 (+/-153).

The ACS 2019-2023 median age in Bern is 29.3 years (+/-13.4); the wide margin makes this a weak estimate.

The ACS 2019-2023 median household income in Bern is $77,813 (+/-$10,394).

The ACS 2019-2023 median value of owner-occupied homes in Bern is $207,400 (+/-$37,747).

The state Municipal Data System lists Debora Auner as Town of Bern clerk (715-560-0864, [email address]), with an Athens, WI 54411 mailing address.

Two unified school districts cover the town: Athens School District (about 86 percent of the town's area) and Medford Area Public School District (about 14 percent).

Athens School District (NCES 5500570) is a PK-12 district of 4 schools with 417 students in 2024-25, based at 601 West Limits Road, Athens.

Medford Area Public School District (NCES 5508940) is a PK-12 district of 5 schools with 3,220 students in 2024-25, based at 124 W State St, Medford, in Taylor County.

A 1913 county history described Bern as purely a farming community with one cooperative cheese factory and farmers mostly of German descent.

Marathon County had 3,436 business establishments and 65,770 paid employees in 2023, including 18,923 in manufacturing.

A 2021 Athens Fire District notice lists the Town of Bern as a member of the Athens Area Fire Commission, with the Village of Athens and the Towns of Johnson, Rietbrock, Halsey, and Frankfort.

The Bern clerk's state record uses an Athens, WI 54411 mailing address; no post office located in the town was confirmed.

USGS GNIS names Lake Allu and 9 Reservoir as the named lakes nearest the town's centroid within Marathon County.

A 1913 county history says Bern was set off from the Town of Halsey in 1902 and organized as a separate town in spring 1903, electing John C. Searing as its first chairman.

In 1913 the town had three school districts, each with a new schoolhouse, and no church; most residents lived in the eastern part of the town and attended congregations in the village of Athens.

Wikipedia states the town's name is a phonetic rendering of German 'Bayern' (Bavaria), citing Tolzmann's edition of Lacher's history of Wisconsin's German element.