Kewaunee was the site of a Potawatomi village at the time of European contact in the seventeenth century.

[7] French Jesuit missionary Jacques Marquette celebrated All Saints Day at the Potawatomi village in 1674.

[7][8]: 371–372  Later, French explorer René-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle visited the village in 1679,[9]: 215  and Canadian Jesuit Jean-François Buisson de Saint-Cosme stopped in September 1698.

[9]: 262  The Potawatomis moved south and east along Lake Michigan in the eighteenth century,[10] and the area was reclaimed by Menominee people.

Trader Jacques Vieau established a short lived trading post for the North West Company in the area of Kewaunee in 1795.

[11]: 220  The United States acquired the land from the Menominee nation in the 1831 Treaty of Washington.

Land speculator Joshua Hathaway surveyed and platted the settlement.

When no gold was found, the settlers who remained established a sawmill and developed the local harbor for the lumber industry.

In the late nineteenth century, the community attracted many Czech and German immigrants.

36.5% of all households were made up of individuals, and 16.6% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older.

There are 7 primary care providers per 100,000 population in Kewaunee compared to the statewide average of 75.6.