(ISSN 0043-6534) WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY

'Ife .Slate Hi.sKn-ical Stnicty of Wisconsin • Vol. 80, No. 2 • Winter, 1996-1997

,«_^|jjpr:^;. THE STATE HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF WISCONSIN

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Officers GLENN R. COATES, President RICHARD H. HOI.SCHER, Treasurer GERALD D. VISTE, First Vice-President GEORGE L. VOOT, Secretary PATRICIA A. BOC.E, Second Vice-President

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ON THE COVER; Nesouaquoil, a Fox chief. An article on the Mesquakie in Wisconsin begins on page 83. WHi(X3)48336. Volume 80, Number 2 / Winter, 1996-1997

WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY

Published quarterly by ihc State Historical Society of Wisconsin, 816 State Street, Madison, Wisconsin'.s Fox River Valley Wisconsin 53706-1488 and the Mesquakie: Distributed to members as part of A New Local HLstory 83 their dues. Individual member­ ship, $27.50; .senior citizen individual, $22.50; family, $32.50; Neil Schmitz senior citizen family, $27.50; supporting, $100; sustaining, $250; patron, $500 or more; life (one person), $1,000. Single Theodore W. Goldin: numbers from Volume 57 forward are $5 plus postage. Microfilmed Little Big Horn Survivor copies available through and Winner ofthe Medal of Honor 106 University Microfilms, 300 North Zeeb Road, Ann Arbor, Michigan Larry Sklenar 48106. Communications should be addressed to the editor. The Society does not assume responsi­ bility for statements made by contributors. Periodicals postage Book Reviews 124 paid al Madison, Wisconsin. PO.ST.MA.STER: Send address changes to Wisconsin Magazine of History, Book Review Index 132 Madison, Wisconsin 53706-1488.' Copyright © 1997 by the Stale Wisconsin History Checklist 133 Hisloricai Society of Wisconsin.

The Wisconsin Magazine of History Accessions 135 is indexed annually by the editors; cumulative indexes are assembled Proceedings of the One Hundred and Fiftieth decennially. In addition, articles 141 are abstracted and indexed in Annual Meeting ofthe State Historical Society America: History and Life, Historical Abstracts, Index to Literature on the Contributors 158 American Indian, and the Combined Retrospective Index lo Journals in History, 1838^1974. Editor PAUI, H. H.\SS Photographs identified with WHi negative numbers are from the Historical Society's collections. Associate Editors WILLIAM C. M.ARTEX JOHN O. HOLZHUETER Augustin Grignon, as painted for the Historical Society by Samuel Marsden Brookes al Buttes des Moris in October, 1858. It is reproduced here for comparison to the more widely known daguerreotype of him from the first lialf of the 1850's, tuhich is reproduced on page 92 and discussed by the author. Wisconsin's Fox River Valley and the Mesquakie: A New Local History

By Neil Schmitz

HE Wisconsin Fox Indians, in their mal bones, Jesuit rings, musket parts. Jeffery T language, were Mesquakie, People of A. Behm's recent article "Excavations of the Red Earth. "A party of Indians of the Tox' Village at Buttes des Morts Confirm Fox clan were once on a hunt," so the French Bombardments and Burnings" Mesquakie story goes, "when they met up counts the scarce pieces. The site, already with men of another race—the French. scavenged, he tells us, is currently "endan­ The French asked who they were and the gered by residential development."- Indians replied by giving the name of their The "Fox" do not figure largely in our clan, Wakohagi [Fox]. The French then local history. They come into central Wis­ named them les Renards, which the En­ consin in the seventeeth century, probably glish later turned into Foxes. This meeting from Michigan, probably fleeing the was north of the Great Lakes. The whole Iroquois/English/Huron/French war tribe was then known as Utagamiagi."' zone. Other displaced Algonquian nations Utagamiagi (Outagamie) was the Ojibwa (Sauk, Mascouten, Kickapoo, Potawatomi, name for the Mesquakie, and was some­ Miami) also resettled in central Wisconsin. times used by the French in referring to the In The Middle Ground: Indians, Empires, and Renards. Republics in the Great Lakes Region, 1650- Fox Hardware, Fox Liquor, Fox Cities, 1815 {\99l), Richard White vividly describes the Appleton Foxes, the Fox River Valley central Wisconsin at the end of the seven­ Golf Club—such are the weak linguistic teenth century as a vast refugee center, its traces ofthe Mesquakie in our everyday Fox situation volatile, nations socializing, coop­ River Valley discourse. We are Foxes, of erating, feuding, fighting, constantly ad­ central and east-central Wisconsin, sort of. justing their strategies to shifts in French Some of us live in Outagamie County. At trading policy, which was always the domi­ the Bell Site on the southern shore of Big nant reality. Louise Phelps Kellogg's The Lake Buttes des Morts, these are the physi­ French Regime in Wisconsin and the Northwest cal traces of the Mesquakie: charcoal, ani­ (1925) counts two Franco-Mesquakie wars:

' William Jones, Ethnography of the Fox Indians, ed. -Jeffrey A. Behm, "Excavations of'Fox' Village at by Margaret Welpley Fisher (Bureau of American Butte des Morts Confirms Erench Bombardinents Ethnology, Bulletin no. 12.o, W'ashington, 1939), 8. and Burnings,"in Uoyag-eMr( Summer-Fall, 1992),44.

C^opyrighl © 1997 by Ihc Smie Hisloricai Society of Wisconsin 83 All righls of reprocliiclion in any form reserved. f*' '..H'/

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A Mesquakie archaeology site on the tuest bank ofthe Wolf River being studied in 1914.

thefirst, 1701-1712; thesecond, 1727-17.38. ans. Caught up in Sauk history, in the Black In R. David Edmunds andjoseph L. Peyser's Hawk War (1832), the Mesquakie next lost The Fox Wars: The Mesquakie Challenge lo Neiu their upper Mississippi Valley dominion, France (1993), chapters 5 and 6 are entitled hard-won and held in strong alliance with "Armageddon" and "Genocide." The the Sauk, and were put on reservations in Mesquakie had several strongly fortified Kansas and Oklahoma. Eventually, with villages in the Fox River system, the princi­ great exertion and sacrifice, they reestab­ pal village on Lake Buttes des Morts a major lished a homeland in Iowa: the Tama Settle- fortress. A radical Mesquakie leadership ment, on the Iowa River. In 1857 challenged French authority in the region. Maminwaniga, a Mesquakie "chief by right The French effecti\'ely declared the of clan (bear) and tribal custom,"'^ led rem­ Mesquakie a terrorist nation and attempted nant Mesquakie back to central Iowa, to an exemplary genocide. By the time land they had purchased. Tama is, one Augustin Grignon, Kaukauna's Creole fore­ supposes, the last redoubt ofthe Mesquakie, father, established himself at the Grand Kau-kau-lin Chute in 1813, the Mesquakie were gone from the Fox River Valley. The ' William Jones, Fox Texts (Publications of the Mesquakie are no longer Wisconsin Indi­ Airierican Ethnological Society, Leyden, 1907), 1:2.

84 SCHMITZ: WISCONSIN S FOX RIVER VALLEY .-iiND LI IE MESQUAKIE this Algonquian people of the Eastern last, but still holding claim to the country, Woodlands, renowned in the eighteenth they moved southward to the Rock River century for their emergency fort construc­ country, where their friends the Sauk lived."'' tion. In the strictest sense, Mesquakie local Mesquakie history differs from the Sauk history now belongs to Iowa history. account of this place and moment in Wis­ consin history. As Black Hawk has it in 1833, doing Sauk traditional history in the Life of HERE is a Mesquakie account of their Ma-Ka-Tai-Me-She-Kia-Kiak, or Black Hawk: T Wisconsin epoch, different versions, "Their enemies still pursued them, and different perspectives, extant in early twen­ drove them to different places on the lake, tieth-century American ethnography, until they made a village near Green Bay, on present in Mesquakie-American literature. what is now called 5ac river, having derived Mesquakie histor)' has it: "They continued its name from this circumstance. Here they their flight on a westward course; and when held a council with the Foxes, and a na­ they had come to a great distance, they tional treaty of friendship and alliance was swung round toward the south. They kept concluded upon. The Foxes abandoned going till they came to the country of Green their village, and joined the Sacs."^ Bay and Wisconsin River. There they tar­ Mesquakie history acknowledges Sauk res­ ried; and, liking the country so well, they cue and refuge, but nowhere mentions decided to abide there and make the place single nationality, nowhere accepts the des­ their home. This was not altogether pleas­ ignation: the Sac and the Fox. ant for the people living round about. As a In the "Historical Tales" first presented result, the Foxes had to fight them to hold in William Jones's Fox Texts (1907), a char­ what they held. On the north were the ismatic Wapasaiya (WTiite Robe) appears. Ojibwas and Menominees; on the west were Divinely chosen, a brilliant warrior, White the Sioux. With these nations they were Robe is the great war chief of the Wisconsin ever at war."* Mesquakie, and also their tragic hero. As The Mesquakie account is curiously site- Jones has it. White Robe is what the so- specific. It puts its principal town on Lake called Fox Wars are about, his exemplary Buttes des Morts and regionalizes its do­ being, his portentous fate. White Robe, says minion simply by stressing that the Jones's Mesquakie nariative, is the cause of Mesquakie were present in force. "They the French genocide, "of their all being hadavillage. [This] one Mesquakie village, beset," this war chief "whose name must by the way, was the chiefs town. There must have been White Robe and who was con­ have been a large number staying there. tinually slaying people."^ The name White They did not, it is said, stay very close to the Robe, Jones tells us in a footnote, "refers to edge of a river. The river, it is said, where the fur or robe of the white fox, and is a they were, was called the Fox River. So they name peculiar to the Fox clan."-'War chiefs named it. The reason why they so named it, it is said, was because there were always many [foxes] walking along as they fol­ ' Truman Michelson, "A Sacred Pack Called lowed the river. Finally, indeed, they named A'penawan'a Belonging to the Thunder Gens ofthe this the Fox River, because there were many Fox Indians," in Contributions to Fox Ethnology (Bu­ reau of American Ethnology, Bulletin no. 85, [foxes] there."'Mesquakie history does not Smithsonian Institution, Washington, 1927), 104. renounce title to the Fox River Valley. "At " Jones, "Notes on the Fox Indians," 232. ' Life of Ma-Ka-Tai-Me-She-Kia-Kiak or Blackhatuk, ed. by DonaldJackson (Champagne-Urbana, 1964), 4.5-46. ^ William Jones, "Notes on the Eox Indians," in '"* Jones, Eox Texts, 9. the Journal of American Folklore (1911), 24:2.32. "fbid., 2

85 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY WINTER, 1996-1997 were traditionally chosen from this clan. Tales (1915) and Opbiua Texts (1917-1919), The French, it will be remembered, mis­ and becomes, in the twenties and thirties, took this clan for the nation. Civil chiefs, the dominant figure in the ethnography of who were of the Bear clan, figure impor­ the Mesquakie. In his work, Mesquakie in­ tantly in the French record, often com­ formants, often reluctant, protesting their plaining they can not control their young ambivalence, relate the myths that inform men, and are always distrusted, disbelieved. Mesquakie ceremonies and practices. As the French see it, war chiefs determine Michelson records Mesquakie statement as Mesquakie policy in Wisconsin. In Jones's data, photographs the contents of sacred Mesquakie narrative, the Wisconsin Mes­ packs, identifies and explains the objects, quakie are deeply anxious about White William Jones, on the other hand, positions Robe's terrorist tactics, especially his con­ his Fox Texts at once in Anglo-American temptuous treatment ofthe French. ethnography and Mesquakie-American lit­ Another account of White Robe is in erature. He does not identify his infor­ Truman Michelson's Fox Miscellany (1937). mants. His tellers do not address him as an "When the War Chiefs Worship the Wolf," ethnographer and do not narrate for eth­ a text Michelson produced with Albert nography. They speak, instead, to a Kiyana, Harry Lincoln, and Ida Poweshiek, Mesquakie public that includes Jones. "Ev­ Mesquakie writers and archivists, tells of ery single piece of text was told [tome] but White Robe's warrior companions, once, "Jones assures us, "and delivered with­ Witekoka and Nasalilyata, and offers a cer­ out thought ofthe purpose I meant to make tain rationale for their exceptional zeal in of the material."'- He dedicates the Fox combat. "They always made the Sioux wail Texts first to his Mesquakie-American fa­ when they slew them. They slaughtered and ther, Henrv' Clay Jones, "who made it pos­ killed many. Itwaswhat the people desired. sible for me to get in touch with this diffi­ These did what the people desired."'" Is cult material, for it was largely through him there indeed a Fox and a Bear Mesquakie and for his sake that much of it was im­ narrative of the Wisconsin epoch? parted to me,"'' then to Franz Boas, his Michelson does not say, though his WTiite mentor, head ofthe American .Vluseum of Robe is largely spared the criticism Jones's Natural History. Michelson's texts are sent White Robe receives in the Fox Texts. The to a single address: Social Science. Jones's story of White Robe and Nasalilyata, "young texts—differently situated, situating Jones men and doughty," friends "because they as part ofthe Mesquakie public—are sent to were so much alike," ends with this citation: different addresses and sen-e multiple pur­ "That is what the people did, so the mem­ poses. bers ofthe War Chiefs gens are in the habit Like other conflicted Anglo-Indian an­ of telling."" thropologists and folklorists ofthe period, Readingjones and Michelson, we are in notably Francis La Flesche (Omaha) and the same archive, often in the same Arthur C. Parker (Seneca), Jones was at Smithscmian series; yet there are differ­ once a collector/linguist and a ston-'teller/ ences in format and discourse, in address writer, outside and inside the literature, and concept. Michelson's texts are scien­ always somewhere at odds with the project tific, framed and composed for ethnogra­ of early twentieth-century Anglo-American phy. He edits Jones's posthumous Kickapoo anthropology, its purchases and preserva­ tion of traditional lore, its special interest in

'" Truman Michelson, "When the War Chiefs Worship the Wolf," in Fox iVIiscellany (Bureau of " Idem. American Ethnology, Bulletin no, 114, Smithsonian '-Jones, L'ox Texts, 2. Institution, Washington, 1937), 11.5. '•^ Ibid., 7. 86 .SCHMITZ: WTSCONSIN S FOX RIVER VALLEY AND THE MESQUAKIE

"primitive" Amerindian cultures that were creating in the Harvard Monthly. "The Heart presumably disappearing. Raised on the of the Brave," possibly Jones's best piece, Oklahoma reservation by his Mesquakie establishes an embattled politics for this grandmother, a chiefs daughter and im­ new literature. Jones's heroic warrior, beset portant member of the elite Eagle clan, on all sides, valiantly defending himself, is Jones had an intimate knowledge of the not killed. He dies of heart failure in the nineteenth-century trans-Mississippi midst of combat. The heart of this fabulous Mesquakie narrative, especially those sto­ fighter, it turns out, exhibited, about to be ries dealing with the "bitterest foes of our eaten, is small, "like gristle," a total surprise. nation," the Sioux, "men ofthe long nose, It is not eaten. It is respectfully put back in hooked like the beak of a hawk."" It was not the opened body. In this fiction, Jones marks just creation and trickster stories, parables a proprietary right, a lineage, a criterion of and prayers, that Jones offered in the Fox cultural responsibility. Texts, but modern Mesquakie tales as well, some ("The Killing of Blue Chief) dealing with the prairie wars, others with recent OW Jones got the material for the Fox Mesquakie history: "The Sale of the Land H Texts is therefore an important ques­ in Kansas" and "Why the Red-Earths tion for him, one that invcjlves the larger Went Away to Iowa." Mesquakie literature issue of Amerindian cultural property and was ongoing, not encased in classic forms. Anglo-American anthropological expro­ Certain stories from that general post- priation, and Jones promptly answers it in Wisconsin narrative addressedjones directly his introduction. "With all their weaknesses, as a member of an illustrious clan, one that and in spite of their utter poverty, "he writes, had distinguished itself in the heroic "the Foxes were not yet at that point where struggle with the Sioux. their lore could be purchased, at least by At Harvard in 1899-1900, before he un­ me.""' The Iowa Mesquakie were indeed dertook graduate work in anthropology, under great pressure at the turn of the Jones published an impressive sequence of century. In 1901 a smallpox epidemic dev­ short stories in the Harvard Monthly, two of astated the nation. In the first quarter ofthe which, "In the Name of His Ancestor" and twentieth century, the Mesquakie, strug­ "The Heart of the Brave," are collected in gling to survive, were often at that point, Bernd Peyer's anthology The Singing Spirit: selling cultural property for what they Early Short Stories By North American Indians needed, necessaries, pleasures. Nothing in (1989). "In the Name of His Ancestor" is an the Fox Texts is coerced, Jones insists; no Eagle clan revenge story' that recalls the utterance captured. His carefully chosen warfare with the Sioux "winters and winters word for the cultural exchanges in the Fox ago in our old Rock River countr)', far away Texts is "imparled." That is, given, in the off in the land of the North."''' It is an spirit of equality, in free discourse. Im­ Oklahoma Mesquakie stor)', his to retell parted to him as Jones had already im­ (for Jones was an Eagle), a story of Sioux parted his Mesquakie tales to the Harvard treachery and strong Mesquakie fathers. Monthly, given in good faith. The antonym The title, "In the Name of the Ancestor," of imparl is conceal. states the position of the new Mesquakie- The Mesquakie sold Michelson the in­ American literature Jones was effectively formation and artifacts that are at the cen­ ter of his ethnography, and though this transaction does not invalidate his work, it '"* The Singing Spirit: Early Short Stories by North American Indians, i'd. bv Bernd Peyer (Tucson, 1989), 53. '••' Idem. "' Jones, Eox Texts, 1.

87 WTSCONSIN M.AGAZINE OF HLSLORY WINTER, 1996-1997

differently frames it, reminds us how medi­ peace with the Renards and their allies." In ated it is. Michelson' s ethnography is largely it, he specifies Renard virtues to each hos­ a reconstruction of written Mesquakie texts, tile nation, their good intentions, their gen- the work of Alfred Kiyana, Harry Lincoln, erosit)', their charity. Ida Poweshiek, Horace Poweshiek, and the Noro, Pemoussa, Elecevas, and Kiala Sauk/Mesquakie, Sam Peters. Mesquakie are important Renard war chiefs in the writers would often write the terms of the French documentar)' record. They deliver negotiation into the text: "Verily, now (this insulting speeches, make defiant speeches, is the sacred pack) which Truman Michelson reject French terms. Okimaouassen and purchased, so that it would be well taken Ouachala, civil chiefs, are conciliatory, care of."'" In turn Michelson would report ask for patience, send their regards to the the difficulties in publishing the text, often Governor-General in Montreal. There is a waiting for the death of the donor so that reference to a White Robe, but it identifies "he might not suffer socially and politically him as a Kickapoo. None of these Renard for having disposed of his sacred pack.""^ chiefs figure in the Mesquakie narrative. Between this early twentieth-century Wapaisaya (White Robe), Mamasa, Mesquakie narrative differently lodged in Keleyomawa, Witekoka, Nasalilyata: these American ethnography and the French- are the Mesquakie heroes ofthe Wisconsin Canadian colonial documentary record of epoch. In the French record there are let­ the Renards, there is seemingly a wall of ters ordering the extirpation of the cultural and linguistic difference. The Mesquakie and celebratory reports of suc­ Mesquakie name the French "ameteguci," cessful massacres. Mesquakie histor)' ac­ which means,Jones succinctly tells us, "some­ knowledges this event: "These their foes thing wooden, "and carefully record in their from without were going about giving each traditional lore the French error in naming cither tobacco (as a pledge) to join in exter­ them. In Mesquakie history, the French minating this one nation'"-"; but it reports foolishly vaunt, suffer humiliating defeats. every combat with the French as an easy Mutilated French prisoners are sent back to victory. When Kiala, in the French record, Montreal to deliver insulting Mesquakie finally surrenders himself and his family at messages. The Mesquakie do nt^t theorize Green Bay, he is promptly sold into slavery the French. The French theorize the and shipped to the West Indies, where he Mesquakie. "A people of considerable note disappears. When WTiite Robe despairs and in all these regions," this is how Father surrenders in the Mesquakie narrative, he Claude Allouez begins the French file on is taken by Illinois Indians, the Peoria. In the Renards. He first encounters them in their village, bound to a stake. White Robe 1669-1670 on a missionary venture into defiantly transcends the ordeal of his cap­ central Wisconsin. They flatly reject his pro.s- ture, tf:irture, and death. elytizing. Thev give him a diplomatic mes­ sage to carr\' to the Iroquois. It had. Father Allouez wrote, "nothing ofthe barbarian in NEW appreciation of the Mesquakie it,"'-' Nicolas Perrot, chief colonial agent in presence in the Fox River Valley might Wisconsin in the last quarter of the seven­ A well begin at the Bell Site, thinking about teenth centurv', does the first substantive studv of the Renards in his Memoir on the Manners, Customs, and Religion ofthe Savages '' Michelson, "A Sacred Pack," 71. of North America (1721). The final speech in '« Ibid., 55. '" Early Narratives of the Northwest, ed. by Louise his book is a "Harangue which ought to Phelps Kellogg (reprint edition. New York, 1967), have been made to all ofthe Outaoua [Ot­ 151-155. tawa] Tribes, in order to bind them to the -" Michelson, "When the War Chiefs Worship the Wolf," 109.

88 SCHMFtZ: WISCONSIN S FOX RIVER VALLEY AND THE MESQUAKIE

the Mesquakie and French versions, the Anti-Christian Mesquakie agents had oper­ one embattled, the other besieging. At the ated inside Jesuit compounds, engaged Je­ junction of Sunkist Road and Leonards suit theology, reconverted Christianized Point Road on the south shore of Lake Abenaki at Father Le Sueur's mission. In Buttes des Morts, in the midst of residential this remarkable text, Father Le Sueur re­ development, one looks down a grassy, par­ ports a Jesuit attempt to enter (and sub­ tially wooded hill at the lake, at the site of vert) theAlgonquianpictographic network. the major Mesquakie town. What was done Father Joseph Aubrey, the reporting mis­ here? What was said here? A marker should sionary, dictates an "Abenaki" pictograph state the coexistence and the nonrelation countering the Mesquakie pictograph, one ofthe French and Mesquakie accounts, the that draws a good Christian moral, and has simultaneity and noncoincidence of White it sent out to central Wisconsin. In the Robe and Kiala, as it registers the signifi­ White Robe stories, which have a certain cance ofthe place. Ajust marker at the Bell Christian reference, Mesquakie history pre­ Site on Lake Buttes des Morts, with great sents its insoluble enigma: White Robe, difficulty, might reproduce a Mesquakie brilliant Mesquakie warrior, son of a depiction of the Fox River Valley, might manitou sent specially to them as a leader, ponder White Robe's war-chief strategy, as is the cause of their encirclement and de­ it gives us the names of the French com­ struction. manders who came against this fortified Renard town: Louis de la Porte de Louvigny, Constant Marchand de Lignery, Nicolas ROWING up in the Fox River Valley, in Coulon de Villiers, Jr., their dates, their G Outagamie County, in the 1950's, I defeats and victories. Itwould post Grignon's had no idea ofthe Mesquakie challenge to Creole narrative telling us how the junior New France, or its outcome. ("And so on de Villiers came here on September 20, the morrow at noon did they begin shoot­ 1733, with shot and shell to avenge the ing at each other. Only once did the French death of his father. Surely a White Robe was fire their guns, and then they were all in action when Louvigny's expedition mis­ slain.")'-''^ French regulars and irregulars, erably failed before the Mesquakie stock­ Indian allies, the Potawatomi, the ade in late June or early July, 1716. White Menominee, the Ojibwa, lugging ordnance Robe's anti-French vaunting reverberates and supplies, toiled up the lower Fox River, in the Fox Texts. portaging its several grand chutes and little In the archives, in differentgenres, these chutes, marching to bombard the Renards specific texts are before us: a 1734 postwar and burn their principal village. I had no Jesuit analysis of the Mesquakie crisis and sense of the strategic importance of this the White Robe stories in William Jones's Wisconsin watershed, ofwhat "the portage" Fox Texts. Father Jacques Le Sueur, an was at Portage: the Wisconsin River angling Abenaki specialist stationed in Quebec, southward to the Mississippi, the Fox River reexamining a 1719 Mesquakie pictograph curling northward to Lake Michigan and of the Fox River Valley, rethinking a Laurentian Canada. The Fox River was a Mesquakie calumet (pipe) dance, sifts the major route, Montreal to SL Louis to New question of whether any missionary "can Orleans. I didn't know that the Fox River permit his new Christians to perform the had its spring-fed source in southwestern Calumet Dance, as an indifferent matter."-' Wisconsin, or that an upper Fox, still fairly intact, freely flowing, emptied into Lake

-' Collections ofthe State Historical Society of Wiscon­ sin (reprint edition, Madison, 1907), 17:196. Jones, Fox Texts, 21. 89 The Grignon Home in the 1950's. A building at the quarry shows through the trees on the right.

Winnebago. I thought the lower Fox, the local history, its language blandly extor­ Fox River from Neenah-Menasha to Green tionate, marks that first legitimate occupa­ Bay—dammed, bridged, canalled, hard­ tion: "In One Thousand Seven Hundred working, badly polluted—was the Fox River. and Ninety Three, were present Wabisipine What local history I had I got at the and Le Tabac Noir, who have of their own Grignon Home, the "Mansion in the Woods" free will yielded and ceded to Monsieur built by Charles Grignon in 1837-1838. Dominique Ducharme the land from the Augustin Grignon's eldest son, Charles summit of the portage, at Cacaline to the Grignon, was the founder of the Anglo- end ofthe Meadow below it, with a depth of American Grignon line. Charles Grignon forty arpents; and upon the other side, put up his pillared porticoed mansion on facing the said portage, a tract of four the site of his father's log-and-plank trading arpents wide by thirty deep. The aforesaid post. It looked out over the Cacaline por­ vendors are content and satisfied with two tage that old blind Wabisipine and Le Tabac barrels of Rum, in testimony of which, they Noir had given up in 1793 for two barrels of have inscribed their marks; the old rum. "Wisconsin's First Deed," an icon in Wabisipine being blind, the Witnesses [S.

90 SC:HMITZ: WISCONSIN S FOX RI\T:R VALLEY AND THE .MESQUAKIE

Harrison, Lambert Macabez] have made his mark for him."-' The Menominee were not satisfied. There are additions, other claims, a disbursement of more rum, first five gallons, then a barrel, then another barrel. For three years, every summer, the Menominee complained ofthe transaction, insisted the deed be rewritten. Augustin Grignon had the trading post and the por­ tage from Ducharme. In the 1950's Charles Grignon's man­ sion was a shabby clapboarded house glumly holding its menaced ground of lawn and trees. On one side, a smoky throbbing pa­ per mill. On the other, a sizable quarry with trucks, hammers, and explosions. The big hole of the quarry was very near its side of the house. The Grignon Home is now smartly restored. Young women in antebel­ lum gowns show visitors around. The rooms exhibit furniture and fixtures, represent Charles Grignon's conception of the Jacksonian House Beautiful. The new Grignon Home restores the achievement

of Charles Grignon's social ambition, pre­ VVHi(X3),5{183:! serves Grignon glory, such as it was. In the 1950's the Grignon Home, with its forlorn William F. Wolf showing artifacts at the Grignon Home. air of social disgrace and genteel poverty, told a different story: the failure of the Anglo-American Grignon enterprise. They curator. A Grignon Home historical bro­ were, insofar as the Fox River Valley was chure delivered the core narrative in five concerned, extinct. The Menominee statements. "The white men came in num­ Grignons, on the other hand, had thrived, bers, the Indians withdrew; the river was branched, were important Menominee harnessed and the canal, with the five locks, families. was built almost in the front yard of the homestead." Then came the "advance of industry. "•^'' There was Curator Wolf s poster, crowded with pioneer information: the text SPENT some part of my boyhood at the of "Wisconsin's First Deed," old photo­ I Grignon Home. It was the only museum graphs of the home and the Ducharme- in Kaukauna. The attic was filled with In­ Grignon trading post, a drawing of the dian artifacts. 1 seem to remember seeing original platted property, and a portrait of scalp locks laid out: lengths of long black Augustin Grignon, our Creole forefather Indian hair. William F. Wolf, a kindly old and original settler. In Kaukauna, at mid- gentleman, an amateur geologist, was the century, this was local histor)', its only ex-

-' "Wisconsin's First Deed," facsimile of poster -' Anna Tinney, A Mansion Built in the Woods, compiled by William F. Wolf, Grignon Home, Grignon Home pamphlet, undated (commemora­ Kaukauna, Wisconsin, April 30, 1937. tive reprinting, 1966), 4. 91 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY WINTER, 1996-1997

'^^t

(^-:..-• WHi(X3)246.'M) Augustin Grignon. penditure this dilapidated mansion with its marked in numerous travel narratives. His sparse store of fact. Now I look at Grignon's children were trilingual, his sons official portrait and immediately see what local translators, Indian agents, Indian advisers. history relegated to small citations. Grignon In the Black Hawk War of 1832, the sits in formaljacksonian broadcloth, white- Menominee, embroiled in blood feuds with shirted, wearing a cravat. In his lap he holds the Sauk and the Mesquakie, sent a signifi­ a tomahawk, signif)'ing Menominee rank, cant force of warriors with an American an Indian identit)'. Augustin Grignon's wife, expeditionar)' force marching from Green Nancy McCrea, was half-Menoininee. In Bay. Augustin Grignon led one company of the first quarter ofthe nineteenth century, Menominee fighters. He had a Menominee the Grignons lived among the Menominee, life. He had Menominee relatives. His grand­ to whom the lower Fox River Valley then father, his father, his uncles, his brothers, belonged. Augustin Grignon's trading post all had Menominee wives and women, had was at the Kaukauna portage. He was the extensive families. principal figure on the lower Fox River; his In his "Recollections," transcribed and frontier hospitalitv, his largesse, were re­ edited by Lyman C. Draper and published

92 SCHMITZ: WISCONSIN S FOX RI\'ER \ALI.EY AND THE MESCX'AKIE

in 1857 in the Wisconsin Historical Collections Valley memoirs and travel narratives, other of the State Historical Society, Augustin contiguities. In 1832, traveling up the lower Grignon is ineluctably French-Canadian, Fox, Col. Charles Whittlesey noted that the Upper Country Creole.'"^' Yet his best story— Menominee "existed in a state of worse the death in 1733 of Sieur Nicolas Antoine than savage wretchedness." In 1834 Henry Coulon de Villiers in the Sauk village near Merrell "staid over night at Augustin Green Bay—gives us Charles de Langlade's Grignon's, a very comfortable place," and eyewitness Indian version, not the official "found the two sons [Charles and Alexan­ French report. As Langlade (French- der], very pleasant and agreeable young Ottawa) has it, De Villiers, drunk and mur­ men, having English educations."-** derous, enters the Sauk village at Green Bay In Grignon Home history, the angrily demanding the Sauk surrender their Menominee relationship is left obscure. Mesquakie refugees. Infuriated by their The official family tree, published by the refusal, De Villiers begins shooting Sauk Outagamie County Historical Society, men­ chiefs, one after the other, as each refuses tions only Nancy McCrea's mother, "A his demand. An outraged twelve-year-old Menominee Woman." Charles Grignon's boy. Black Bird, unable to endure the bru­ marriage to Mary Elizabeth Meade, a re­ tality of these executions, seizes a musket spectable young Anglo-American woman and shoots De Villiers. In The Fox Wars, from Pennsylvania, effectively reconstitu­ Edmunds and Pey.ser report the French ted the bloodline and ended the French narrative: "Some of the warriors brandished Canadian-Menominee epoch. These their weapons, and as the French pushed Grignon children, educated at Lawrence forward, three shots were fired and one of College, were Anglo-American gentry in Villier's sons fell dead at his feet."-'' the Fox River Valley .Just where Menominee The tomahawk in Grignon's portrait, history is absolutely grounding for the the Indian signifier, offsets the cravat and Grignons, where it makes the Americaniza­ waistcoat, reminds us that these problem­ tion of the Grignons possible—excision, atic French and Anglo-American Grignons silence. With its three stories and twelve are major figures in Menominee history. rooms, its cased pilasters and double archi­ Elsewhere in the literature, little things fall trave mouldings, its solid cherry stair rail, out of small notices. Mrs. Mary Ann Brevoort with Mary Elizabeth at her piano and Charles Bristol remembers a Grignon wedding in seated, listening, in his high-backed Jackso­ 1824: "The bride was dressed in white mus­ nian armchair, the "Mansion in the Woods" lin; on the table for supper were all kinds of marked its radical difference from every­ wild meat—bear, deer, muskrat, raccoon, thing Indian. A supercilious British traveler turkey, quail, pigeon, skunk and porcupine would write of the Grignon Home, wryly with the quills on. Her mother was an In­ noting its social pretension : "A very fine dian woman."-" This was Nancy McCrea's lath and plaster chateau stands near the festive Menominee table: one follows the waterside; it is built in the only odious flat traverse of Mrs. Bristol's gaze, her contigui­ spot in the whole country, abounding with ties. There are other traverses in Fox River splendid sites for houses, and belongs to the son of a half-breed trader, who has considerable influence over the Indians."-^

-^ Grignon was seventy-six years old when Draper Charles Grignon had Menominee half interviewed him in 1857; he died three years later. -" R. David Edmunds andjoseph L. Peyser, The Fox Wars: The Mesquakie Challenge to New France -* Idem. (Norman, 1993), 178. "•' Anonymous, A Merry Briton in Pioneer Wisconsin -' Thomas H. Ryan, History of Outagamie County, (Madison, 1950), 62. All efforts to identify the au­ Wisconsin (Chicago, 1911), 571. thor of this travel narrative have proved fruitless. 93 \VHi(X:!)36r)()6 The daughters of Charles A. Grignon: Alary, Lydia, Emmeline, Fannie, and Alaggie. 'Fhe little girl is Marie Freund, Lydia's daughter.

brothers and sisters, had a Winnebago half dian removal policy allowed frontier brother and sister. How did the Grignon Indianists, agents, traders, interpreter.s— Home figure in traditional Menominee his­ especially the savvy bilingual sons of half- tor)'? Was there a Menominee opinion of breed traders—to make big scores. Charles Grignon? In the Menominee regis­ Menominee moneybuilt Charles Grignon's tration that began in the Jacksonian period, mansion, enabled him to marry an Anglo- it often greatly mattered that your Creole American wife, a woman of good standing father recognized you, that your paternity and education, to cross that threshold and was recorded. You might escape Removal. shut his door on Menominee history. You might claim benefits. Charles Grignon represented the Menominee tribal interest N 1836, at Cedar Point on the Fox River, at the negotiation of the Cedar Point treat}' I the Menominee lost the Fox River Val­ of 1836, interpreting, advising, and taking ley, lost their central Wisconsin territory. as his fee $10,000 from the hard-pressed The official state historical marker at Cedar Menominee. All outstanding Menominee Point, just outside Little Chute, memorial­ debts to traders and agents were promptly izes the treaty: deducted from the 8700,000 paid the Menominee, and here too the Grignon The Treaty of the Cedars was con­ family took in sums. Andrew Jackson's In­ cluded on the Fox River near here

94 SCHMITZ: WISCONSIN S FOX RIVER VALLEY AND TIIE MESQU.AKIE

September 3, 1836. Under the treaty 1993 Native American Studies Conference the Menominee Indian nation ceded at Lake Superior State College, Chief to the United States about 4,000,000 Oshkosh speaks differently of his position acres of land for $700,000 (about 17 on the Menominee land cessions: "My cents per acre). The area now con­ friends we cannot do otherwise, we are tains the cities of Marquette, Oconto, forced into it."""' At Cedar Point, the Appleton, Neenah, Menasha, Grignons closely attending (Charles and Oshkosh, Wausau, Wisconsin Rapids, Alexander, sons of Augustin; Robert, their Stevens Point and many others. The elder cousin, son of Pierre, also of French- six-day meeting ended in a spirit of Canadian/Menominee ancestry). Chief mutual respect and fairness. Gover­ Oshkosh gave this consent: "Our Great Fa­ nor Dodge said, "I view it as a matter ther has made up his mind to get a piece of of first importance to do the Indians our land, I have consulted my nation and ample justice in all our treaty stipula­ we have made up our minds to let you have tions," and Menominee Chief Oshkosh later affirmed, "We always the land we have marked upon the map.""" thought much of Governor Dodge as English translations of Menominee an honest man," The treaty was pro­ speech—typically the work of Grignons, claimed February 15, 1837, and the Charles or Robert—often curiously report Indians began moving to their new the play of a grave Menominee irony. Here homes west of the Wolf River. the two deliberate convictions, one com­ pelling, the other submitting, are contraposed, as if to mock the legality of For all its information and reassurance, this agreement, to state the injustice. A its pioneer facts and figures, this historical similar irony in and about Oshkosh's state­ marker is anxious about the different story ment undermines the text of the Cedar Menominee histor)' might relate. It goes Point marker, puts it all in brackets, puts it into too much detail, raises the question of to us, our local history, questions the hon­ its own veracity, insists that Menominee esty of Henry Dodge, our first governor, history affirms this version. But what does asks us to think about it. Menominee histor)' say? We don't know. The Menominee do not post a marker at this site. Still, a Menominee knowledge, a Menominee version, exists, and the official E are dead; we are being killed; the only marker is nervous about it, knows that it is W means we have for our preservation are already archival, as testimony, as evidence. taken from us. As the Jesuits have it, these are So the marker is already responding to dangerous lines from a Mesquakie song in charges. What was the question asked of a Mesquakie dance. Chief Oshkosh, later, long after the Treaty Why do the Wisconsin Mesquakie make of the Cedars? Who was the questioner? such aggressive decisions in the first half of What was the situation that produced his the eighteenth century, challenge French practiced equivocal an.swer? "We always authority, become a terrorist nation, alien­ thought much of Governor Dodge as an ate important Indian allies, stand alone honest man." outside the general French-Algonquian al- A Menominee version ofthe 1836 Treaty ofthe Cedars exists in Patricia Ourada's The Menominee Indians: A History (1979), which "' David M. Beck," T recommend that you do not fairly reports the chicanery and extortion drop my bones': The Menominee Voice in the Treaty of the American commissioners. In David Process" (unpublished paper delivered at the 1993 Native American Studies Conference, Lake Superior R. M. Beck's "The Menominee Voice in the State College, Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan), 5. Treaty Process," a paper delivered at the '" Edmunds and Peyser, The Fox Wars, 53.

95 TREATY OF THE CEDARS The Tr««ty *a tte Cedm* »•• wnelncied ««the Pen Rlvw new- here S^teaher S. »38. tMer thetr««ty the MeaoMh^e Imilan Mtkm ceded to Hie United SMet about 4.000.000 •crcf irf tend f«r *TO0.000 tebont 17 cents per •crd. The area now contain* the cttlea of pfoHiietle. OcoRlo* A|)|4ei<^ Neenah* Plehaiita. (MilUMh. WMMS. WttconMn Rapids. SteVent feMt and nany oOim. The rix-day Meeting ended in a i^rH of onitiial respect and Uimea*. Oommar Ood^ Mid 1 view It as a Blatter of fh^ io^ortance to do the ladtant anpte Juatlcx In aO oar treaty •tlpHlatkwM.- and Muionbtee Chief Othkosh toter afftmwd. "We ahrays thought nach of Co*ernor Dodge «• an honest man." The «fe«y was prodalned February 15, 1857. and

'<»•* of the W»lf Rhwr.

mi \VHi(x:i).')08:i2

Treaty ofthe Cedars historical marker, August, 1965.

96 SCHMITZ: WISCONSIN S FOX RIVER VALLEY AND THE MESQUAKIE liance? Edmunds and Peyser's Fox Wars be­ involved cultural studies and psychological gins with the Peace Conference of 1701 in analysis. Montreal, which sought to establish a French The Franco-Mesquakie war waged in protectorate in the Great Lakes region. Father Le Sueur's memoir of 17.84 is ideo­ The Mesquakie participate, join the gen­ logical. In 1719 a Mesquakie pictograph eral agreement, but make an ominous ex­ and a Mesquakie pipe dance were sent to ception: they will remain at war with the the Christian Abenaki living at St. Francois Sioux. Mesquakie self-interest necessarily de Sales, the Jesuit mission near Three conflicts with French strategic intentions in Rivers, Quebec. In remarking the text of the Upper Country. French imperial policy the dance, Le Sueur gives us a single line had already privileged certain adjacent In­ from it, personally overheard by the report­ dian powers—the Illini confederacy in the ing missionary. Father Aubrey—one single south, the Ojibwa-Ottawa-Potawatomi con­ charged Mesquakie statement: "In all the federacy in the north—and now wanted attempts that have since been made to es­ profitable relations with the western Sioux. tablish the Dance in this Mission, the fol­ To get to the Sioux, and the Mississippi lowing words have been heard a hundred River Valley, the French needed safe pas­ times to fall from the lips ofthe supporters sage on the easy access of the Fox River of the Dance: 'We are dead; we are being waterway, needed a complaisant Mesquakie killed; the only means we have for our who would tolerate a French strengthening preservation are taken from us.' These words of Sioux power. Edmunds and Peyser imagi­ have been heard by the missionary, uttered natively reconstruct campfire discussion by an Elder in the middle of the Village after the 1701 conference, "perceptive Fox while the people were coming out after men and women" analyzing the situation. mass."'''^ "No longer were their lives governed by the What are "the only means"? The traditional wisdom ofthe village chiefs and Mesquakie announce an Indian emergency, the council of elders. More and more, they declare an Indian crisis. The Mesquakie are seemed to be subject to a chaos of warfare, seen to have assumed a certain status as the which was encouraged, if not precipitated, ideologues of an apocalyptic tribalism, of by young men seeking the admiration of an Indian Truth, an Indian Way: the only their peers. Eager for recognition, these means. The Abenaki Elder delivers a public warriors disregarded the traditional clan- reproach to the Christianized Abenaki com­ dominated political system and often ig­ ing from Mass, nored the advice of older kinsmen. For Abenaki informants explain the picto­ younger men seeking honors on the war­ graph to Father Aubrey. "My Brother," says path, these were heady times, but for their the pictograph, "thou seest that my country older, more-conservative kinsmen the sea­ is of vast extent; that it is very fertile in sons were fraught with danger.'"'•^ What producing grain of all kinds; that my woods were the options for Mesquakie leadership and my Rivers supply me abundantly with in the first decade of the eighteenth cen­ all sorts of wild animals and with fish. Con­ tury? The Mesquakie were already hemmed sequently see how well off I am etc. I learn in, too far from the supportive Iroquois, with regret that thou art reduced to a small too far from English equipment and sup­ area of barren and sterile Land wherein all ply. One can also imagine a deeper, more things necessary for thy subsistence are complex Mesquakie discussion, one that wanting; that this is the cause of thy lean­ ness and ofthe death of thy children whom

'- Ellen Kort, The Fox Heritage (Woodland Hills, California, 1984), 36. ' Edmunds and Peyser, The Eox Wars, 53.

97 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY WINTER, 1996-1997 thou canst not rear. ""'^ The depiction of this least outwardly, to have the God of the desirable place, this Indian paradise, is of Renards's Religion. Consequently the Mis­ the Fox River Valley in north-central Wis­ sionary [Fr. Aubrey] was not surprized consin. when—on the Return ofthe Abenakis from "But the compassion I feel for thee," the Montreal and on his declaring to the Leader pictograph continues, "is greatly increased of the present Conspiracy that the Chris­ at the sight ofthat great Dragon with gaping tian Religion and this Idolatrous Dance jaws, ready to devour thee and whose fury could not exist together and that a choice thou canst escape only by prompt flight. As must be made between them—he heard I take an interest in everything that con­ the savage reply coldly and firmly: 'Since cerns thee, and as I cannot suffer my fellow- these two things are incompatible, the Calu­ man (whose Flesh is dark like my own) to met Dance must therefore be retained in perish miserably for want of succor, I offer preference.'"'"' thee my Land; thou wilt find it vast enough Thus the Mesquakie had won the hearts to settle in; fertile enough to abundantly and minds of the Christian Abenaki at the supply all thy needs and finally, sufficiently St. Francois mission. That, too, was reported: remote to enable thee to live in safety and "About two years after these messages two far beyond the reach of thine enemies." As thirds of the Abenakis nation were on the the Abenaki informants have it, the Great verge of departure to take refuge in the Dragon "represented the English alone"; country of the Renards, and this was at but Father Aubrey suspects "they were the beginning of the time when war was lacking in sincerity in giving him to under­ about to break out between the Abenakis stand that." He wants the local Abenaki and the English."'' It was a general question pictographer to return this Abenaki mes­ put to Jesuit deliberation, whether Chris­ sage to the Mesquakie: "I have the happi­ tian Indians could participate in Indian ness of living here with the Frenchman who ceremonial dancing. Father Le Sueur's has taught me to know the Author of my memoir spoke to that issue. WTiatever purely Being, and what I should fear and hope for religious or social meaning such dance ritu- after this short and miserable life."'^' The ally expressed, it was always, he argued, pictograph is sent; but how received. Father necessarily a resistance, therefore danger­ Aubrey cannot say. ous, because unanswerable. The Jesuits could send by Indian mail their own picto­ graph to the Mesquakie, declaring the HE dance was harder to read than the Abenaki "happiness of living here with the T pictograph. It was a complex total per­ Frenchman,"•'*' but they had no dance to formance: music, song, movement, high outdo the Mesquakie calumet dance, could drama situated in ceremony. It was the not get into this mode of Indian expression generic pipe dance, as the Jesuits read it, to work against its text, its meaning: "We are dead; we are being killed; the only means the dance all the "idolatrous Nations" did; we have for our preservation are taken from and yet there was a specific Mesquakie turn us," Indians who protest the innocence of to this particular version. "The Calumet the dance. Father Le Sueur decides, are not Dance is a Religious Ceremony amongst to be trusted. In Michelson's transcription the Renards; the Abenakis wish to retain ofthe 1926 Mesquakie narrative, "The Cer- this Dance as a flag, a standard, a symbol. The Abenakis therefore desire to appear, at

'•"^ Ibid, 197. "'"' Wisconsin Historical Collections, 17:199. ''Ibid, 194. '''Ibid., 192-193. •»/fo-rf., 193.

98 SCHMITZ: WISCONSIN S FOX RIVER VALLEY AND THE MESQUAKIE emonial Runners of the Fox Indians," the offspiritual-psychological relations with the informant, meditating on the gift and pur­ French, to disengage. When the last cer­ pose of ceremonial running, laments the emonial runner "began to be sick and when present condition of Mesquakie literature he was about to die, then it seems he strongly and history, (Ceremonial runners are mes­ urged the people not to give up anything sengers, mystagogues, dispatched on mis­ they did and to firmly keep this religion.'"*^ sions, carrying Mesquakie news.) As a narrative given over to Michelson and Michelson's text is primarily the work of to Anglo-American ethnography, "Ceremo­ Mesquakie writers: Harry Lincoln, writing nial Runners" violates that decree, gives us from memory, doing a complex discourse permission to read, but argues that the from a "reliable informant whose name is present situation is such that textualized withheld, as it would diminish his social Mesquakie history continues the narrative prestige owing to the very conservative char­ office of ceremonial running. It preserves acter of Fox Indians," and George Young "these ancient stories." It amends the de­ Bear, doing the paraphrase, the final cree, allows translation and dissemination, Mesquakie version. Michelson finishes the because—and this is a turn Jones takes in text, translates it, presents it as an ethnogra­ the Fox Texts—it speaks primarily to itself, phy. The informant perfectly understands creating a Mesquakie text for Mesquakie his dilemma. This narrative cannot be told readers. ("it is against their religion to tell of it"); it Jones posts that protocol in his introduc­ must be told ("this story is being lost").'''' tion to the Fox Texts, explaining the condi­ The last time a ceremonial runner was sent tions of textual production, describing the on a mission, we learn, the runner traveled status of the text: "What was imparted tome from Green Bay "to the edge of the Mis­ was done in friendship and by way of a gift, souri." On his deathbed, this last runner not all at once, but at leisure and bit by speaks to the nation. His final message: bit."*' Jones's transcription of these break off cultural relations with the white Mesquakie texts is from memory, written man. Euro-Americans do "not think any­ first in Mesquakie. Where the non- thing of your rules," he tells the Mesquakie, Mesquakie Michelson everywhere posts ca­ "and you do not also give him permis­ veats in his ethnography, Jones presses his Mesquakie cachets, marks his special knowl­ sion. It is the final momentous message ofthe edge: "Every single piece of textwas toldbut last ceremonial runner, and here it is, for us once, and delivered without thought ofthe to ponder, in a Smithsonian collection. In purpose I meant to make ofthe material."** White's The Middle Ground, Algonquian The Mesquakie trust Jones, trust his pur­ people and French people communicate pose. In another text, certain Mesquakie using "rules that gradually shifted to meet say to him: "We let you inside the lodge the exigencies of particular situations," because you are one of us,—not one of our working out "common conventions."*' clan, but one of our people."*^ In this com­ There is a discursive pact that legitimizes plex negotiation, this new discursive pact, contact and permits all kinds of exchange. which the literary format of the Fox Texts In 1719 the Mesquakie were urging the emblematically represents, Mesquakie and Abenaki to withdraw from the pact, to break English texts are separate, equivalent, bilat­ eral.

'^ Michelson, "A Sacred Pack," 5. *" Ibid, 13. *- Michelson, "A Sacred Pack," 13. *' Richard WTiite, The Middle Ground: Indians, ''•'Jones, Fox Texts, 1-2. Empires, and Republics in the Great Lakes Region, 1650- '''' Idem. 1815 (Cambridge, England, 1991), 52. '' Jones, "Notes on the Fox Indians," 220. 99 WISCONSIN MAG.AZINE OF HISTOR'l WINTER, 1996-1997

HE two Wliite Robe stories in Jones's to collect traditional Mesquakie stories is a T Fox Texts are effectively the major minor Anglo-Indianist classic of the Mesquakie narrative of their Wisconsin Indianizingl970's.JohnG. Neihardt's/^/ac/; habitation. Each is of a piece, of a mood, Elk Speaks (1932), immensely popular in the explaining the disaster ofthe French geno­ 1970's, inspired McTaggart's project. cide. "When The Red-Earths Were Be­ Neihardt famously shared a mountaintop sieged" and "WTiite Robe" differently tell with Black Elk, witnessed Black Elk sum­ the same story: the defiance of WTiite Robe, mon Indian spirit powers, saw the weather his despair, his capture, torture, and death. change. Neihardt transmitted Black Elk's In his footnotes, Jones is the first academic visions. reader/analyst of traditional Mesquakie No Mesquakie visionary awaits McTag­ history. "This narrative," he tells us, "is told gart in Tama, Iowa. The Mesquakie politely toaccountfor the defeat ofthe Foxes by the elude him, finesse his inquiries, leave him allied peoples who came against them on finally alone in the library with the ethnog­ account of the reckless conduct of one of raphy of Jones and Michelson as his only their leading men, WTiite-Robe by name.""' reliable resort. He sees Christian elements Recent ethnohistorical studies of the in White Robe's suicidal/sacrificial death Mesquakie largely follow Jones's under­ and wants elucidation from the Iowa standing of the narrative. In both White's Mesquakie. This is not forthcoming. A Middle Ground and Edmunds and Peyser's Mesquakie friend tells McTaggart his fa­ Fox Wars, the White Robe stories dramatize ther can recite the WTiite Robe stories "al­ the political division within the tribe in the most word for word"; but when McTaggart first half of the eighteenth centurv'. They asks his Mesquakie informants—Henry Stur­ are about a crisis in Mesquakie leadership. geon, Albert Cloud, and C^harlie Laveur— "The virtues of a war leader were not the "if they had heard of White Robe, they virtues of a chief," White observes, reading shook their heads." McTaggart decides fi­ the White Robe stories as anti-White Robe nally that White Robe (like Neihardt's Black stories. "Without true chiefs, the war leader's Elk) "was a visionar)' who knew his destiny courage and cruelt)' in destroying enemies and that of his people." White Robe exem­ would also destroy his own people. Fox plifies Mesquakie resolve, signifies legend and memory, and indeed the actual Mesquakie redemption. "WTiite Robe's body histoiw of the period, reveal the repeated is gone, but he and...all other Red Earth failure to find chiefs who could check the People live."*'* WTiite Robes, who could cover the dead The White Robe stories, it might be said, and reconcile the living."*' Traditit:)nal contain both critical and celebratory ver­ Mesquakie history, as White has it, repudi­ sions. As the stories work through the great ates the radical strategy of total resistance. moment of Mesquakie resistance and the There is a different reading in Fred catastrophe of encirclement and flight, dif­ McTaggart's personal narrative. Wolf That 1 ferent orders of narrative, different causal Am: In Search ofthe Red Earth People (1976). logics, historical and mythical, coincide, The White Robe stories fascinated intersect. Both stories move finally from McTaggart, who came to them "again and the exigencies of history, which baffle and again, tning to discover if WTiite Robe was entrap White Robe, to the supernatural, god or devil, hero or villain."*** McTaggart's where, in death. White Robe regains his rueful account of his failure, as a folklorist, power and freedom. If the Christ story figures in the "' Jones, Fox Texts, 8. -•'White, The Middle Ground, 170. ^^ Fred McTaggart, WolfTlmt I Am: In Search ofthe Red Earth People {Boston, 1976), 168-169. « Ibid., 172.

100 WHi (X3) 441.'52 White Breast and family, Mesquakiesin Tama, Iowa, undated.

Mesquakie narration of White Robe's life, it Mesquakie stations, its Mesquakie state­ figures as an ingenious appropriation: ments, works out the same ironies of histori­ touches, references, features. Sometime cal event and divine providence, the hu­ early in the eighteenth century, the miliation and death of a cultural savior. Yet Mesquakie appropriated the French how different it is, this Mesquakie Passion: syllabary and constructed their own White Robe's proud insolent bearing, the Mesquakie writing. We have it from Father sublime trickery of his Eucharist, the taking Le Sueur that the Mesquakie, like "all the and the eating of his body. Savages," sift "this same Gospel through the Sieve ofthe Councils."''" In .such cultural sifting and reserving, the Mesquakie did N Mesquakie history, the Mesquakie never not apparently see any surrender of the I lose a battle with the French: "They say fundamentalist decision, reported in that about this time were they then visited Michelson's ethnography, "not to give up by soldiers of the French. They slew them anything they did and to firmly keep this all."'^ So it goes in the first story. In the religion."''' White Robe's death at the stake, second story: "Oh, how the Red-Earths like Christ's death on the cross, through its

'' Michelson, "A Sacred Pack," 5. "•'" Wisconsin Historical Collections, 17:197. '^' Jones, Fox Texts, 9, 101 WISCONSIN MAG.AZINE OF HLSTORY WINTER, 1996-1997 rushed to the attack against them, they slew out and advanced to the attack, fewer they them all without a single one of themselves kept getting every time that they returned. being wounded."'' Thereafter the French And at last all the youths were slain."-''' It never again engage the Mesquakie in battle. cites individuals: Uncle He-who-make.s-the- Instead, they support the tribal enemies of Earth-rise-at-his-Call, a conjuring drummer, the Mesquakie, and these are the peoples a sharpshooter. The teller identifies him­ that encompass and nearly annihilate the self as the descendant of the little girl hid­ Mesquakie. It was indeed just this arrogant den in the log. Readers ofthe French record Mesquakie sense of superiority that so infu­ will recognize this dead-of-night, this snow­ riated the French, made Governor-General fall, these foes put to sleep by a magical after Governor-General in Montreal expos­ singer/drummer, the desperate flight. The tulate against "These Savages, who are re­ recorded sieges at Detroit (1712) and at stricted by no rule of subordination, who Starved Rock in Illinois (1730) contain just are restrained by no government, and who such elements and factors. see no shame in unfaithfulness and treach­ In "When the Red-Earths Were Be­ ery."-^* sieged," it is possible to see a certain benefit Both WTiite Robe stories move from de­ in White Robe's action, his "continually fiance (anti-French vaunts) to despair, from slaying people," especially the "people that easy victories to sanguinary defeats, pre­ were passing through the land.""" White senting each event in the disaster sequence Robe is a charmed, fearless warrior, spirit- as a victor)'of survival. A child, "the mother protected, spirit-assisted, the kind of exem­ of my grandfather," is hidden in a log; a plary warrior whose charismatic presence is wounded uncle, He-who-makes-the-Earth- a Mesquakie town's principal security. Yet, rise-at-his-Call, returns to save his brutal­ in the second stor)', even WTiite Robe sees ized niece who is being led off to captivity; how doomed this aggressive policy is. Just a singer/drummer puts the besieging forces after a successful ambush of the French, a to sleep; a providential snow and fog covers victory in which the Mesquakie suffer no a retreat. There are heroes everywhere. casualties, White Robe admits: "Oh, of a There is a legendar)'Mesquakie marksman: truth, I must have greatly erred." French "Every time that he shot, he killed some soldiers are defeated; French power is not. one. WTienever one ofthe enemy whooped "Never again did the French come; but byway of giving command, him he shot. In rather among other people did they go, the centre of his forehead did the arrow inciting them and furnishing them with go."^^ In Mesquakie history. White Robe is fire-arms."-''*' Command is given to WTiite honorably captured and triumphantly dies Robe; he is the leader-designate, he "sits on at a Peoria stake, cursing the Peoria. high." But what is the right policy? WTiat The first tale, "WTien the Red-Earths should he do? Were Besieged," shows us the Mesquakie The second tale, "WTiite Robe,"presents people responding to the crisis. "Where­ White Robe as an Indian subject, doubly upon the old men, 'Do not go forth,' they natured, mortally conflicted, forced to op­ said to the youths. Then the old men con­ erate at an intersection of different reali­ tinually went out to fight, and fewer grew ties. He has all the supernatural powers their numbers every time they came back given in the old pre-contact covenant, but home. In the end all the old men were slain. he has to perform in the new period of Thereupon the youths continually went time, the French-Canadian epoch. There

''' Ibid., 23. ''^ Ibid., 13. '"* Wisconsin Historical Collections, 17:121. '••'' Ibid,9. '''Jones, Fox Texts, 23. '"^ Ibid., 23.

102 scHvirrz: WTSCONSIN S FOX RI\T:R VALLEY AND THE MESQUAKIE arises a conflict in Mesquakie thought about ings. Can such fearless bearing, such splen­ what he should have done. At first WTiite did arrogance, prevail against formidable Robe will not even entertain the idea of French and Indian pressure in the Great French superiority. He meets French threats Lakes region? How responsible is WTiite with cool contempt, refuses a civil chief­ Robe for the catastrophe of encirclement taincy, pursues a very aggressive course of and massacre that befalls the Mesquakie? action. This story ponders WTiite Robe's An angry Mesquakie voice speaks in the sociopathic psyche, his aggressive weird- story, upbraiding the disheartened WTiite ness as a child: "Well, it was common for Robe: "You forget that you are the cause of him to make the boys cry while he was yet a all this. You forget that you brought on this small boy." He doesn't blacken his face and war."'''^ fast. "He was a ver)' wicked [child]." Re­ WTiite Robe does despair. Fate gives him turned to the manitou lodge, reeducated, up in a Peoria warrior's dream. He refuses reborn, he is seemingly changed, non-ag­ to fight, breaks his bows, suffers that re­ gressive. "Then he grew up without ever buke; but as he does this, as he is captured, joining the company of a party off to war.'"'^ the story, as it were, refocuses, casts off his WTtat happens next—White Robe's curious human despair and defeat, and finds him retransformation—complicates the narra­ again in the assurance ofthe supernatural. tive, admits the historical, raises the ques­ Captured, led to the torture stake, mocked, tion of causation. WTiite Robe is now a manitou. Elements ofthe Christ story glimmer in this Mesquakie account of White Robe's iEN finally White Robe does join a torture. Mid-torture, White Robe gives up Wwar party, he promptly kills his first his warrior-comrade, captured with him, enemy. It is a memorable raid. "On their bound to another stake, identif)ang him as return they had a great time dancing." But the slayer of the important Peoria chief the very night White Robe is given his war­ these Peoria captors are avenging. As they rior name, Wapasaiy, he is "bitterly rebuked strike this Mesquakie warrior with their by his father, by the great manitou, by hatchets, he is transformed on the spot into the one yonder who dwells afar on high."''" a Peoria youth who will one day become a This warrior business was not to have been Peoria chief. In the torture of WTiite Robe, WTiite Robe's course of action, yet he takes there are episodes, the stations of a it, and seemingly carries his spiritual pow­ Mesquakie crucifixion. There is an expia­ ers with him into this career. Now he goes tion, a compensation, a splendid show of on every war party, "and he made a killing defiant self-mastery under the supreme or­ every time that they went to an attack against deal of extreme physical agony, and there is the enemy." A cadre of eight warriors at­ a revenge. tend him. He is the "main object of all the "Are you hungry?" WTiite Robe is asked talk" in the nation."' The Mesquakie anx­ by the taunting Peoria. They cut flesh from iously admire him, look to contain the his thigh, roast it, and give it to him to eat. potent value of his charmed valor, but can­ "Thereupon [his flesh] was cut from him, not persuade him to take on civil chief­ first from the hip, and he ate it all; then off taincy. the calves of his legs, that too did he eat up; Both stories remark these tribal misgiv- then of the biceps; then the flesh of the elbows to the wrist; then ofthe belly; then of the loins; then ofthe cheeks; then the ears;

=' Ibid, 19. ™ Ibid, 20. '•' Idem. Ibid., 25.

103 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE CDF HISTORY WINTER, 1996-1997 then the nose; then his entrails were taken but elsewhere, in Kansas, in Oklahoma and out; so was also his liver which was roasted Iowa. for him; he simply went on eating when his As for William Jones—he dies in the entrails were taken out; it was his own flesh; Philippines, March 28, 1909, of an Ilongot then he ate up his heart; and he ate all his spear thrust, just as he is boarding a bam­ tongue, and he ate up the flesh about his boo raft to depart Ilongot territory, all his mouth. Only the bones were left bound to ethnographical data packed and crated. the tree."''-' How he got there, and why, lies outside the With such divine trickery, WTiite Robe scan of our local history, belongs to larger takes the captivit)' and torture a-vv'ay from histories, those of early twentieth-century the Peoria, making his death his triumph. American imperialism and early twentieth- As he cannibalizes himself, eats up his body, century American anthropology; yet Henry his very heart and tongue, he keeps his Milner Hideout's account of Jones's death mana intact. He is not incorporated by the on the Cagayan River in Luzon recalls ear­ Peoria; he is not changed into a Peoria. lier death scenes (Mesquakie and French) That which is Mesquakie remains on the Fox River in Wisconsin. That Fox Mesquakie. WTien one ofthe Peoria tortur­ River and this Cagayan River are, after all, ers makes the mistake of insulting WTiite the same river. Robe's bones, he inadvertently reopens the revenge sequence. W'hite Robe's bones in­ In deep twilight the boat reached stantly speak: "I shall burn, and with me you Dumubatu. Romano, following or­ and your towns one after another.""* This ders, went up among the hovels and apotheosis at the torture stake is the final called the people, who came down to act in the history of the W'isconsin the shore and set a guard round­ Mesquakie. about; for the doctor's only fear had been that those Ilongots up-river might descend and take his head. About an hour later, Romano put T A THAT are the traces left by the Wiscon- some question to his master, who lay V V sin Mesquakie in the Fox River Val­ still in the boat. He received no an­ ley? Their Anglicized French name, their swer. Jones had quietly closed his eyes Ojibwa name, the village remnants Jeffrey forever, while the great stream ran Behm and others are collecting and sorting silent underneath him, and tropic at the Bell Site on Big Lake Buttes des stars burned overhead.''" Morts—these, and a certain bad memory of their "haughty, imperious conduct" in the How might we rethink our local history, memoirs of the Wisconsin Creoles. "The what it comprises, when it starts and where? surviving Foxes," recalls Augustin Grignon, Jean Nicolet arrives in 1634 at Green Bay: "located themselves on the northern bank this I learned in elementary school. A print of the Wisconsin, twenty-one miles above of Edwin W''illard Deming's classic painting its mouth, and some little distance below of this dramatic arrival hung on the class­ the creek next below the mouth of the room wall at St. Mary's. It was also the Kickapoo river; when I first passed there, in interesting frontispiece of my history 1795, I saw some crude remains of this village.""'After this—absence, silence. The Mesquakie are out of our local history, our '" Augustin Grignon, "Seventy-two Years' Recol­ state histor)'. Their history begins again— lections of Wisconsin," in the Wisconsin Historical Collections (reprint edition, 1904), 3:208. '''' Henry Milner Rideout, William fones: Indian, "' Ibid., 29. Cowboy, American Scholar, and Anthropologist in theField "' Idem. (New York, 1912), 209. 104 SCHMITZ: WISCONSIN S FOX RTVER VALLEY .AND THE MESQUAKIE

primer, a depiction I studied in long class­ tribe. The Mesquakie are vigilant, evasive. room hours. Here was Nicolet, in his big hat They reply "by giving them the name of and brocaded coat, astounding the their clan, Wakohagi [Fox]." In this version Winnebago with the discharge of his pis­ of first contact, the French seek intelli­ tols, the Winnebago fearfully admiring gence, the Mesquakie disinform. A com­ splendid Nicolet, two of them crouched, plex communicative structure is established, ready to flee. Our local history is first French- is immediately axiomatic. Canadian, then Anglo-American. It knows It is not yet in our parlance that there its boundaries: a town, a county, a river were many Foxes here, before the Grignons, valley. It knows its subject-cases, where it is walking up and down the river, WTiite Robe in the library. "In the indexes of the publi­ among them, nor that a major Amerindian cations of the Wisconsin Historical Soci­ resistance to European power took place ety, " says a Grignon Home brochure, "there here, along our roaring rapids-driven river, are 1350 references to the Grignon fam­ on our large marshy lakes. We do not see ily.""' the irony of our misnomer. How much local Other local histories, that of the first Fox history do we need to know to be conver­ principally, count different momentous sant? How should the history of the Fox times, have their own patriotic painting, River Valley report its Winnebago, still sustain their sovereign intention, still Menominee, Sauk, and Mesquakie narra­ declare their non-participation, their non- tives? One imagines big historical markers membership, in our county historical soci­ at the new shared sites, markers with many eties. Mesquakie, Sauk, Mascouten, hard-to-turn iron pages, each page crammed Kickapoo, Menominee, Winnebago, with hard-to-read engraved text. Many lo­ Potawatomi, Oneida, Mohican, their mod­ cals would no doubt long for the modest, ern narratives intersect our local history, undemanding scale ofthe original marker, contest its versions, contest its grounding. for the simplicity of its original inscription. The Mesquakie also did their first French­ Still, bigger, heavier, ought not deter us. man. On a hunt, the Mesquakie come upon After all, local history is only one genre up "men of another race" in their forest. A from family history, with its partisan inten­ Frenchman asks: WTio are you? meaning sities of silence and suppression, its truth regime, its core narrative, its absolute loyal­ ties. This is local history's struggle. It has to ''" Tinney, A Alansion Built in the Woods, 4. be larger than family history.

105 Theodore W. Goldin: Litde Big Horn Survivor and Winner of the Medal of Honor

By Larry Sklenar

F an examination of Theodore W^ able information on at least those portions I Goldin's life were limited to his role in of the fight in which he participated or Wisconsin politics or his successful law prac­ which came under his direct observation. tice, his accomplishments would warrant Instead, he invented or borrowed so much no more than a brief footnote in local detail in telling his tales that he came to be history. The part of his story that merits any regarded as a master of mendacit)'—a char­ broader consideration actually began in acterization that is only partly accurate and 1876, when, as a mere boy, he enlisted in not altogether fair.- the Seventh U.S. Cavalry under Gen. George When I began to look into the life of Armstrong Custer.' Until his death in 1935, Goldin, it was notwith the purpose of resur­ those eighteen months of service under the recting his reputation. Rather, it was part of "Boy General" of Civil War fame consumed an investigation to determine whether he Goldin's attention in a way that can only be might indeed have carried a last message understood as part ofthe nation's continu­ from Custer to one of his subordinate com- ing fascination with the annihilation of Custer and some 250 troopers at the Battle ofthe Little Big Horn at the hands of nearly 3,000 Sioux and Cheyenne warriors. As one - W. J. Ghent, a prominent Custer researcher, regarded Goldin as a "liar and fakir," chiefly with of the survivors of that famous debacle, respect to Goldin's claim that he carried a last Goldin should have been a source of reli- message from Custer to Maj. Marcus Reno. Ghent wrote that "the genesis of Mr. Goldin's myth is not known. Whether it arose as pure delusion . . . or began as a deliberate effort at self-dramatization for ' Custer's regular army grade was lieutenant- political purposes and only gradually took on the colonel, but he had attained the brevet rank of major form of an obsession, is an attractive subject for general (two stars) during the Civil War. A brevet speculation." (Quoted in W. A. Graham, The Custer rank was largely honorary, given for exceptional Myth [Lincoln, 1986J, 277-278.) Goldin was aware of performance, but it did pertain in etiquette and in Ghent's characterization, which was shared by Gra­ questions of command. Except in official army cor­ ham and most other historians and writers since respondence, Custer was addressed as "general," 1900. See John M. Carroll, ed.. The Benteen-Goldin and since that rank is associated with him in normal Letters on Custer and His Fast Battle (New York, 1974), usage, it is used here. 37.

Copyright © 1997 by the Stale Historical Societv of Wisconsin 106 .'Ml righls of reproduciidn in anv form reserved. SKLENAR: THEODORE W. GOLDIN .AND THE LITTLE BIG HORN manders, Maj, Marcus Reno, as Goldin had claimed but which most experts had dis­ credited on grounds that will be discussed later. My inquiry led to many sources, in­ cluding the pertinent records in the Na­ tional Archives, which yielded much infor­ mation on Goldin's life.' Theodore Goldin's early life remains largely a mystery. In fact, details of his pri­ vate and professional life in Wisconsin are lacking, and might constitute a worthwhile project for someone with more ready access to records in the state and community. We do believe that Goldin was born on July 25, 1858, in the little village of Avon on the Sugar River in Rock County, although he himself said later that he had no birth WHiCXSj.iiOVW certificate and that this was common at the time. He was in fact an adopted child; his George Armstrong Custer. birth name is unknown, but it was not John Stillwell, as was at one time suspected. At account for the young Goldin's interest in the age of about four, he and his family military service in the West, moved to Brodhead, Green County, where he resided until he enhsted in the army. A On April 8, 1876, Goldin enlisted in Rock County biography of 1889 indicates Chicago and was assigned as a clerk to G that his grandfather George moved there Company, Seventh U.S. Cavalry. Although from New York in 1844. A descenden t of the he was only seventeen years old, he gave his Quaker faith, his father Reuben W. was age as twenty-one and his previous occupa­ born in New York in 1820 and married tion as brakeman, which seems unlikely. Elizabeth E. Bradfield of Ohio. After farm­ He was described as having blue eyes and ing for some years, Reuben started a har­ brown hair, and as being five feet, seven ness and saddlery business in Brodhead. and three-quarters inches tall, though later Theodore's uncle James W. is said to have notarized statements give his height as five fought in the Civil War, and he later went to feet, ten inches. Given his father's occupa­ the Black Hills of South Dakota, which may tion, Goldin was probably pretty adept at riding a horse and could doubtless shoot a gun. All in all, he was typical of boys who ran away from home, lied about their ages, and joined the army for adventure on the fron­ -' Goldin material may be found in Record Group tier. As destiny would have it, he was about 94 in the National Archives, Washington, D.C.I have to find himself in the midst of one of the not cited every specific archival document in the bloodiest and most celebrated fights ofthe footnotes. For the broad outlines of the Little Big Plains Wars. Horn campaign of 1876,1 have relied upon Edgar I. Stewart, Custer's Luck (Nonnan and Lincoln, 1989), and the more detailed rendering in John S, Gray, Custer's Last Campaign (Lincoln, 1991). For other ARELY a month had passed since important data aboiu Goldin, I am particularly in­ Goldin's enlistment before the Sev­ debted to Mr. Maurice J. Montgomery ofthe Rock B County Historical Society and Mr. Alan W. enth departed Fort Abraham Lincoln, Da­ Dunwiddie, Jr., a grand-nephew of Goldin's, both of kota Territory, on May 17, 1876, to begin a whom reside in Janesville, "Wisconsin. campaign aimed at subduing the "non-

107 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY WINTER, 1996-1997

with the infantry, expecting to find mounts awaiting them there. (The animals never materialized.) However, it is known that only Goldin and one other fresh recruit were considered fit to be mounted in G Troop, one ofthe twelve cavalry companies that constituted the regiment. The regiment established a base camp at the junction ofthe Pow'er and Yellowstone rivers, and there the wagons, the infantry, the sick and unfit, many new recruits, and Custer's beloved regimental band were left, the latter's horses being required to accom­ modate soldiers without mounts. Thus, for the march to the Little Big Horn, the Sev­ enth was diminished by some 100 bodies; but Custer supposedly declined an offer of an additional battalion from the Second U.S. Cavalry as well as a battery of three Galling guns, which he considered too un­ wieldy to take over rough terrain. Actually, the Dakota column was com­ manded not by Custer, but by Gen. Alfred Theodore W. Goldin, Christmas, 1895. Photo by Barlow Terry, a thoroughly professional infantry­ and Hatch Studio, fanesvilte, courtesy the Rock County man. The army's plan of action was laid out Historical Society. by Gen. Philip H. Sheridan, commander of the Military Division of Missouri. It called for an attack on the Indians from three treaty Indians"—that is, those Indians un­ directions: a Dakota column commanded der the spiritual leadership of Sitting Bull by Gen. Terry and including Custer's cav­ who had not come into the reservations as alry, moving to the west; a Montana column instructed in a government edict which the headed by Col. John Gibbon moving south­ nomadic tribes never received, did not un­ eastward; and a large force under Gen. derstand, or did not care to obey. Goldin George Crook coming up from the south. was one of the many recent or "fresh" re­ Although there was no way to coordinate cruits who had virtually no opportunity for the movements of these widely separated tactical training or target practice. In fact, components, itwas hoped that the pressure his G Troop was only thenjoining the whole from three columns would cause the Indi­ regiment at Ft. Lincoln, having come up ans either to risk a military defeat or submit from Louisiana, where it was engaged in peacefully to the government's will. From Reconstruction peacekeeping and miscel­ the best intelligence available to Gen. Terr)' laneous duties. As the Seventh gathered at and his field commanders, it was thought Lincoln, the first time the entire regiment that the Indian encampments contained had been stationed together since about perhaps as many as 800 warriors—a formi­ the time of its formation in 1867, Goldin dable force but not sufficient to deflect the was assigned clerical duties. He may or may power of any single arm of the triad. (Re­ not have had a horse of his own as the ports that Gen. Crook's column had been Seventh departed the fort; approximately stalemated, if not defeated, by the Indians 100 troopers marched to the Powder River some days earlier, and that many young and

108 SKLEN.AR: THEODORE W. GOLDIN AND THE LITTLE BK; HORN able "summer roamers" had left the reser­ ion of three companies under Maj. Marcus vations to join Sitting Bull for the storied Reno and a second battalion under Capt. Sun Dance ceremonies, did not reach Terry Frederick Benteen, each consisting of about until several weeks after the disaster on the 120 men; a company to guard the pack Little Big Horn.) The available information train, the total force amounting to some suggested that the Indians could be found 150 soldiers; and five troops formed into somewhere between the Rosebud and Big two battalions under his direct command, Horn Rivers, a guess which proved surpris­ totaling just over 200 men. ingly accurate. After crossing the divide between the At a conference of commanders aboard Rosebud and Little Big Horn rivers, Custer the steamboat Far West on June 21, it was ordered Benteen to take an oblique left, decided that Terry would accompany Gib­ toward the southwest, apparently in order bon to the west, then up the Big Horn, while to herd any satellite Indian camps in the Custer would lead the Seventh up the Rose­ direction of the main thrust. At the same bud as the primary strike force. Such a plan time, Custer instructed Reno to move down doubtless pleased Custer, who preferred the left bank of a streambed (afterwards operating in a lead position and according known as Reno Creek) while Custer and his to his own dictates, Terry fully understood command took a parallel route on the right and valued this aspect of his young (east) side ofthe creek. The first objective subordinate's personahty. WTiile Gibbon ofthe now separated columns was the site of playfully cautioned Custer about being too several lodges, commonly called the Lone greedy, Terry thought that Custer seemed Tepee, and it was here that occurred a happy as the much-esteemed Seventh Cav­ sequence of events that constitutes what alry set forth on June 22 to the accompani­ might be called the core of the Custer ment of massed trumpets. controversy. According to most interpreta­ tions, when his Arikara scouts refused to move forward ahead ofthe soldiers, Custer )R the purposes of this broad recount­ ordered Reno forward to follow the dust Fing ofthe expedition, the period June cloud observed on the west side ofthe Little 22-25 can be considered uneventful except Big Horn, which he took to mean that the for the increasingly clear signs that the Indians were fleeing. He instructed Reno to Seventh was on the right trail and that the attack the south end ofthe Indian encamp­ quarry was not far ahead. In the early morn­ ment, telling him that he would be sup­ ing hours ofthe 25th, the scouts and Custer ported by the whole regiment. detected the first hard evidence of an In­ As Reno crossed the Little Big Horn and dian encampment in place, within easy reach began his attack on the Indian camp, Custer of their observation point (the Crow's Nest). and his two battalions turned to the right, Although Custer had hoped to gather more thereby keeping them concealed behind information, then attack the village on the bluffs on the east side of the Little Big following day, his hand was forced by two Horn, apparently with the intention of sup­ separate incidentswhich suggested that the porting Reno with a flank attack on the column had been discovered by the Indi­ village. From a vantage point along the ans, and that he had lost the element of edges of these bluffs, Custer probably saw surprise. He knew from experience how Reno advance to within some 800 yards of fast-moving and elusive the Sioux and Chey­ the objective and there dismount his men enne could be. Therefore, he prepared to to fight on foot. After going perhaps an­ move forward immediately. other quarter-mile, Capt. Thomas Custer To this end, Custer divided the regiment dispatched a courier (Sgt. Daniel Kanipe) into four distinct components: one battal­ with a message from the general ordering

109 "Last ..••••. I i.ti„ Stand::--- •••. Little ••«jt ••. Bighorn "^ •••Battlefield i

Reno halted and repulsed by Sioux and Cheyenne

the pack train forward, adding that if Capt. notifying the commander that the hostiles, Benteen was encountered, to advise him rather than running away as expected, were that he should hurry his battahon along. coming out to meet him in some force. Several miles farther on the trail, Custer (Since both of these messengers subse­ sent a specific order for Benteen to "come quently died with Custer, we are completely quick" and bring the packs. This now- dependentupon Reno's testimony as to the famous message was written out by his adju­ contents of the messages.) The mounted tant, Lt. William W'. Cooke, and carried by warriors were soon able to turn the left his orderly. Trumpeter John Martin flank of Reno's skirmish line, forcing the (Giovanni Martini), a young Italian with troopers back into a stand of timber along limited understanding of the English lan­ the river, where Custer's favorite Arikara guage. scout. Bloody Kmife, was shot in the head, splattering Reno with his brains and sup­ posedly causing the major—who had virtu­ EANWTilLE, Reno's command was ally no experience in fighting Indians—to M heavily engaged with an increasing order what soon became a disorderly and number of Indian warriors. Shortly after disastrous retreat toward the bluffs from crossing the Little Big Horn, he had sent which Custer had presumably viewed his two messages to Custer, both apparently advance down the vallev. There Reno's

110 SKLENAR: THEODORE W. GOLDIN AND THE LITTLE Bit; HORN' command hunkered down on the high where they filled kettles and canteens as ground (known afterwards as Reno Hill), quickly as they could while Indians shot having left in its wake over forty dead and into them from the opposite bank. The wounded comrades, as well as almost twenty ordeal for the survivors ofthe Seventh Cav­ men hiding in the woods and underbrush. alry ended on the morning of June 27 with Within a matter of minutes, Benteen the arrival of the Terry-Gibbon column. arrived at Reno Hill with his force, and for The Indians had actually departed the pre­ roughly the next hour the combined com­ vious evening. As viewed by the soldiers on mands remained in place, allegedly await­ Reno Hill, they had seemed an awesome ing the arrival of the pack mules carrying assemblage, with many thousands of per­ ammunition. During this period, Capt. sons and an immense pony herd and travois Thomas Weir and perhaps other officers bearing belongings and wounded in a cav­ entreated Reno for permission to move alcade several miles long and a mile across. toward the sound of rifle volleys and scat­ tered firing heard downriver, in the direc­ tion Custer had gone. Finally, without au­ NE of the 300 or so soldiers who sur­ thority. Weir departed on his own, followed O vived that incredible experience was by his company, and a short time later by Theodore W. Goldin of Wisconsin. He had Benteen, then by Reno and the impedi­ an extraordinary story to tell, even if he had menta (wounded, packs, spare horses, etc.). done nothing special. For many years after From ridges in the vicinity of what would the battle, well into the twentieth century, later be called Weir Point, the lead ele­ veterans of the most memorable Indian ments watched the final moments of fight in American history told and retold Custer's last stand several miles to the north, their stories to newspapers, magazines, and now obscured by clouds of ash-like gray eager researchers. And no one—not Sgt. dust. Kanipe, not Trumpeter Martin—commu­ Having dispensed with Custer and his nicated with more people about those events 200 troopers, the victoricjus Indians turned than did Trooper Goldin. His articles and back toward the remnants ofthe regiment correspondence would fill at least a large under the command of Reno, the senior volume.* Unfortunately, much of what officer then present, who led the balance of Goldin wrote was simply not true. the Seventh Cavalry—some fighting a rear­ Goldin was discharged from the army on guard action as they retreated—in the di­ November 13, 1877, on appeal from his rection of the hill from whence they had parents, in accordance with Special Order come. Largely under the guidance of No. 174 of August 16, for having enlisted Benteen, the men were deployed in a rough circle or oval on the hilltop. There was little cover, and the troopers scratched shallow * In addition to his service at the Little Big Horn, Goldin was present with elements of the Seventh trenches in which they huddled and for the Cavalry at another dramatic moment in the march of next two days fought off mostly long-range Manifest Destiny: the surrender of the Nez Perce fire from their confident and patient foes. under Chief Joseph in 1877. The Goldin materials Some more men were killed, many were are scattered in a variety of locations. Besides the wounded, and all of the living suffered National Archives and the letters published by John M. Carroll in The Benteen-Goldin Letters, the largest terribly for want of water. single repository is probably the Earl Alonzo In order to satisf)' this need, water parties Brininstool Collection at the Harold B. Lee Library, of enlisted volunteers were formed, and Brigham Young University. Other correspondence may be found at the Little Big Horn Battlefield under the covering fire of sharpshooters, National Monument and in Charles Deland's "The they sneaked down through ravines cutting Sioux Wars," in the South Dakota Historical Collections, into the bluffs, then raced to the river. vol. 15 (1930).

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Dunwiddie of Wisconsin; the couple had one son (Herbert D.) three years later. In the fall of 1882 Goldin was admitted to the bar and also elected clerk of the circuit court of Green County. During that year, and until 1885, he was assistant chief clerk of the Wisconsin Assembly. He became a Mason in 1883. In 1885 Goldin moved to Janesville where he joined his brother- in-law's legal firm as a partner, apparently with responsibilities connected with a midwestern railroad company.*" WTiatever the extent of his formal education, Theodore Goldin was obviously a busy and successful young man in this short stretch of time, setting the stage for further achieve­ ments over the next twenty years in W^iscon- sin. His initial entry into the post-Little Big Horn controversy occurred in 1886, the tenth anniversary of the event. No doubt he had followed with great interest the Army \\Hn\i),()7tt Court of Inquiry which was convened in Alfred Howe Terry. 1879 to investigate the conduct of Maj. Reno—and by implication, of Capt. under false pretenses—that is, for reason of Benteen—at the battle. The court was con­ minority enhstment (the so-called Baby Act). vened at Reno's own request in order to After his discharge, Goldin apparently re­ clear his name, which was under assault by sumed his education, but whether that Custer partisan and biographer Frederick meant high school or college is not speci­ WTiittaker, among others. Custer was still fied.' Goldin himself stated that during the regarded as a national hero by many, pri­ years after his military service, he worked as marily for his Civil W^ar exploits. The court's a civilian scout for the army (not true) and findings simply tended to exacerbate the that he was employed by the railroad, which points of contention, and, in declaring Reno is possible. free of any "animadversion," further polar­ In 1881, he began the study of law un­ ized the forces supporting either Custer or der A. M. RaiTdall in Brodhead, W^isconsin. his accused subordinates. That same year, he married Laura Belle But other than his later assertions that he had transcribed copies ofthe testimony, probably taken from newspaper accounts, ' Letter in the National Archives dated October there is no reliable evidence that Goldin 8,1924, from George W.Webb, editor and publisher attended any of the sessions in Chicago. It of Winners of the West (a magazine designed for was not until the early summer of 1886, veterans of the Indian Wars) to the secretary of Congressman Charles L. Faust of Missouri on behalf when an article critical of Custer appeared of Goldin's efforts to get his discharge changed to "honorable." Webb apparently obtained certain bio­ graphical information from Goldin himself, includ­ '' In Goldin's own words, he was "connected with ing the fact that his parents had applied for his the political end ofthe legal department of a leading discharge because they wanted him to complete his middle west railroad," See Carroll, Benteen-Goldin education. Letters, 57.

112 SKLENAR: THEODORE W. GOLDIN AND THE LITTLE BIG HORN

interesting for its defense of Custer in spite of his faults, and for its pejorative com­ ments about Maj. Reno and Capt. Myles Moylan, who is accused of hiding behind boxes of hardtack while the fight on Reno Hill was in progress. But clearly it is Goldin's reference to the "lastmessage"which makes the letter of more than passing interest. It may be tempting to dismiss the story as just more of the same from a long line of "last survivors," those imposters and pre­ tenders who usually surface well after the fact, when there is no one left to challenge their claims; but in Goldin's case, he made the statement while Reno, Moylan, and other officers and men who might contest his account were still living.^ Additionally, and more importantly, it made sense— indeed it was mandatory—for Custer to send a message to Reno in respon.se to the two he had received from his subordinate. That Goldin was chosen to carry such a message is also plausible, it being his con­ tention that as a clerk with the headquar­ Laura Belle Dunwiddie Goldin, 1901. Photo by S. L. Stein Studio, Milwaukee, courtesy the Rock County Historical ters command, he had been detailed to Society. serve as orderly with the general's adjutant, Lt. Cooke, who was the conduit between Custer and the components of the regi­ in the St. Paul Pioneer Press, that Goldin ment. Goldin was at least a competent horse­ entered the fray." man. And lastly, when all of Goldin's ac­ counts are analyzed, he cannot be positively located with any other element, including N response to the Pioneer Press attack, his own G Troop, which was riding with IGoldin wrote a letter to the fanesvilleDaily Reno. Gazette on July 8,1886, which was published After a thorough examination of all avail- in the next day's edition. He signed it "Sev­ enth Cavalry" rather than with his own name, it being a common practice at the " A number of other enlisted men did invent time to use pseudonyms, especially in let­ stories of one kind or another, some of which placed ters to editors. The letter contains the first them near Custer until almost the last shots had known appearance of Goldin's claim that been fired. Goldin seemed to have heard many such he carried a last message from Custer to tales, remarking: "The temptation to add a few Reno after the two had separated in the thrills to a story of an old-timer in telling is mighty strong. I know, because I have had to fight it time and area of the Lone Tepee. The letter is also time again." This tendency, Goldin continued dis- armingly, "accounts for a lot of the fairy stories that creep into print; added to this fact that the ' It is likely that the anti-Custer article was written average enlisted man ofthe old army had both a vivid by Maj. James Brisbin, who commanded a battalion imagination and a willingness to use it, accounts for of the Second Cavalry during the expedition of a lot of false history." Quoted in Carroll, Benteen- 1876. Goldin Letters, 48.

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threat to his survival. When he fmallyjoined up with Reno's troops on the hill and belat­ edly delivered Custer's message, he prob­ ably received a dressing-down of sufficient severity to ensure his silence for the next ten years. The available evidence suggests that im­ mediately after the publication of his letter to the fanesville Daily Gazette, Goldin sent a copy to Custer's widow, Elizabeth Bacon Custer, universally known as Libbie. In her timely response, Libbie thanked Goldin for his defense of her husband's memory, and also apparently suggested that he ought to write more about his life in the Seventh. In a letter to Libbie dated July 21, Goldin apologized for "a private soldier presuming to address the wife of his commanding officer," but explained that Gen. Custer had treated him "in my dark days of soldier­ ing, like aman and brother. "'"The neat and well-written missive is three and half pages long, covering the Reno court of inquiry (a "farce") and the "pleasant" relationship Marcus A. Reno. Photo by D. F. Barry, courtesy the between Terry and Custer. Montana Historical Society, Helena. Goldin went on to say that if he were called upon again to answer another article able source material, I have concluded'* such as that which had appeared in the that Goldin did carry such a message from Pioneer Press, he would "furnish some facts Custer, but that he failed to deliver it as which are capable of proof and institute a described in any of his accounts because, by vigorous campaign in defense of my posi­ the time he would have reached Reno's tion," but as for writing more for publica­ command, it was virtually surrounded by tion, he was inhibited by the demands "of very angry Indians. Here was a very young my profession, society and politics," even man, really a civilian and not a soldier, though he had been making "voluminous sorely lacking in training and with no com­ notes" for possible later use. He admitted, bat experience, suddenly thrown into a however, "my memory is not as it once was maelstrom of chaos and terror as the en­ when every trivial detail, ever)'word spoken raged Sioux and Cheyenne closed in on was as fresh as ever in my mind." Reno. For Trooper Goldin, the moment of Apparently encouraged by Libbie decision must have been daunting as well as Custer's response to his correspondence, defining, and his inability to carry out his Goldin wrote a second article in March, assignment a mere afterthought to the real 1888, for Ot

'' The author's detailed analysis of Goldin's ac­ count, "Private Theodore W. Goldin: Too Soon Dis­ '" Goldin's letter of July 21, 1886, is in the E. B. credited?," was published in Research Review: The Custer Collection at the Little Big Horn Battlefield fournal ofthe Little Big Horn Associates (January, 1995). National Monmnent, Montana.

114 .SKLENAR: THEODORE W. GOLDIN AND THE LITTLE BIG HORN

Gen. Terry, inspired by something Goldin The sketch contains no mention of Custer's had read in the Army and Navy fournal. The last message to Reno, Reportedly, Goldin thrust ofthe article is that the enlisted men was discharged in September, 1879 (two were hoping that Custer would command years too late), having been wounded twice the expedition, and were concerned about on the second day of fighting on Reno Hill Terry's reputation "as a martinet in disci­ (not true). pline," who promptly endorsed all severe By 1889, Theodore Goldin was not only sentences resulting from court-martial pro­ a partner in one of the leading and most ceedings. However, when Terry arrived on reputable law firms in Janesville but had Reno Hill after the battle, he showed great also been appointed a colonel in the Wis­ sympathy and consideration for the men, consin National Guard in charge of small- and afterwards excused those who got in arms practice on the staff of Governor Wil­ trouble if they had been good soldiers. For liam Dempster Hoard. Goldin may or may our purposes, the most interesting feature not have been responsible for the misstate­ of the article is that Goldin was still calling ments of fact in the Rock County album. himself a "private" and had not yet begun to Certainly some of them are consistent with exaggerate the duration and merit of his his later efforts to ingratiate himself to service with the cavalry." prominent people for various purposes. In this instance he may have done so in order to advance his personal ambitions, and HE first evidence of Goldin's effort to possibly his political fortunes as well. T embellish his bona fides appeared the One ofthe individualswith whom Goldin following year, with the publication of the was able to establish a close and enduring Portrait and Biographical Album of Rock County, relationship was Capt. Frederick Benteen.'-' Wisconsin for 1889.'- Described as "one of Their correspondence began in the fall of the leading citizens of Janesville," Goldin is 1891 and continued for five years, with only said to have been born in Spring Valley on ,several unexplained breaks. The letters July 29,1855, an only child, and received his written by Goldin have not survived, but primary education in Brodhead, "supple­ those composed by Benteen were kept by menting it by a course in the Tilton Univer­ Goldin and constitute one of the more sity of Tilton, N. H., where he was a student impressive and interesting records relating for four years." He then enlisted in the army to the Little Big Horn and other aspects of in April, 1875. Thus, according to the al­ army life in the West, including scathing bum, he was born three years earlier than attacks on some ofthe principal characters we believe, and enlisted a year before the involved. It is clear from Benteen's letters date contained in the official records, and that Goldin had persuaded the now-retired went to college during the time in between. officer that he had served a full five-year tour with the Seventh, and it seems likely that Goldin's rank of colonel in the Na­ '' Goldin led some people to believe that he had tional Guard facilitated his entry into attained the rank of sergeant. In one of his fictional Benteen's most private thoughts and opin­ accounts in the Brininstool Collection, he plays the ions. Goldin would later claim that he had part of a sergeant providing comfort and guidance visited Benteen in Georgia, where they had to a green young trooper who probably ver)' much sat on the old officer's veranda and sipped resembled Goldin at the time of his enlistment. mintjuleps while they puffed on their corn- '•- A typical commemorative and biographical "mug book" ofthe day, issued by the Acme Publish­ ing Co. of Chicago. The biographical sketches in such volumes were frequently written by the subjects theinselves, who ordinarily paid to see their names and deeds enshrined in print. " See Carroll, Benteen-Goldin Letters. 115 WTSCONSIN M.AG.AZINE OF HISTORY WINTER, 1996-1997

political ambitions. (Oddly enough, it is a tendency ascribed to the Indians who fought at the Little Big Horn, and is therefore used as an excuse to disbelieve their stories of what really happened.) In any case, Goldin encouraged Benteen's anxieties about Godfrey's Century magazine article, which was published in 1892, and together they collaborated on what was to be an honest account of the battle as seen from the en­ listed man's point of view. Benteen fed details to Goldin, who actu­ ally drafted the article, then returned them to his cohort for review and possibly revi­ sion. After failing to get them accepted by such high-profile publications as Century or the fournal ofthe Military Service Institution^-', Goldin managed to get them printed in two parts in 1894 in a relatively obscure periodi­ cal called Arra)) Mag-azz>ie"', which appears to have lasted only several years. In these ar­ ticles, Goldin repeated his claim of carrying Custer's final message to Reno and also Frederick William Benteen. Photo courtesy the Montana included Benteen's story to the effect that Historical Society, Helena. Reno had proposed leaving the hill posi­ tion under cover of darkness on the night of June 25, abandoning the wounded to their cob pipes and talked of days gone by.'^ The fate. The two installments are actually quite fact of the matter is, Benteen could still not well-written, rich in the kind of detail that remember Goldin even after he was sent a ought to have stimulated plenty of com­ photograph near the end ofthe correspon­ ment; but to date no reaction whatsoever dence. Still, this does not in itself preclude has been discovered, and from the content Goldin's having gone to Fort McPherson, of Benteen's letters, it is clear that the ex­ near Atlanta, as part of a National Guard pectations of both men were indeed disap­ small-arms competition held at some point pointed. The story and the magazine disap­ prior to Benteen's death in 1898. peared into oblivion until unearthed only Goldin's purpose in opening a corre­ in recent years; later in life, Goldin could spondence with Benteen was twofold. The not even recall the name ofthe magazine in ostensible reason was to discuss an article which the articles had appeared. then being written on the Little Big Horn fight by Lt. Edward Godfrey, which Benteen Although it can only be inferred from thought might distort the facts, especially the nature ofthe surviving correspondence. as they pertained to his own role. Goldin had a special talent for tailoring his re­ marks to his audience, a skill required by '" Goldin eventually wrote several commentaries and often highly developed in people with for this Journal, but they dealt with National Guard issues rather than the Custer battle. "' The Army Magazine articles are reprinted in John M. Carroll, ed., Custer in Periodicals (no place, " See letter from Goldin to Dr. Phillip G. Cole, 1975; photocopy in the U.S. Army Military History ibid., 54. Institute).

116 SKLENAR: THEODORE W. GOLDIN AND THE LITTLE BIG HORN it seems clear that Goldin had a second Officers might know the men in their own objective in communicating with Capt. companies a little or not at all, depending Benteen. It was to curry support for his instead on the knowledge of their senior effort to acquire a Medal of Honor for his sergeants for the identification of men in the role in the fight of June 25-27, 1876— ranks. Even the troopers within a company- virtually the only medal then in existence sized unit probably knew many of their for acts of gallantry. More than a dozen comrades only by a nickname or surname years after the Custer battle. Trooper Goldin unless they were "bunkies" or close friends. began claiming that he deserved the nation's Throughout his life, it puzzled Theodore highest award for braving enemy fire and Goldin that not a single man in his water bringing water to the wounded on Reno party had received a medal.'*^ Hill. And in the pursuit of that trophy, he His correspondence with Capt. Benteen was to display both ingenuity and remark­ was only one of Goldin's avenues of ap­ able persistence. proach and, on the surface, the least pro­ ductive. The evidence suggests that Goldin first broached the idea of his deserving a T A 7H1LE it isjust possible that Trooper medal in 1887, when he happened to run V V Goldin did in fact perform heroic into Lt. Luther Hare in Chicago. Hare had feats on the battlefield and deserved a medal, been the second-in-command of scouts at to date no compelling firsthand evidence the Little Big Horn. In response to Goldin's has come to light. Then as now, the bestow­ querying, he told Goldin that while he re­ ing of medals for heroism in combat— called the circumstances of the water par­ especially the Medal of Honor—was fraught ties, he could not remember Goldin as one with inequities. In all, twenty-four enlisted of the participants. However, when Hare men were given the Medal of Honor for met Lt. George Wallace the following sum­ actions above and beyond the call of duty at mer, the former deputy commander of G the Little Big Horn. Most of these twenty- Company indicated that as he recalled four enlisted men so recognized were events, Goldin was in fact one of the men awarded their medals within two years of who risked their lives going for water. the event. The army review system militated In 1894, Hare's information was for­ against a fair assessment of merit, being warded to Assistant Secretary of Warjoseph stretched out as it was over a period of B. Doe, an army general and Wisconsin almost two years.'" Some company com­ Democrat who had already begun an inves­ manders did not .submit any names at all, tigation into Goldin's case—probably at on the grounds that every man or none in Goldin's instigation. Doe sent queries on the several water parties should be consid­ the subject to many ofthe sur\'iving officers ered. Inevitably, individual acts of heroism went unnoticed and unrecorded. Many such acts were carried out in an atmosphere of desperation, exhaustion, and confusion. '"Two ofthe men in Goldin's party were actually woimded in going for water, and yet never received a medal. Sgt. Michael Madden had a leg amputated on the battlefield for his trouble, but apparently he was not popular among the officers and men. Pvt. '' The original lists of recommendations by troop Charles Campbell was the only other new trooper in commanders were forwarded to regimental head­ G Company fit to be mounted and was wounded quarters in May, 1877, almost a year after the battle. going for water; he made an affidavit in support of In February of the following year, the lists were Goldin's getting an award but was never recognized returned by the Department Commander for more himself. In a letter to Brininstool in 1928, Goldin careful scrutiny and revision, then submitted to a expressed his "great surprise" upon learning that board of officers. Based on the board's report, the none of the other men in his party had received a medals were awarded. medal. (Brininstool Collection.)

117 r^.^

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Photo by S. f. Alonvtu.

118 SKLENAR: THEODORE W. GOLDIN AND THE LITTLE BIG HORN of the Seventh Cavlary, but none of them S with almost everything Theodore could remember Goldin as a participant; A. Goldin did, historians have tended to none of them, that is, except Capt. Thomas be skeptical about the legitimacy of his McDougall, who had commanded Com­ claim, feeling that itwas more the result of pany B, which guarded Custer's pack train. political influence, rather than exceptional In a letter he wrote in October, 1895, bravery at the Little Big Horn.^'- It is true McDougall asserted that he was sure that that by the period 1894-1896, Goldin was Goldin had been a part of at least one president of the Janesville Board of Educa­ mission to get water, and that some of tion, and only a few years away from becom­ McDougall's men had provided covering ing chairman of the Wisconsin's Republi­ fire from their positions on Reno Hill.''' can central committee and chief clerk of This testimony, along with affidavits from the Wisconsin Senate. He also became a two former privates in G Troop who also 33rd-degree Mason and held a number of recalled Goldin's involvement, provided senior positions in that service organiza­ sufficient evidence for Doe to recommend tion; the fact that Secretary of War Doe was approval. On March 31, 1896, Theodore likewise a Mason probably explains the con­ Goldin was awarded the Medal of Honor at nection between the two men. a ceremony in Janesville. The medal itself According to Goldin, "in 1900 I was was engraved: "The Congress to Pvt. appointed Inspector General for the State, Theodore W, Goldin, Troop G, 7th Cavalry, a po.sition I held until 1903 when other for most distinguished gallantry at Little business made it necessary for me to drop Big Horn River, Montana, June 26, 1876." out."'-' It is not known when or why Goldin The accompanying citation read: "One of a left Janesville, but his alignment with the party of volunteers who, under a heavy fire anti-La Follette wing of the Republican from the Indians, went for and brought party may have had some bearing on his water to the wounded."'-" decision. In the spring of 1904, Goldin cast Goldin may have been an ambitious self- his lot with the Stalwart (i.e. conservative) promoter, but he was no ingrate. He faction of the party in opposing Governor promptly sent President Grover Cleveland Robert M. La Follette's bid for a third term, a letter thanking him "for the high honor and he was named reading clerk of the conferred upon me" and concluding that Stalwarts' rump convention in Madison's "the Medal is a thing to be prized above all opera house. ("The phonograph," he was other gifts at the hands of our Govern­ called in the press.)-* Since Governor La ment."^' Follette won his third term and the progres­ sive faction of the party was victorious, it seems likely that Goldin lost any chance he '•' Although there is no evidence for it in the may have had for political office. records in the National Archives, it is possible that Benteen encouraged McDougall to send a letter to the War Department on Goldin's behalf. The two former officers were on friendly terms and did corre­ -- See Graham, The Custer Myth, 267-278, where spond during this period, and Benteen customarily Graham discredits Goldin's claim that he carried a worked through intermediaries on potentially con­ message to Reno and expresses his doubts about the troversial questions. basis for Goldin's claim to a Medal of Honor. -" It is worth noting that Goldin told Brininstool '^' Carroll, Benteen-Goldin Letters, 87. that his water party received no supporting fire from •^'' Goldin received front-page mendon in a long McDougall's sharpshooters, that it was not fired list of "inen of influence" arriving in Madison for the upon by the Indians during the first run, and that tumultuous Republican convention. See the Wiscon­ during its second trip to the river only one volley was sin Statefournal (Madison), May 16 and 19,1904; also fired, at which time Sgt. Madden was wounded. the fanesville Gazette, November 23,1918, which hints '" Goldin's letter of April II, 1896, is in the at Goldin's earlier political aspirations ("Former National Archives. Janesville Resident Doing "V Work at Presidio"). 119 WlSC:ONSIN M.\GAZINE OF HISTORY WINTER, 1996-1997

In any event, by 1907 he was in Kansas against Francisco ("Pancho") Villa.'''WTiile City, Missouri, working for the YMCA as thus serving on the Mexican border, he industrial director and still telling one or once lost his Medal of Honor and had to ask another version of his experiences with Washington to replace it.''" Custer. None ofthe stories he told after the During 1917-1920, Goldin remained in Army Magazinearticles in 1894 quite reached Texas doing morale work for troops on the outlandish proportions of a letter he behalf of the YMCA. By this dme, he had wrote to Cyrus Townsend Brady in 1904, earned the nickname "Dad,"which he liked, which was published as part of Brady's book and he was said to be "more sturdy and on the Indian wars.^' It is clear that in this active than many a younger man."^' From variation, Goldin drew heavily on the ex­ there, Goldin apparently returned to the ploits of other enlisted men with whom he YMCA in Kansas City, where he remained had served, the result being so grotesque in until 1924. During this period, he received its claims that he would find it difficult to extensive help from a Missouri congress­ extricate himself, finally arguing that Brady man in successfully obtaining a pension as had tampered with and distorted his let­ a medal winner, culminating in a Special ter.^'' However, when Goldin told the tale to Act of Congress. a Kansas Git)' newspaper in 1910,-" the Brady In 1924, Goldin apparently suffered a chapter is cited throughout, probably with stroke, which may have resulted in partial Goldin's knowledge, suggesting that he had paralysis in one leg and caused his retire­ simply lost track ofthe "facts" used in previ­ ment to the Masonic Home in Dousman, ous narrations. W^isconsin.''- He visited the CXtster battle­ In 1911, Goldin's wife Laura died in field in that year and again in 1926, where Oklahoma City at the age of fifty-five, after he expressed interest in the park superin- which it was said that Goldin "went all to tendency. (Despite some initial support pieces" and began to wander all over the from Libbie Custer and the old Indian southwestern United States.-*^ After a short fighter and novelist Gen. Charles King of stay in Colorado, he moved to El Paso, Milwaukee, nothing came of this.) WTiereas Texas, where he was employed during 1912 Goldin's preoccupation with the Little Big by the Mexican Northwestern Railroad. For Horn fight had previously been occasional roughly the period 1913-1917, hewas regu­ even if constant, it now became an obses­ larly employed at the Office of the Depot sion. He gradually parted company with Quartermaster in El Paso, where he appar­ business associates and friends and drifted ently helped distribute supphes to U.S. Army away from what had been a productive forces engaged in the punitive expedition

'"' Goldin liked to tell people that while in Texas, '-•' Cyrus Townsend Brady, The Sioux Indian Wars he was engaged in doing "secret service" work which (reprint ed.. New York, 1992); originally entitled he could not discuss. WTiile he mav indeed have Indian Fights and Fighters. gathered information of one kind or another in the -'' In a letter to Albert W.Johnson, Goldin wrote pursuit of his everyday functions, it seems unlikely that Brady had rewritten his account of the battle "to that he was on the government payroll to do more meet his ideas of that campaign...the arucle in than distribute supplies to the troops quartered question.. .was so different from the one I dictated as there. In any case, it appears that he was well liked, to be to me almost unrecognizable." Carroll, Benteen- in part because of his wealth of Indian W'ar stories. Goldin Letters, 16. See, for example, the El Paso Herald, August 8, 1918 ("Preacher Sees Life on Border"). ^' See Kansas City Post, December 4, 1910; the story by Donald Lawder is headlined "Y.M.C.A. •'" Goldin letter of October 13, 1913, to the War Worker Escaped Death with Custer at Little Big Department, National Archives. Horn." '"fanesville Gazette, November 23, 1918. -" George W. Webb, letter of October 8, 1924, '- "Barely Missed Death in Custer Massacre," in National Archives, the AHlwaukeefournal, December 19, 1926. 120 ti

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#fe Goldin visiting the bcMlefield in 1926. Photo courtesy of Little Bighorn Battlefield National Monument. private life. During the years between his On June 29, 1929, Goldin married twice- wife's death and his own, he worried the widowed Sarah J. Murphy, and together War Department about one matter after they retired to the Grand Army Home in another. For example, he badgered offi­ King, Wisconsin. Although afflicted with cials about getting his discharge changed poor eyesight, impaired circulation, and from "not honorable" to "honorable" for neuritis (which affected his abihty to write), pension purposes (a perfectly understand­ Goldin maintained an increasing flow of able concern).''^ This he achieved in 1927, correspondence with many ofthe most ac­ but when the War Department averred that tive researchers into Custeriana, including it could not, under existing rules, issue new W. J. Ghent, Albert Johnson, Charles discharge papers to this effect, Goldin en­ Deland, Phillip Cole, and E. A. Brininstool, listed the help of prominent people to get refining and adding to the material he had these regulations changed as well. previously supplied to Brady and Walter Mason Camp. It was with Brininstool, a California jour­ •'•' Goldin's discharge was "not honorable" (as nalist and freelance writer, that he main­ opposed to "dishonorable") simply because he had tained the closest relationship. Eventually lied about his age at the time he enlisted, and his the two men worked out an arrangement discharge papers described his character as "good."

121 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTOR'l' WINTER, 1996-1997 whereby Brininstool ser\'ed as an agent for on his small pension and eager for any Goldin's largely fictional sketches of army supplemental income he could find. life and his manuscript memoir of several On February 15, 1935, at age seventy-six, hundred pages. Although little of this mate­ Theodore W^ Goldin died and was buried at rial was ever published, the common cause the Wisconsin Veteran's Memorial Cem­ of the two men did lead Goldin to provide etery in King. An enigma to the end, his Brininstool with Capt Benteen's letters, death certificate gave his birth date as July which by then apparently were in the po,s- 25, 1857, and his age as seventy-seven years, session of Goldin's son.'^* six months, and twenty days, while an obitu­ Because Benteen had written so can­ ary published in a local newspaper said that didly about intimate matters relating to "Colonel" or "Brother" Goldin was seventy- officers in the Seventh Cavalry, especially nine.'"' Custer himself, and because Libbie Custer was still alive, much admired, and therefore potentially the victim of embarrassment, HE Batde of the Litde Big Horn con­ Edward Godfrey and others interested in T tains puzzles within puzzles, which is protecting reputations and feelings were one reason—perhaps the main reason— incensed that Goldin would release the for its enduring interest. In any effort to letters to Brininstool. WTiat they did not penetrate its conundrums, it is useful to know was that Goldin had limited find unassailably credible witnesses. Brininstool to using the correspondence Theodore W. Goldin does not qualify. In only as a basis for constructing notes which his letters, he liked to say that he could might be appended to Goldin's work.-^' In defend his stories with "information ca­ fact, Goldin did not realize any profit from pable of verification," but he also admitted the letters until Brininstool sold them to that he had borrowed from others to round Phillip Cole in 1932 (and then only perhaps out his narratives. To say this much does $500), and they were not published in their not explain why he lied about the duration entirety until 1974. WTiatever success he of his enlistment, about his service as a enjoyed early in life, it is evident from government scout, about his being with Goldin's letters that in his decliningyears at Reno in the valley fight, about his narrow the Grand Army Home, he was dependent escape during Reno's retreat, and about a number of other, lesser matters,"" Perhaps Goldin was simply unable to say "I don't know" when asked what happened on any part ofthe field up to the point of Custer's '" Brininstool had turned to freelance writing at demise—and, after the deception was un- the beginning of this century. He wrote articles, poetry, and books, mostly to do with the American West. It is likely that he, like many others, approached Goldin for information on the Little Big Horn cam­ paign. As a result, the two men began an extensive "' The author was supplied a photocopy of correspondence and a relatively unproductive busi­ Goldin's obituary by Ms. Gretchenjungerberg ofthe ness relationship. Much of this material, including Wisconsin Veterans Home at King, biu the clipping Goldin's impublished and largely fictional manu­ lacked the name of the newspaper. Goldin's wife script, is in the Brininstool Collection, Harold B. Lee lived undl I960. Library, Brigham Young University. '' For example, Goldin claimed in a number of ''' On February 25,1928, Goldin wrote Brininstool: versions of his story that during the retreat, he had "Of course the letters are not for publication, nor spent time with scout George Herendeen, who even­ would I care to have them freely quoted from during tually led twelve troopers out of hiding to safety on the little time Mrs. Custer has to remain with us, and Reno Hill. But Herendeen told Walter Mason Camp perhaps not then save in the shape of footnotes or that Goldin's story was "all fiction." Undated inter­ addenda to some other publication." (Brininstool view, "Walter Mason Camp Papers, Harold B. Lee Collection.) Libbie Custer died in 1933. Library, Brigham Young University.

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The Old Barn Book: A Field Guide to North Cultural geographers have especially American Barns and Other Farm Structures. By helped lead the way in these investigations ALLEN G. NOBLE and RICHARD K. CLEEK. and Jfie Old Barn Book is another in their (Rutgers University Press, New Brunswick, worthy contributions. Compiled from sec­ New Jersey, 1995. Pp. ix, 222. Illustrations, ondary sources and supplemented by the maps, bibliographv, index. ISBN 0-8135- authors' own extensive travels throughout 2172-6, $29.95, hardcover; ISBN 0-8135- the United States and Canada, this is a field 2173-4, $16.95, paperback.) guide intended to be "a convenient and inexpensive handbook" to help people Farm buildings are attracting increased "identify the thousands of structures that public and scholarly attention. City resi­ dot the rural landscape of North America." dents yearn to discover what is authentic The guide is based on the second volume of and genuine in the complexities of modern Nobel's 1984 book. Wood, Brick, and Stone: living, rural people struggle to save a pass­ The North American Settlement Landscape. ing way of life as their numbers dwindle, The authors' geographic perspective and the historic preservation movement principally identifies where varieties of farm notices its support building in the country­ buildings are located and seeks to explain side. Although some people write off rural their uneven spread across the landscape in architecture as being of no consequence terms of particular vernacular building tra­ and no interest, others see in it the qualities ditions, especially those practiced by ethnic of rugged honesty, bygone craftsmanship, groups. Areas of English or German or and rustic beaut)'. Growing respect for these French settlement are thus linked to dis­ rural simplicities contains its share of nos­ tinctive types of barns found there. Ap­ talgia, but it also has sparked desires to proximately two thirds of The Barn Book is learn about—rediscover if you will—coun­ devoted to such barn-related discussions. try architecture and life. As Midwest Living The remainder identifies "other farm struc­ magazine supplies readers with the popular tures," provides lists of where particular appeal of country life, scholarly publica­ kinds of farm buildings are to be found, and tions have been informing them about indicates sources of information about America's rich variety of farm buildings them. and rural landscapes. Following a general overview of the tv'pes

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A gothic-roofied barn under construction near Viroqua, Vernon County, undated. of barns and their features in the first three bygone structures and to their origins in chapters, each of the remaining ten chap­ the building predilections of European- ters deals with a category of barn or farm American peoples which settled during the structure and briefly describes its individual eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. variations. The description typically informs In this ethno-cultural approach there the reader about a building's exterior char­ also lies certain weaknesses. Modern con­ acteristics (e.g., form, dimensions), its simi­ struction (i.e., after 1900) consequently gets larity to other varieties, where it first ap­ little attention. More important, the reader peared, and where its range of construction may gain the false impression that most of extended. Useful maps and illustrations what there is to be told about barns is give the reader a good sense ofwhat to look connected to their ethnic origins. WTiile for and where to find them. aspects ofthe barn's form are indeed "clues The strength of the book lies not in to cultural change," they have much more telling the story of farm buildings through to inform us as well. For barns are also clues time, but in linking them across space to to agricultural and technological change, reveal how examples of one or another new livestock production practices, shifting kind are clustered and dispersed over labor requirements, and emerging special­ America's rural landscape. In the process a ized farming areas. Moreover, one must be sense of history is imparted through the careful to not assume, for example, that attention the authors give to many old. where you find a German-American settle-

125 WISCONSIN M.AGAZINE OF HISTORY WTNTER, 1996-1997 mentyouwill also find "German" t)'pe barns. Orvllle and Wilbur WTight. Despite their All it takes is a journey through German- stalwart efforts as the godfathers of flight in American settlements in the western Mid­ Wisconsin and the Upper Midwest, the west to quickly notice that they typically Larsons barely rate a footnote in most his­ contain other types of barns. These matters torical reviews of flying's early days. are touched upon here and there in the Bernice Lee Krippene rectifies this over­ volume but ethnic associations are what sight with a carefully researched portrayal receive the main attention. of how the Larsons and their daredevil Another point deser\'es mention. While cousin Clyde Lee introduced airplanes to the authors state that their book "is the skeptical W^isconsin farmers. Roy, the eldest most comprehensive ever written on North brother, returned from the World War I American barns and farm structures," it is trenches determined to emulate Eddie especially puzzling to see that hog buildings Rickenbacker and Baron von Richthofen. are missing from its pages. Swine facilities He had never flown, yet was adamant about are a significant part of Corn Belt farms and becoming a pilot, owning an airplane, and give meaning to the other buildings—silos, building an airport—certainly an ambitious corn cribs, etc.—which together comprise dream for a Fox Valley soldier with no the farm operation. Tvpes of hog buildings, money who was expected to run the family like chicken houses, are a story of forms farm. The rest ofthe tale could be a chapter that underwent change as people's atti­ from Horatio Alger. Roy inspires his three tudes and knowledge changed about what brothers to work hard, save money, and buy would best increase hog production, im­ a used biplane. More diligent labor, a larger prove hog survival, and allow farmers to savings account, and they have the first enlarge the size of their swine-raising op­ airfield in the State of W''iscon,sin, just out­ erations. side of Winneconne. Of course is wasn't Overall, general readers will find the quite that easy, there was endless danger­ book a good introduction to the topic and ous barnstorming at country fairs, para­ fun to look through, barn enthusiasts will chuting at preposterously low altitudes, and, like the maps and geographic clues to where worst of all, wingwalking to dazzle the various types are to be found, and travelers crowds. will enjoy its usefulness in identifying much Ms. Krippene tells the stor)' with verve ofwhat stands on our farms throughout the and grace, skillfully recreating a snapshot country. All will come away with a better of the twenties in rural Wisconsin. She appreciation for the extent that surviving emphasizes that prosperity never quite clusters of one or another kind of barn reached the farm country, and the Larsons gives regional identity to contemporary had to continually struggle to keep their America. vision alive. The author also describes the machines, the flimsy yet beautiful Jennys, LOWTLLJ. SOIKE Swallows, and Stinsons, which defied grav­ Slate Historical Society of Iowa ity and held together during improbable stunts and landings in tiny cornfields. Then Ms. Krippene abruptly shifts focus to her brother Clyde Lee, handsome and Wingwalker: From Wisconsin to Norway: The reckless as a matinee idol. His role in the Larson Brothers and Clyde Lee. By BERNTCE LEE diligent Larson airport enterprises had been KRIPPENE. (New Past Press, Inc., Friendship, peripheral. Lee was above all a flier, his Wisconsin, 1995). Pp. 255. Illustrations, hero was Lindbergh not Rickenbacker. The maps. ISBN 0-938627-29-5, S15.00.) plan was a nonstop flight from Newfound­ land to Norway, indeed a perilous under­ The Larson brothers will never be con­ taking in 1932. After meticulous prepara­ fused with those other pioneers of aviation. tion and a year long quest for a sponsor

126 Abraham and Rachel Bella Calofiin the sulky, with a woman named Monee and daughters Hannah and Minnie .standing alongside. Photo courtesy the publisher.

(Oshkosh B'Gosh backed out prior to take­ Rachel Calof's Story: fewish Homesteader on the off), the intrepid Lee set out across the Northern Plains. Edited byj. SANEORD RIKOON, North Atlantic in late summer. Unfortu­ with translation by JACOB CAI,OE and MOLLY nately, like so many of his brave colleagues, SHAW, with essays byJ.ACOB CALOF, J. SANEORD Lee disappeared. Ms. Krippene suspects he RIKOON, and ELIZABETH JAMESON. (Indiana ran out of fuel trying to avoid a storm system University Press, Bloomington, 1995. Pp. near the British Isles. xiii, 158. Photographs, notes, index. ISBN 0-253-32942-6, $20.00, hardcover; ISBN 0- Despite obvious affection for her brother 253-20986-1, $12.95, paperback.) and the Larsons, Ms. Krippene proves an objective reporter. She ruefully admits the foolhardy risks taken by these young farm Rachel Bella Kahn was a Russian Jewish boys, marveling that so many sur\'ived the girl who immigrated to the United States in travails of those fragile early aircraft. She 1894 at the age of eighteen. Shortly after also provides a superb depiction of the she landed in New York, Abraham Calof, to rural Midwest just after the Great W''ar, a whom her marriage had been arranged vanished aura ofthe dairy country and the when she was still in Russia, moved her to small provincial villages of east-central Wis­ Ramsey County, twenty-five miles north of consin. This is an entertaining, often excit­ Devils Lake, North Dakota, where he, his ing sample of the contributions made by parents, and his brother were homestead- talented amateur historians. ing. In 1936 Rachel Calof decided to record her experiences in North Dakota in a Yid­ dish narrative. The result is Rachel Calof's JEREMY C. SHEA Story. Madison 127 WISCXJNSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY WINTER, 1996-1997

Calof's narrative recounts the bitter sion thatjewish settlements were short-lived struggle for survival of her early years in because they lacked the population base North Dakota. W^en the Calofs were at­ necessary to sustain Jewish communal cul­ tempting to make their farm they were ture and to provide opportunities for edu­ insufficiently capitalized, and privation and cation and endogamous marriage is sound even hunger resulted. Because food and and well-conceived. fuel were insufficient to sustain two house­ Readers interested in settlement on the holds, her parents-in-law and a young Great Plains, Jewish immigration, or just a brother-indaw moved into the Calof shack good story of human triumph well told will for three successive winters. For months, enjoy Rachel Calofs Story. I recommend it five people (then six, then seven, because highly. children were born to Abraham and Rachel), two dozen chickens, and an occa­ DAVID B. DANBOM sional calf shared a twelve-by-fourteen-foot North Dakota State University space. Small wonder that Calof treasured privacy above all else forever after. Sum­ mers were better, but Calof faced the ter­ rors of childbirth and illness without physi­ Milwaukee Architecture: A Guide to Notable cians present, suffered severe depression Buildings. By JOSEPH KORO.VL (Prairie Oak and hallucinations, and witnessed such natu­ Press, Madison, 1995. Pp. xx, 188. Photo­ ral catastrophes as a hailstorm that wiped graphs, maps, bibliography, glossary, in­ out the wheat crop and killed both of the dex. ISBN 1-879489-27-0, $18.95, paper.) family's horses. Added to her other bur­ dens was that of attempting to maintain an Americans have an increasing interest in Orthodox Jewish home many miles from a a sense of place. This is seen in the new substantial Jewish community. The Calofs spate of urban guidebooks published across eventually succeeded in making a farm and the country. City guidebooks can be useful in raising a family, but in 1917 they sold out to residents, researchers, and tourists. This and moved to St. Paul. book fits nicely into the genre and repre­ Rachel Calofs Story is one of survival, but sents a much improved effort by the au­ she hardly suffered her trials stoically. At thor, Joseph Korom, who in 1979 pub­ times she indulged in self-pity, and her lished Look Up Milwaukee. In the current judgments of Abraham's parents and book he discusses 150 buildings beginning brother were harsh and uncharitable. In a with inventory information—the building's sense, though, Calofs flaws lend a large name, address, architect, and date. Each measure of authenticity to a narrative writ­ entry contains a number that relates to one ten forty years after the events it describes. ofthe five maps. These inventory facts and Just as the passage of time failed to soften the size of the guidebook will make this Calofs bitterness, neither did it diminish work much more useful than the 1979 pub­ the vividness and drama of her account lication. Look Up Milwaukee did not cover This is truly a moving and even compelling buildings beyond the downtown corridor, story, well worth the time of any reader. and left out the city's historical and affluent Adding to the strength of Rachel Calof's East side that is filled with architectural Story, which is less than ninet)'-one pages in gems. In the current volume Korom ex­ length, are essays by her son and translator, pands his geographical focus and includes Jacob Calof, anthropologist J. Sanford such neighborhoods as the East and South Rikoon, and historian Elizabeth Jameson. sides. Rikoon's essay, which traces the origins, Milwaukee is architecturally the richest development, and demise of organizedjew- city in fhe state, retaining several score of its ish agricultural settlement in the Midwest historically significant buildings. Fortu­ and West, is especially valuable. His conclu­ nately, Milwaukee did not pull down all its

128 WHi(X.'!),r,()l9:^ City Hall, Milwaukee, about 1940. older examples of public and office build­ buildings. Other early local architects such ings or housing stock, resulting in the pres­ as Ferry & Clas and H. C. Koch added great ervation of buildings from the 1850's for­ richness to the cityscape with such fine ward. The important architect, Edward examples as the Milwaukee Public Library Townsend Mix, worked in Milwaukee dur­ and the City Hall, respectively. Scores of ing the second half of the nineteenth cen­ late-nineteenth-and early-twentieth-century tury. Examples of his flamboyant Victorian buildings became part of the fabric of the style and outstanding craftsmanship can city as Milwaukee grew to become the com­ still be seen today in the Mitchell and Mackie mercial center of the state.

129 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTOR'l' WINTER, 1996-1997

Mr. Korom provides clear and concise Kaufman, which was published in 1989 by explanations for the city's notable build­ the John Carter Brown Library of Provi­ ings. His entry on the Iron Block building dence, Rhode Island, as a boxed portfolio has a fine description ofthe building meth­ of full-sized facsimiles. Parker's published ods used to construct this historically sig­ map collection featured "nearly all of nificant building. He could have taken more the most important printed maps of the critical approaches when describing build­ seventeenth-centur)' that show the five Great ings such as the Performing Arts Center, Lakes." Nine ofthe maps published in the where the addition ofthe Peck Pavilion has folio were among the eleven maps that radically diminished the importance ofthe formed the core of the Maps cf Encounter original architectural effort by Weese & exhibit. Associates. The exhibition catalog contains four In addition to the text, there are qualit)' short essays and an exhibition checklist. An photographs with good contrast, most taken initial essay by Randall Berndt explores the by the author. One useful appendix is a list evocative nature of the maps and their ap­ of buildings which offer guided tours (with propriateness for the celebration of the telephone numbers). There is a building Academy's 125th anniversary. Comments index; however, it should have been supple­ by George Parker follow, outlining the in­ mented with the inclusion of the buildings' tent behind the formation of his map col­ landmark designations. It frustrated the lection and the significance of its subse­ reviewer not to have an architect index. quent publication as full-scale facsimiles, a The design and size of this guidebook format of service to both lay interests and are convenientfor tucking in the car, purse, scholarly pursuits. Next is anthropologist or pocket. Korom's new book will bring Jeffrey Behm's several-page historical and years of enjoyment and use to all who own archaeological description ofthe Bell Site, or use it. one of the most important eighteenth- century American Indian sites in French DLANE M, BUCK Period Wisconsin. This discussion is a wel­ Milwaukee come illustration of how maps, ethnohistory, oral tradition, and archaeolog)' must com­ bine to "arrive at the fullest understanding" of the past. The discussion presents an Maps of Encounter: The French in Seventeenth- entirely appropriate vignette of the amaz­ Century Wisconsin, An exhibition of period maps ing histon'of this Mesquakie (Fox) village, from the George Parker Collection with accompa­ providing an example of the extreme vari­ nying images and artifacts of the French presence ability of French influences on W^isconsin's in early Wisconsin. (The Wisconsin Academy native populations. of Sciences, Arts, and Letters, Madison, The most substantial essay, making up 1995. Pp. 24. Maps, photograph. $4.50, over half of the booklet, is David Buisseret's paper.) "The French in Wisconsin." Buisseret's his­ torical treatment of French activities and Maps of Encounter is a modestly priced influences in Wisconsin from the seven­ and attractive exhibit catalog issued by the teenth through nineteenth centuries does Wisconsin Academy of Sciences, Arts, and not attempt analytic depth, but is delivered Letters for its June, 1995, exhibition ofthe with a clarity and authority derived of schol­ same name. The core, and apparently the arly familiarit)' with his subject. Thus he is conceptual origin, of the exhibit was The able to make precise statements delinating Mapping ofthe Great Lakes in the Seventeenth cause and effect in the course of French Century: Twenty-two maps from the George S. empire and French ethnic influences in and Nancy B. Parker Collection, with an in­ W''isconsin. By following this discussion be­ troduction and commentary by Kevin yond the seventeenth century and well after

130 BOOK REVIEWS the demise ofthe French Regime, Buisseret work has come to publication. WTitten in is able to follow the conceptual thread of 1983 as a master's thesis under Lerner's French influences to identifiable develop­ direction, it is a model of good scholarship, ments and identities in nineteenth- and a gracefully written presentation of pru­ twentieth-century Wisconsin. dent conclusions drawn from careful analy­ Two of Buisseret's maps support discus­ sis of well-designed research. sions that are worthy of further note. Steinschneider studies the women's club Although previously published, the Ameri­ movement in Wisconsin at the state level. can period (1820) plan maps ofthe French- By examining organizational records and derived settlements at Green Bay and constructing a profile ofthe sixty-six women Prairie du Chien, coupled with a short dis­ who held leadership positions in the cussion of each of these settlements, con­ Federation'sfirst twenty-five years, she docu­ tributes to an ongoing development of his­ ments the group's rapid growth, traces its tories for individual North American places changing goals, and assesses its impact on having French-influenced origins. Specifi­ society and on the women themselves. cally, these maps and short histories comple­ The growth ofthe Wisconsin Federation ment those developed for many other Great was typical of women's clubs nationwide. Lakes and Upper Mississippi Valley loca­ Between 1896 and 1917 it expanded from tions as presented in Buisseret's Mapping 3,150 members in 70 local clubs to more the French Empire in North America (1991), a than 13,500 members in 259 clubs. Those catalog developed in conjunction with the who assumed positions of state leadership Newberry Library exhibit Plotting French tended to be well-educated, middle-aged, Settlement in North America. It is these small Protestantwives and mothers from the white additions Buisseret's essay makes to the middle and upper-middle class; more than corpus of "histories of place," for both these half had live-in servants. They embodied two settlements and the entire state of Wis­ the nineteenth-century gender ideology consin, that make the Maps of Encounter which prescribed sex-specific roles that catalog a scholarly contribution, as well as a consigned women to economic depen­ document commemorating an interesting dence and political impotence within male- exhibit. dominated private families that existed apart from the public arena. At the same time, DUANE E,SAREY the ideology ascribed to women a moral Dickson Mounds/Illinois State Museum superiority which was likely to generate a social conscience and an impulse to activ­ ism. Club women acted on that impulse. An Improved Woman: The Wisconsin Federa­ Drawn together initially by the luxury of tion of Women's Clubs, 1895-1920. By JANICE leisure time and the desire for cultural C. STEINSCHNEIDER. (Carlson Publishing, New enrichment, joiners soon affirmed a sense York, 1994. Pp. xix, 153. Illustradons, in­ of solidarity as women and developed a dex, bibliography. ISBN 0-926019-71-6, shared perspective on social issues. Gradu­ $40.00.) ally they projected that perspective into public debate and claimed a voice for This book is one in a series on women's women in identifying and solving the prob­ history edited by Gerda Lerner. The series lems that attended the growth of industrial­ consists of graduate theses and disserta­ ism capitalism. They devised practical tions, some of them written decades ago, projects that applied their allegedly natural that were neglected in the years before concern for family and community to such scholarship about women had the wide issues as unsafe working conditions and audience it now enjoys. That audience will urban poverty, and in the process they en­ appreciate the fact that Steinschneider's tered the supposedly male realm of politics.

131 WISCONSIN MAG.AZINE OF HISTORY WINTER, 1996-1997

For example, from a responsibility for obligations and moral superiority to justify their own families' health, this trajectory their ventures into public affairs, they rein­ moved club women into lobbying for pub­ forced more than they challenged the pre­ lic sanitation and pure food laws. From a vailing ideolog)' of domesticity. The book's concern for their own children's educa­ title highlights this conclusion. It is from tion, it moved them to establish public the statement by the Federation president libraries and kindergartens and to urge in 1912, at the peak ofthe woman suffrage women to exercise their limited right to campaign in 'Wisconsin. The club woman vote on school matters. had become "not a new woman, but an Steinschneider offers three indicators improved •woman," she said. By distinguish­ of the significance of the club movement. ing themselves from the so-called "new First, the influence of club women on pub­ women" of their day who were pursuing lic life was considerable. They created pub­ careers, flouting Victorian sexual and gen­ lic institutions, initiated social services, and der conventions, demanding equal rights, shaped public policy. These activities illus­ and even promoting socialist ideas, club trate the political importance of women's leaders also distanced themselves from organized activity in the years before suf­ movements for fundamental change in ei­ frage. Second, club activity changed the ther the public or private sphere. Defend­ lives ofthe women themselves. Individuals ing their activism as an expression rather experienced real personal growth as they than a rejection of women's special role, honed organizing skills and took positions club women remained committed to their of public responsibility. own dependent domestic status, in effect Yet, for all this, Steinschneider concludes validating the systems of class and race privi­ that the change in their gender conscious­ lege that made it possible. ness was minimal. She is attentive to politi­ This finely crafted case study is a must cal tensions among club women—the ques­ for students of Wisconsin history, especially tion of woman suffrage was extremely those interested in the Progressive Era, and divisive—but finds the internal conflicts a welcome addition to the literature on overshadowed by differences between the women's activism. club movement and the many other types of contemporary women's activism. Because JOYCE C. FOLLET club women invoked notions of familial University of Wisconsin-Madison

Book Reviews

Korom, Milwaukee Architecture: A Guide to Notable Buildings, reviewed by Diane M. Buck 128 Krippene, Wingwalker: From Wisconsin to Norway: The Larson Brothers and Clyde Lee, reviewed by Jeremy C. Shea 126 Noble and Cleek, The Old Barn Book: A Field Guide to North American Barns and Other Farm Structures, reviewed by LoweUJ. Soike '. 124 Rickoon, editor, Rachel Calof's Story: fewish Homesteader on the Northern Plains, reviewed by David B, Danbom 127 Steinschneider, An Improved Woman: The Wisconsin Federation of Women's Clubs, 1895-1920, reviewed by Joyce C. Follet 131 Wisconsin Academy of Sciences, Arts, and Letters, Maps of Encounter: The French in Seventeenth-Century Wisconsin . . . , reviewed by Duane Esarey 130

132 Wisconsin History Checklist Friends of the Mitchell Gallery of Flight, Inc., General Mitchell International Air­ port, 5300 South Howell Avenue, MiL Recently published and currently avail­ waukee, Wisconsin 53207.) able W'isconsiana added to the Society's Library are listed below. The compilers, Isaacson, Kevin. Return to Glory: the Inside James D. Buckett, Gifts and Exchanges Li­ brarian, and Susan Dorst, Assistant Acqui­ Story of the Green Bay Packers' Return to sitions Librarian, are interested in obtain­ Prominence. (lola, Wisconsin, cl996. Pp. ing information about (or copies of) items 240. Illus. $16.95. Available from Krause that are not widely advertised, such as pub­ Publications, 700 East State Street, lola, lications of local historical societies, family Wisconsin .54990-0001.) histories and genealogies, privately printed works, and histories of churches, institu­ tions, or organizations. Authors and pub­ Jones, Russell. A History of Palmyra Area lishers wishing to reach a wider audience Churches. (Palmyra, Wisconsin, 1996. Pp. and also to perform a valuable bibliographic 24. Illus. $6.00 plus $1.50 postage and service are urged to inform the compilers handling. Available from Palmyra His­ of their publications, including the follow­ torical Society, c/o Dorothy Johnson, ing information: author, title, location and P.O. Box 265, Palmyra, Wisconsin 53156- name of publisher, date of publication, price, pagination, and address of supplier. 9265.) Write Susan Dorst, Acquisitions Section. Knutson, David A. Chautauqua on the Banks of the Red Cedar: the Ancestors and Descen­ dants of the Halvor Knutson andAslak Th­ Burton, Paul, and Burton, Frances. Ephraim's ompson families. (River Falls, Wisconsin, FoundingFather: the Story of Reverend A. M. 1993. Pp. xvi, 949. Illus. $50.00 plus posu Iverson. (Ephraim, Wisconsin, 1996. Pp. age and handling. Available from au­ xii, 237. Illus. No price listed. Available thor, N8290 1015th Streeu River Falls, from Stonehill Publishing, P.O. Box 250, Wisconsin 54022.) Ephraim, Wisconsin 54221.) Kronenberg, Harold (Diz). Honor &" Re­ Dobberpuhl, Harold C. Cedarburg, 1946- membrance: the Military Heritage of the 1964, Photographs. (Cedarburg, Wiscon­ Chippewa Valley. (Eau Claire, Wisconsin, sin, cl995. Pp. 184. Illus. No price listed. cl993. Pp. xi, .59. Illus. $10.00 plus $2.40 Available from Cedarburg Cultural Cen­ postage and handling. Available from ter, P.O. Box 84, Cedarburg, Wisconsin Chippewa Valley Museum, P.O. Box 53012.) 1204, Eau Claire, Wisconsin 54702.)

Eswein, Ralph. Logging Dilemma in the Big Leavitt, Judith Walzer. The Healthiest City: Swamp: a Late 1800's History of Harvesting Milwaukee and the Politics of Health Reform. the Last Virgin Pine Forest of West Central (Madison, Wisconsin, 1996. Pp. xiii, 294. Wisconsin. (Sparta, Wisconsin, cl995. Pp. Illus. $19.95. Available from University ii, 236. Illus. $35.00 plus $4.50 postage of Wisconsin Press, 114 North Murray and handling. Wisconsin residents in­ Streeu Madison,Wisconsin 53715-1199.) clude 5 '/2% sales tax. Available from Mon­ Reprint of 1982 book. roe County Historical Society, P.O. Box 422, Sparta, Wisconsin 54656.) Mershart, Ronald V. Pioneers of Superior, Wisconsin. (Roseville, Minnesota, 1996. Hardie, George A., Jr. Milwaukee County's Pp. vi, 80. $27.00. Available from Park General Mitchell International Airport. (Mil­ Genealogical Books, Dept. SHS, P.O. waukee, Wisconsin, 1996. Pp. iv, 184. Box 130968, Roseville, Minnesota 55113- Illus. No price listed. Available from 0968.)

133 WTSCONSIN M.AG.AZINE OF HISTORY WINTER, 1996-1997

Muller, Richard G. People, Places, Events: an Washburn, William H. The Life and Writings Index to Muscoda, Wisconsin Newspapers, offeromeA. Watrous, Soldier-Reporter, Adju­ 1874-1995. (Bettendorf,Iowa, 1996? Pp. tant ofthe Iron Brigade. (Lake Bluff?, Illi­ 319, No price listed. Available from au­ nois, cl992. Pp. ii, 149. Illus. No price thor, 2701 Olympia Drive, Bettendorf, listed. Available from author, 120 East Iowa 52722.) Hawthorne Court, Lake Bluff, Illinois 60044.) Poling, Jerry. Downfieldl: Untold Stories ofthe Green Bay Packers. (Madison, Wisconsin, cl996. Pp. xiii, 223. Illus. $14.95. Avail­ Williams, Don. The History of the Village of able from Prairie Oak Press, 821 Pros­ Waldo, Wisconsin. (Plymouth, Wisconsin, pect Place, Madison, Wisconsin 53703.) 1995. Pp. iv, 188. $28.50. Available from author, 620 Rivervlew Drive, Plymouth, Protz, Ruth Liskow. A Research Guide to Wisconsin 53073.) Winnebago County, Wisconsin. (Oshkosh, Wisconsin, 1996. Revised edition. Pp. 67. Illus. No price listed. Available from Women of Northeast Wisconsin: Dreamers and Winnebagoland Genealogical Society, Doers. (Green Bay, Wisconsin, cl994. Pp. c/o Oshkosh Public Library, 106 Wash­ X, 158. Illus. $17.50. Available from North- ington Avenue, Oshkosh, Wisconsin east Wisconsin Women, c/o Jean 54901.) Ketcham, 1247 Libertv Street, Green Bay, Wisconsin 54304-3868.) Puchner, Rudolph. Memories oftheFirst Years ofthe Settlement of New Holstein. (Eau Claire, Wisconsin, cl994. Pp. xiii, 79. Illus. $9.95 Zwiefelhofer, Maxine. History of Sl. fohn the plus postage and handling. Wisconsin Baptist Catholic Church, Cooks Valley, residents add 5% sales tax. Available from 1885-1995. (Chippewa Falls, Wiscon­ William G. Thiel, E2645 Kristy Road, sin, 1995. Pp. 250. Illus. No price listed. Eau Claire, WTsconsin 54701.) Thiel, who Available from author. Route 2, Box translated this from the German, adds 271, Chippewa Falls, Wisconsin 54729.) several maps and other supplementar)' Cover title is St. fohn the Baptist, Cooks material. Valley, 1885-1995.

134 Accessions Horicon Public Library, concerning Horicon and Dodge County history and the history of Services for copying all biU certain re­ Wisconsin Indians. Most items presented stricted items in its Archives collections are by Walter R. Bussewitz, Horicon; scrapbook provided by the Society. presentedbyMrs. E.A. Kraemer,WestBend; two items presented earlier by an unre­ corded donor. Area Research Center Collections History ofthe Mayville Specialty Manufac­ turing Co., of Mayville, compiled in 1987 by Robert Owen for the Mayville Historical Society, consisting of newspaper accounts OSHKOSH. Papers, 1857-1863, consisting of typed copies of letters written by Matthias f. ofthe company which existed from 1904 to Bushnell (d. 1863), a Union soldier in Com­ 1912 and made iron and steel utensils. Pre­ pany B of the 1st Wisconsin Cavalry, to his sented by the Mayville Historical Society via family in Waitsfield, Vermont. Pre-war let­ Erline Boeck. ters describe his home life near Omro, Speech, 1948, providing a history of the Wisconsin, and his work as a logger and Community Baptist Church of Allenvilleand its farmer. Later letters describe his military members, given at the church's centennial experiences, fellow soldiers' behavior, and celebration by Reverend Richard D. Pierce. a near-execution of three Confederate sol­ The Winnebago County congregation was diers. Also included are some materials established in Vinland township in 1848 concerning other family members. Pre­ and was connected with the Free Will Bap­ sented by Elizabeth B. Jones, Dedham, tist denomination. Presented by the Com­ Massachusetts. munity Baptist Church of Allenville via Ann Winkenwerder, Oshkosh. "Some notes, papers, stories and corre­ spondence of a small town editor," 1978, a Photocopy of a poem by Hugh S. .Stevenson compilation by William A. Draves, a news­ describing his visit to an 1869 fair in man and managing editor of the Fond du Oshkosh, Wisconsin; and a 1986 letter from Lac Reporter, including responses by Draves his great grandson providing some bio­ to remarks about the press made by former graphical information abouthim. Presented Vice President Spiro Agnew, Vice President by Robert Scott, Los Angeles, California. Gerald R. Ford, and Milwaukee Mayor Henry Photocopies of two reminiscences, ca. W. Maier; correspondence (1969) with U.S. 1974, written by Mildred E. Turner for the Senator F. Ryan Duffy from Wisconsin sug­ Yarns of Yesteryear contest, one in which gesting Duffy write his reminiscences, and a Turner discusses her paternal grandmother, subsequent reminiscence from Duffy; a let­ Elizabeth Patchett Dunsmoor, who lived in ter written to his son concerning his re­ Markesan; and another concerning the sponsibilities as a newsman; and a photo­ Yosemite House, the Markesan hotel owned graph of Draves in his office. Presented by and operated by Turner's maternal grand­ William A. Draves, Fond du Lac. parents, George and Ellen McCracken, in­ cluding descriptions of Markesan and its Record book, 1870-1898, of the First early residents. Presented by Mildred E. Presbyterian Church of Oshkosh containing a Turner, Brandon. church history, session records and meet­ ing minutes, baptism records, statistical re­ Typescript narrative by Irma K, Wells ports, lists of elders, ministers, and dea­ concerning Genessee, a crossroads settlement cons, rolls of members, and miscellaneous in the Town of Byron, Fond du Lac County, records. Presented by Clarence Mielke, including references to individual residents. Wausau. Presented by Ms. Wells, Oakfield. Clippings, notes, essays, and other items, Affectionate letters, 1864—1866, written 184.3-1854 and undated, written and col­ by Ella Wheeler (Wilcox) (1850-1919) to her lected bv Allie Freeman, librarian of the friend, Hellen B. Grain (Perry), containing

135 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY WINTER, 1996-1997 news and gossip about life in Neenah. Pre­ ents and from church records, focusing on sented by Dorothy A. Anderson, Placerville, the Welsh Calvinistic Methodist Church at California. Caledonia. Presented by Mrs. Lester Tombstone inscriptions and photocopies Herrman, Ensign, Kansas. of maps, tombstone photographs, and cen­ Miscellaneous photocopied clippings, sus enumerations for those interred at the letters, and documents, 1944—1981, relat­ Clyman Center Cemetery located in Clyman ing to the life of Emil Robtllard (1908-1980) township. Dodge Count)'; collected in 1992 of Kenosha, who was active in Wiscon­ by members of the Wisconsin Children of sin state and federal politics, especially the American Revolution. Presented by the within Teamsters' Union Local 95, as well as Wisconsin Society of the Children of the other local and national union organiza­ American Revolution via Sue and Christo­ tions. Presented by Mrs. Emile Robillard, pher Hopfensperger, Nashotah. Kenosha. Papers, 1950-1964, of Kenosha labor P.ARKSiDE. Photocopyof an August 30, 1900, leader Paul L. Whiteside, including 1964 letter from Olympia Brown (1835-1926), records of the Active Ballot Club of the Racine,presidentof the Wisconsin Woman Retail Clerks International Association for Suffrage Association, to Mrs. A. W. Gile, which WTiteside served as state coordina­ Marshfield, urging her to carr)' out her tor; constitution and bylaws (1950) ofthe responsibility to solicit funds for their cause Kenosha Trades and Labor Council; a in Marshfield and Ashland; and a 1975 Kenosha Union Label Director)' and Pur­ letter suggesting that a Racine school be chasing Guide (1960); photocopies of a named after Brown, accompanied by bio­ 1957 series run in Kenosha Labor entitled graphical information. Photocopied letter "Where Are They Now?" about early presented by Mrs. Allyn Smith, Oregon; Kenosha labor leaders and organizers; J. I. 1975 materials presented by Jane Case Company labor negotiation materials Beaugrand, Racine. (1960); and records (1958-1962) of the Photocopies of letters, 1944-1945, writ­ Kenosha AFL-CIO Council which WTiiteside ten by Lt. Kenneth L. Greenquist to his wife served as president. Presented by Paul L. Hilda in Racine, during his service in the Whiteside, Sr., Kenosha. U.S. Naval Armed Guard during W^orld W^ar II. The letters describe his surroundings PiATTEVTLi.E. Undated index to the Benton and day-to-day activities while in officer United Methodist Cemetery, including names training in Gulfport, Mississippi, and aboard of interred, birth and death dates, and the Ralph A. Cram with ports of call in locational remarks. Europe and later in the South Pacific. They Cemetery inscriptions, plot maps, and also reflect life on the homefront. Presented indexes (ca. 1845-1986) of the Arena Cem­ by Hilda Greenquist, Racine. etery, copied by Mr. and Mrs. Robert Demby. An unpublished histor)', 1897-1985, of Presented by Mr. and Mrs. Demby, Arena. fockey International, headquartered in A typescript record of the information Kenosha, written about 1983 by Richard H. found on the older and least legible mark­ Keehn with photocopies of photographs ers in the Argyle Cemetery copied by Dennis and advertisements; and advertisements and Gerard Dillon, 1977, arranged by lot num­ information about/. C. Leyendecker, an illus­ ber and indexed by adult male names and trator who did early advertisements for the veterans' names. Presented by Dennis G. company. Presented by Jockey Interna­ Dillon, Argyle. tional, Inc., via H. E. Somnier, Kenosha. Letters, 1944-1945, written by Kenneth (Publication restricted.) R. Fish (1908-1945), a fireman first class in Brief history (1846-1938) of the the U.S, Navy serving on Okinawa, to his Caledonia W'elsh settlement as told to Sa­ wife Wava in Richland Center, a few letters rah Roberts by her grandmother and par­ written to Fish by his daughter Lorraine,

136 AC;CESSIONS

who was about ten years old at the time, and Winskill, a lead miner in the Town of New two letters written by Naval officers to the Diggings (Lafayette County), written to family concerning the circumstances of his sister Jane Atkinson in Cumberland, Fish's death. Presented by Lorraine Fish England. The detailed letters include dis­ Schluter, Fairchild. cussions of lead mining, food prices, and Diaries (1885-1886; 1892; 1894-1895) cholera in New Diggings, family news, and of LeanderBlairHowery, a southwestern Wis­ differences between American and English consin farmer, businessman, and public customs. Also included are other family servant. The diaries include mention ofthe papers. Presented by Sarah E. Crann, weather, politics, his farming and business, Llangorse, Brecon, Powys, Wales. and his family. Presented by G. M. Howery and Bertha Howery Fromader, Burlington. RIVER FALLS. Photocopied pages from a case­ Undated Index to the 1910 Federal Census book, 1877-1886, kept by Dr. Frank W. Epley for Lafayette County, organized alphabeti­ who practiced in New Richmond from 1877 cally by last name and noting age, township to 1908, describing medical treatments used of residence, and census page number. Pre­ in cases including childbirth and various sented by the Area Research Center, Uni­ tumors, use of a blood transfusion with versity of Wisconsin-Platteville. remarkable results, and a number of autop­ Personal memoirs, written 1983-1987, sies he performed. Original loaned for copy­ by Rev. Henry f. Kurtz, on his boyhood ing by the State Medical Society of Wiscon­ experiences from 1902-1915, primarily con­ sin via LaVerne Bartel, Madison. cerning years in Boscobel where Kurtz's A funeral oration delivered by James H. father was minister at St. John Lutheran Laue at the funeral service for his father, Church. Discussed is time spent on the dentist Roy August Laue of River Falls, Sep­ William Heller farm, funerals and death, tember 9, 1979; presented by Ursula sleighriding and skiing, school, and area Peterson, River Falls. sites. Presented by Harold P. Kurtz, New Photocopy of a 1945 reminiscence by Brighton. Edwardfames Quintan (1871—) concerning Handwritten account by Bessie McKevett his growing up on "Tory Hill" in Milwaukee ofthe community surrounding the Brunson (1871-1880) and later, in Stanton (St. Croix School (Joint District No. 2, Towns of Patch County). They include family anecdotes, Grove and Mount Hope, Grant County), comments on neighbors, and descriptions including notes on people and their move­ of buildings and businesses in Milwaukee. ments to and from the community, sickness After 1880 they concern the family's estab­ and accidents of note, and school and com­ lishment of a general store and post office munity events, ca. 1845-1927. Presented by in Stanton, his father's death which left his Sadie Bailey, Mu Hope. mother with five children to care for, towns­ Record kept by Gerty Moon, a Ridgeway people and businesses, and activities there. dressmaker, of her clients' names and mea­ Quinlan also briefly discusses his adult work surements, ca. 1905. Presented by Jack with the railroad from the 1890's to 1941. Holzhueter. Presented byWalkerD. Wyman, River Falls. Photocopies of obituaries, family Bible Records, 1975-1976, ofthe River Falls records, and family letters, 1851-1939, of Bicentennial Commission, including corre­ members of the Ladner and Phillips fami­ spondence, grant applications, and nomi­ lies, written primarily to Priscilla Ladner nating statements for "Outstanding W^omen Phillips who was born in England, came to of River Falls Area." Presented by Timothy Wisconsin with her father in 1848, and lived L. Ericson, River Falls. in Mineral Point for many years after her Tombstone inscriptions copied by Judy marriage to Hugh Phillips in 1851. Pre­ Schultz in 1993 from tombstones in Sacred sented by James S. Mau, Kenosha. Heart Cemetery, located on County Highway Three letters (1850; 1853) hy foseph H in Burnett County. Information dates

137 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY WTNTER, 1996-1997

1850-1993 and includes the names ofthe Other papers concern farming, the Lake interred; birth and death dates; rank, ser­ and River Logging Company, the Plum Lake vice branch, unit, and war (for veterans); Golf Course, and other business and com- and notes on special markings or decora­ munit)' activities. Presented by Florence E. tions. There is also a name index. Presented (W^arner) Miller, St. Germain. (Copyright by Judy Schultz, Hudson. retained.) Family history of Marian O'Connel and Carl Wurtz, 1978, compiled by Keith G. STOUT. A collection of ephemera, ca. 1984, Wurtz. Included are transcripts of tape- from the Bolo Inn, a restaurant, motel, and recorded interviews with Wurtz' mother cocktail lounge in Menomonie, originally and father (I968-I978), family tree charts owned by Bill Braker and named for a black for both the WTirtz and the O'Connel fami­ Labrador retriever once owned by Braker. lies, and photocopies of miscellaneous docu­ A superb hunting dog and field trial cham­ ments. Presented by Keith G. W^urtz, Arling­ pion, Bolo is enshrined in the decor ofthe ton Heights, Illinois. restaurant. Presented by Billie Walleen, Menomonie. STEVENS POINT. "A statistical study of the Small yearbooks, 1923-1940, of the exemption of growing timber on forest Boyceville Woman's Club, containing meeting lands—Forest County, Wisconsin," 1912, a summaries, membership lists, and quota­ report by A. E.James of a study which used tions. Presented by the Boyceville Public Forest County as the test site to examine the Library. effect of exempting the value of the grow­ A brief history by Pauline Brusen(?) of ing timber in assessing forest land for taxa­ the Lolland (fohnson) Cemetery dedicated in tion purposes. Transferred from the SHSW' 1872 by the Lolland Scandinavian Evangeli­ Library, cal Lutheran Congregation, and located Typescript narrative by Robert f. Poss de­ four miles northeast of Chetek in Section scribing the brick making process used in 22 on a portion of the Paul and Bodel Antigo and some of the brickyards oper­ Johnson homestead; includes information ated there in the 1900's until the industry on the gravestones and a chart showing plot died out. Presented by Mr. Poss, Antigo. locations. Presented by Pauline Brusen, Memoirs by Helene Plath Tonn (1867- Chetek. 1953), recorded by her daughter, describ­ Photocopy of a diar)', 1945, kept by Leo ing her youth in Montello, visits to relatives Chermack of Barron, while a German pris­ in Minnesota, moving to New London after oner-of-war during W^orld W'ar II, a typed her marriage to August Tonn who was in­ transcript of the entries, and a 1944 letter volved in several businesses there, and later he wrote to his parents. Presented by Leo moving to Mena, Arkansas, where they Chermack, Barron. farmed, containing photocopied photo­ Minutes and correspondence of Dunn graphs, genealogical charts, and biographi­ County Sports Clubs Affiliated, a coalition of cal sketches of other family members. Pre­ hunting and fishing clubs founded to ex­ sented by Clarence Renter, Madison. change ideas and advance particular Papers, 1900-1983 (mainly 1913-1933), projects of member clubs. The group lob­ of Herbert Warner (1870-1952) and Bert bied state and county officials on concerns Warner (1900-1989), a father and son who ranging from boat safet)', bowhunting li­ were owners of Forest Home Summer Re­ censing fees, and fox bounties to the use of sort (later called Herbert and Bert's Re­ herbicides on roadsides and fire breaks and sort) , on Plum Lake in Vilas C]ountv', from the make-up and proposals of the Wiscon­ 1898 to the late 1940's. Included are de­ sin Conservation Commission. It sponsored tailed records from the advertisement and anti-fire and anti-littering campaigns, was operation of the resort, guest correspon­ involved in a pheasant-raising project, and dence, photographs, and home movies. created the David Mrdutt Artificial Leg

138 ACCESSIONS

Fund. Presented by Joseph M. Petryk, ger, a few playbills for musical events, and Boyceville. financial papers relating to the advertising Daybook, 1881, January-September, of company. Presented by the University of /. P. Kraft Company, a general merchandise Wisconsin-Stout Area Research Center. store in Menomonie, itemizing daily sales Original patent documents, 1880-1914, of clothing, groceries, and dry goods. Pre­ held by /. Burnham Tainter (1836-1920) sented by Brent D. Skinner, Menomonie. concerningimprovements to sluiceway gates Two letters, 1863 and 1870, written by or the "Tainter Gate," an important devel­ Samuel La Forge, Menomonie, to his son and opment in the history of dam building. Also daughter, urging them to join him while included is a photograph presumed to be of government land was still available and de­ Tainter. Presented by Margaret J. Burns, scribing his crops and a number of small­ Altoona, pox deaths; presented by Irene Schultze, Knapp. SUPERIOR. Ledger, 1889-1890, of Dear and Account book, 1899-1900, of Charles f. Hayes of Superior, Wisconsin, a railroad Olson, a Menomonie dealer in liquor and and dock construction firm owned by Rich­ cigars and proprietor of a boarding house. ard B. Dear. Presented by the Douglas Included are indexed individual accounts County Historical Society, Superior. for food and alcohol purchases, as well as Reminiscences hy fohn C. Jacques of life horses, feed, and bed and board. Presented during the 1930's in a Douglas County lum­ by Michael Kohl. ber camp where Jacques was a baker. In­ Three items concerning the Menomonie cludes descriptions of the camp, dining area preserved by Mary Ramsey: the original room, and kitchen, and of foods cooked for list of subscribers for purchasing a town the loggers. Presented by Howard Kanetzke, clock for the Stout Manual Training School Madison. clock tower (1892), and typewritten copies Typed, undated manuscript of an un­ of a Menomonie party invitation (1867), published autobiographical novel hy Debres and several entries from Abner Morse's J. Levy about growing up on a dairy farm diary describing his journey to River Falls near Superior in the 1930's and 1940's, (1856). Presented by Mary Ramsey, including information about the roles of Menomonie. women and children on the farm, work, Records, 1903-1949, ofthe ScritsmierClub, social life, leLsure time, and the effects of a fellowship club for boys organized by rural electrification. Presented by Don Levy, teacher Kate Scritsmier (1872-1953) for Lodi, California. her Sunday school class at the First Congre­ Farm Family Record Books, 1940-1960, gational Church, Menomonie, consisting printed by the Farm Security Administra­ primarily of incoming correspondence tion and kept by Fred Richart for his Guern­ from club members who had left sey farm in Solon Springs as a condition of Menomonie, including several who were the government loan which Richart had serving overseas during W''orld War I, plus secured. Each volume contains informa­ bulletins, financial materials, membership tion on the members of the household, lists, newsletters, and other files, including budgeted and actual family expenses, esti­ one folder about Kate Scritsmier's partici­ mates of farm production for the year, and pation in the suffrage movement. Presented reports of farm receipts and operating ex­ by the First Congregational Church, penses. Presented by Lucy Mitchell, Solon Menomonie. Springs. Records, 1908-1936, of Menomonie Ar esearch paper hy Arthur Roberts {1899- businessmen the Smith Bros., William S. and 1973), presented at the 1969 annual meet­ Fred H., managers of the Opera House, ing ofthe Douglas County Museum, which Grand Theatre, and Menomonie Bill Post­ traces land speculation in the Superior area ing and Advertising Co., including a led­ from 1852 to 1890. Placed on depo.sit by the

139 WlSC:ONSIN M.AG.AZINE OF HISTORY WINTER, 1996-1997

Douglas County Historical Society, Supe­ Beaver Bay (Lake County), Minnesota, 1858, rior. by Thomas Clark, who later became a Minne­ Records, 1934-1950, of the Superior sota legislator. Placed c:)n deposit by the Audubon Society, an organization established Douglas County Historical Society, Supe­ to study and stimulate the conservation of rior. birdsandwildlife. Documentation concerns the group's activities such as sponsoring WHITEWATER. Papers, 1907-1970, collected lectures, exhibits, placing bird hou.ses, plant­ hy H. L. Kadishon his grandfather, Leopold ing bushes and trees, a children's essay Kadish who came to America in 1849 and contest, sponsorship of thejunior Audubon started a monthly cattle fair in W^atertown Society, monitoring area envlromental and before moving to Chicago, consisting of a conservation issues, and encouraging aware­ biographical sketch and newsclippings re­ ness of conservation issues. Placed on de­ ferring to Kadish and the cattle fair, pre­ posit by the Douglas County Historical So­ sented by Mr. Kadish, Milwaukee. ciety, Superior. Reminiscence written in 1985 hy Duane Weather observations recorded for Su­ Koenig of his high school years in Fort perior,July, 1856-January, 1857 ,hy Richard Atkinson, 1931-1935. Presented by Duane Washington, a Superior resident; and for Koenig, Coral Gables, Florida.

Contingent on funding, the twent)'-sixth editing; Diana Hadley {Documentary Rela­ annual Institute for the Editing of Histori­ tions ofthe Southwest), annotation; Richard cal Documents will be held June 16-21, Leffler {Documentary History of the Ratifica­ 1997, in Madison. Jointly sponsored by the tion ofthe Constitution), transcription; Beverly National Historical Publications and Wilson Palmer (Thaddeus Stevens Correspon­ Records Commission (NHPRC), the State dence), selection and indexing; John P. Historical Society ofWlsconsin, the Univer­ Kaminski {Documentary History ofthe Ratifica­ sity of Wisconsin, the institute will provide tion ofthe Constitution), promoting and fund­ detailed theoretical and practical instruc­ ing editions; Beth Luey (Arizona State Uni­ tion in documentary editing and publica­ versity), publishing an edition; Michael tion. Sperberg-McQueen (Text Encoding Initia­ The institutes have been extraordinarily tive/Model Editions Project), electronic productive, providing training to 420 par­ editions. Diana Hadley, Richard Leffler, ticipants to date. Of these, sixt)'-eight are and Beverly Wilson Palmer will serve as the heading or have headed important docu­ resident advisors. mentary publication projects and many Single accommodations for fifteen to others have worked as full-time historical eighteen scholars are provided at the Wis­ editors. Institute graduates also include col­ consin Center Guest House on the Univer­ lege and universit)' faculty, editors of state sity of Wisconsin campus. The Guest House historical publications and staff editors of is run much like a hotel, and is two blocks other publications, archivists, manuscript from the State Historical Society, where the librarians, government historians, and daily meetings are held. graduate students from many universities. Application to the institute is competi­ The fifteen to eighteen interns meet every tive, with numerous applicants every year morning and most afternoons for lectures from all over the country. Further informa­ and presentations by experienced editors. tion and application forms are available Three resident advisors are available for from the NHPRC, National Archives and consultation during the term of the insti­ Records Administradon, W'ashington, DC tute. 20408; phone (202) 501-5610'; e-mail: The 1997 facult)' and their topics are: [email protected]. The application Michael Stevens (State Historical Society of deadline is March 15, 1997. Wisconsin), introduction to documentary 140 Proceedings of the One Hundred and Fiftieth Annual Business Meeting of the State Historical Society of Wisconsin, 1995-1996

Minutes of the Annual Meeting

RESIDENT Glenn R. Coates called the P 150th annual business meeting to Re-elected to three-year terms expiring in fune, order at 8:13 A.M. in the Capitol Ballroom 1999: of the Madison Concourse Hotel. Eighty members and guests were present. Mary A. Sather, New Richmond President Coates said 150 years ago our Vivian L. Guzniczak, Franklin founders decided to create this Society, and Jane B. Bernhardt, Cassville here we are 150 years later in Madison. Charles E. Haas, La Crosse President Coates reported the Society is Paul C. Gartzke, Madison alive and well and indicated he was very George H. Miller, Ripon much impressed during the past two weeks Sharon L. Leair, Genesee Depot when interviewing candidates for a new director of the Society. Every candidate, Elected to a three-year term expiring in June, without exception, indicated how very 1999: pleased they were to be considered for the job of director of this Society, a premier Douglas A. Ogilvie, Hortonville society. President Coates said that was be­ cause ofthe Society's founders, and those President Coates congratulated those who have guided us during the past 150 individuals elected or re-elected to the Board years. of Curators, and looked forward to working The reading of the June 16, 1995, min­ with them in the year ahead. utes was waived, and approved as published Mr. Holscher, Treasurer, reported on in the Wisconsin Magazine cf History. One the financial activities ofthe Society for the member opposed because the minutes were fiscal year ending June 30, 1996. He re­ not read. ported the Society continued its statutory Members of the Nominating Commit­ duties with a Legislative General Purpose tee included Mr. Jerry Phillips (chair), Mr. Revenue Budget of $10,283,400 compared Gerald D. Viste, Mrs. Bette M. Hayes, Mrs. to the previous fiscal year of $10,114,300, Mary Connor Pierce, and Mr. David A. an increase of $169,000 (1.7 per cent). Jankoski. A total of 1,332 ballots were cast in Gifts and donations for the first eleven the recent Board of Curators election. No months of the fiscal year were $394,200, names had been submitted by petition. The which is up 4.4 per cent. Last night it was membership 141 VMSCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY VMNTER, 1996-1997 announced that the annual fund drive Dane Count)' Airport, and Bill promoted reached 5170,000, with more donations the state as they rode the Merrimac Ferry on expected before the end of June. the way to Devil's Head Lodge for the an­ Endowment income for the first eleven nual meeting. months was $274,000, which is $6,600 more than the previous year. Long-term capital "I feel very privileged to be with you, to gains for the first nine months earned talk with you, and to participate in the $440,100, compared to 8386,200 for the 150th annual business meeting ofthe Soci­ same period last fiscal year. ety. I very much appreciate President Coates Federal funds in the first eleven months having asked me to participate in the were $756,000, which is down slightly from Society's sesquicentennial celebration. He $830,000 the previous year. and I were both emotional in that meeting Earned income generated by goods and when I announced my decision to resign. services provided was $3,013,077 for the "It is also fitting that you hear from the first eleven months ofthe fiscal year, almost acting director, Robert Thomasgard, who identical to the receipts for 1994-1995 which has been managing the affairs ofthe Society were $3,024,754. Most programs had in­ over the last two months. In our nearly creases of 2 to 5 per cent during the first eleven years together, we have worked very eleven months, but the museum archeol­ much in tandem and as a team. I don't og)' program had fewer cash receipts in the expect ever in my working life to experi­ amount of $128,000. This was caused by a ence quite the same situation, and never large account receivable due from the De­ expect to have a colleague with his abilities, partment of Transportation as of May 31, energy, integrity, humor, and capacity. So it 1996, because the contract for archeology is a privilege for me to give my last report to work had not been signed by both agencies. you with an individual who as much as Pie charts based on a financial report for anybody is responsible for successes the the entire fiscal year will be published in the Society may have enjoyed. Winter, 1996-1997, issue of the Wisconsin "At Devil's Head in 1985, there were two Magazine of History. basic challenges for me as the new director. The Treasurer's Report was accepted as One was a series of issues which the Board presented. of Curators had identified. The other was President Coates said Dr. Muller in­ an agenda that I brought to the position formed him he was leaving the Society in and which had, in many ways, propelled me Februar)', but graciously agreed to report to into wanting this job ver)' much. The Soci­ the membership today. Wx are all going to ety, I believe, has accomplished what is miss him since he has done a superb job. essentially our motto or slogan in the ses­ President Coates indicated Mr. William Kidd quicentennial logo, 'Forward Through the called yesterday and reminisced that I had Past.' I had become committed to the no­ the same responsibility of selecting a new tion (most of you have heard me say it more director as he did eleven years ago. Presi­ than once) that only through the perspec­ dent Coates indicated the fact that we are tive of the past could we make reasonable both from Racine does not mean that every public policy and institutional decisions to time a president takes office, the director create a better future. I wanted ver)' much resigns. President Coates indicated that Mr. to see what I could do to help make that part Thomasgard had been appointed acting of life in Wisconsin, and from this pulpit, director, and he and Dr. Muller would de­ sometimes beyond Wisconsin. liver the annual report of the Societv for "I would like to talk a bit about 1995, in 1995-1996. those terms, by reporting on the year Dr. Muller began his report by remind­ through the issues that the Board handed ing the audience that eleven years ago this to me in 1985. Looking back ten years, one month. Bill and Elaine Kidd met him at the ofthe priorities was governance. The Soci-

142 PROCEEDINGS: 1995-1996

ety had been through a radical change in heard. We have almost always had the Presi­ the makeup of its Board, and itwas not yet dent Pro Tem ofthe Assembly on the Board. comfortable with that change. The nomi­ The same effect. Leader of the caucus or a nating committee this year looked at the leader in the caucus and a leader of the Board and tried to assess what, outside of Rules Committee. The results this year re­ personalities, makes the strongest Board ally were quite stunning. The Society be­ for this institution. They considered geo­ lieved when it came out of the 1995-1997 graphic distribution, interest in program budget cycle that an error had been made. areas of the Society, a balance of capacity to We tried to fix that last July with a guberna­ do a variety of things for the Society, and torial veto, but the error could not be ve­ ethnic and racial issues, and made deci­ toed. We went back to the Legislature to try sions about the list of nominees for the to repair that budget. Representative Huber three years ahead. I find that making elec­ is here today. He will tell you this kind of tions non-ad hominem has really improved repair, during what may have been the most the process. With legislators around the difficult biennial budget process in table, some folks did not want to talk to anybody's memory, was a very difficult task. them. We now have legislators who are It would not have happened without the working well on behalf of the Society, and Board' s legislators. Treasurer Dick Holscher they are extremely important contributing reported that in fiscal 1996 the Society had members of the Boarcl. $100,000 more than in fiscal 1995. The "The plenary sessions of the Board of Society is one of three state agencies to have Curators are often more quiet. Policy issues more funds in 1996 than it had in 1995. The are hammered out within committees. reason for that is extraordinary support Members of the Board receive all commit­ from legislative members. tee materials. If they are interested in issues "Administration relations was another of another committee, they are welcome to task that this Board put in front of me in attend. The committees have now been 1985, and in fiscal 1996 that also was re­ structured so they are not program ori­ flected in the budget. Contained in the ented, but are oriented across programs. capital budget is a recommendation for $5 This Society has avoided what many other million to provide off-site storage. How not-for-profit institutions have not—com­ much of that building will be devoted to the mittees for a library or archives which then Society and to the State Records Center, become advocates for those programs in and what ofthe Society's collections will be the board. We have a collections committee stored in that facility, is not clear. Brother which cuts across the entire agency and a Thomasgard and my successor will con­ facilities committee which cuts across the tinue to grapple with that issue. In 1991, it entire agency. Each committee considers was learned that a new Department of Cul­ institutional priorities on the whole as op­ tural Affairs was being proposed, which posed to adopting one particular program would combine the Arts Board, the State for which it advocates. Historical Society or its sites, and the Divi­ "The legislative relations thisyear, build­ sion of Tourism. During a late-night session ing on the change in the mid-1980's of with administration officials, I indicated I having legislators on the Board, paid divi­ did not want to oppose them, but they had dends that I cannot underline enough. Since to know that I would fight such a merger 1985, the President of the Senate has always with every fiber in my body. I attended a been on this Board. What does that mean? press conference and a briefing for state It means that leader is always on the Rules officers where the Governor and the Secre­ Committee. It is the Rules Committee that tary of Administration presented their new decides what gets calendared for action. plan, and we were, happily, not included in Without that kind of help, bills can languish it. As the Secretary of Administration ex­ no matter how good they are, and never get plained why they were proposing this new

143 WISCONSIN MACiAZINE OF HLSTORY WINIER, 1996-1997

department, every example related to our descriptions. It should be the basis for the historic sites. I found a small cognitive dis- office of school services to develop curricu- sidence there. lar packages for schools. The images can be "Again, in late 1995, I could begin to placed in malls, bank lobbies, and other sense that the effort to form a Department public spaces throughout the state. It should of Tourism required a critical mass large be the basis for scholars to discuss change. enough to justify' a department. Our his­ It should be the basis for a public television toric sites, with their number of positions program, a videotape, or internet informa­ and budgets, would help that effort, and I tion. It is precisely what this institution managed to get that out of the budget bill. should be doing. In March, 1996, after spending the day in "In 1985, a development program was legislative budget discussions, I received a begun. Nineteen ninety-five has been a call from the Secretary of the Division of great year. Treasurer Holscher reported Tourism in which he indicated he and the that the annual fund has not only gone Governor had just discussed shifting the beyond its $150,000 goal, but for the fourth historic sites to the Division of Tourism. I straight year gone up double digits in per­ went quietly ballistic. I called then presi­ centage. Through the Wisconsin History dent Dr. Hicklin and the legislative mem­ Foundation, a planned-giving initiative is bers of the Board of Curators, and we suc­ available. The foundation has agreed to ceeded in defeating the proposal. develop an endowment to underwrite a "In the past year, the Society has played planned-giving officer and to underwrite a leading role in the organization of the that program until the endowment is in Wisconsin Sesquicentennial Commission. I place. The Wisconsin History Foundation will tell you briefly about a program which has made tremendous strides in increasing the Society has agreed to produce for the its corpus to $2 million. Treasurer Holscher state's celebration. It is a very interesting talked with you this morning about public program. A group of the staff is selecting a monies. Private funds, through the founda­ series of a hundred or more historical im­ tion, have become an increasingly impor­ ages of the state from the early daguerreo­ tant part of direct support for the programs types to more recent photography that in­ of the Society. The Jeffris Family tellectually describe a good portion of Foundation's gift of $600,000 for renova­ Wisconsin's development. It could be a tion work at the Villa Louis historic site may landscape, a cityscape, a corner tap in Mil­ be the largest grant the Society has ever waukee, a bank building in Mellen. It could received from a private source. The be a Queen Anne house in Eau Claire, a $400,000, raised largely by the Friends of school, a barn, the interior of a parlor from Old World Wisconsin, made it feasible to the 1880's. Photographers are being con­ move and renovate the Caldwell Farmers' tracted to duplicate those photographs in Club Hall. A commitment has been made 1996 in four seasons. Possibilities might be bv the Kohler Foundation toward recon- J the inside of a parlor, the inside of a school, struction of the Robinson/Herrling dam the exterior of a school, a Milwaukee cor­ and sawmill at the Wade House historic site. ner tap that is now boarded up, a cornfield Smaller programs include $10,000 to pro­ in Middleton with a distinctive feature on tect the Frank Lloyd WTight collection, and the horizon that is now condominiums. $5,000 to purchase John Fuller's forty-six Those photos will become the intellectual photos, each abt^ut the size of a business basis for a series of exhibits during the card, mostly of downtown Madison, circa sesquicentennial year. The project will in­ 1861-1863. fluence audiences from school children to "The Friends ofthe State Historical Soci­ scholars, and it should be the basis for a etv' continue to gain momentum, touting a museum exhibit where the original and membership of 450 people. Friends groups 1996 images are placed side-by-side with at various historic sites continue to grow.

144 PROCEEDINGS: 1995-1996

"The membership program has library, giving it the first major boost in struggled. A membership survey was con­ general purpose revenue support in many ducted in 1987. Income level was corre­ years. lated with age. It was discovered that the "The largest issue the Board handed me, older the members, the more income they and one on which I think we made huge had. 'Why in the world, then, are we offer­ strides, is increased visibility ofthe Society. ing senior citizens membership rates if they The Governor's economic summits, much have the most dough at their disposal?' We to the surprise of many, included the State discovered that good logic does not always Historical Society. At those summits, I made make good decisions, just as good logic a case for why the perspective of the past always does not make good history. We merits not only the support ofthe state but discovered the 'gray panthers' rebelled. can affect positively the economy and other They wanted their senior citizens' discounu parts ofthe lives ofthe people in this state. and we gave it back to them. The member­ That is part of the attempt to make the ship program is recovering members lost Society and its mission something that is during that turmoil. accepted viscerally by policy makers, by lead­ "Virtually every collection the Society ers, and by the people of this state. has is controlled by an updated collections "The Society had a good year. Certainly policies. These policies describe what we the public programs of the Society have collect and why, standards for collection gathered strength, not only in the fiscal care, loans and conservation, ethics issues year that we are just closing, but in the and those responsible for them. Most of closing months of the previous fiscal year. those policies underwent another iteration, The Civil War program and the American another modernization last year. Film program are examples of programs "The Native American Graves Repatria- which are attracting large audiences, rang­ fion Act (NAGPRA) is also an issue. AL ing from high school students to scholars. though a four-year-old law, the regulations They are an important part of the present have not been written, but federal law re­ and the future in the Society. quires they be administered. We have to "The staff has produced a sesquicenten­ look at every Native American artifact in nial issue of the Wisconsin Magazine of His­ our collection that may have anything to do tory. I had come here in 1985 after just with graves or funereal activity, or with the resigning a nine-year stint as editor of the spiritual life, and notify every tribe that may journalof the Vermont Historical Society. I be involved about what items are in our thought I knew something about editing collections. The museum staff must then historical society journals. However, I was collaborate with all tribes who would like to determined not to try immediately to re­ have these items repatriated. peat the past and get involved with the "During the fiscal year, the archives be­ Wisconsin Magazine of History. As a result, I gan the Public Records Appraisal Project to have never done anything with that maga­ dispose of 25,000 to 30,000 cubic feet of zine other than convince its editors to get it public records. If unorganized collections back on schedule. can be appraised—given interest and facil­ "A feasibility study for a capital cam­ ity repair and maintenance and janitorial paign several years ago discovered the Soci­ costs—approximately $4 to 5 million would ety to its best supporters was a little bit like be saved over the next twenty years through an elephant and blind people. Everybody the project. In three to four years, public loved the Society, but they loved one part of records will be accessible to researchers, it and didn't know much about the rest of it. and up to 40 to 50 per cent ofwhat was in A logo and standard stationery were de­ storage gone. When those dollars are ex­ signed that listed the major program areas pended for this project, they will shift to the within the Society. The Society would be

145 V\lSC;ONSIN .VIAGAZINE OF HISTORY WINTER, 1996-1997 viewed more as a comprehensive whole as played on a regular basis in more than 100 opposed to a series of isolated programs. A communities across Wisconsin. Even with logo is a step in the right direction. Seeing the paring down of the National Endow­ the logo on the banner on the headquar­ ment for Humanities budget, the State His­ ters building, and on mats on the marble torical Society managed to maintain fund­ floors, you have to look at 'Forward Through ing for the series. the Past.' I hope it stays for many years to "The Northern Great Lakes Visitor Cen­ come. ter designed for Ashland will become a "Historic preservation in this state is reality. The State Historical Society is a known nationally as perhaps the best state­ major player in that effort. Outside of the wide program. Only two states, other Madeline Island Historical Museum, the than Wisconsin, offer tax credits for owner- center will provide a programmatic basis in occupied houses. Throughout the state the Lake Superior basin. are a series of housing projects which are "Historic sites programming is growing combining affordable housing tax credits, and getting stronger. Caldwell Farmers' state tax credits, and federal historic preser­ Club Hall provides a public meeting place vation tax credits to facilitate economically at Old World Wisconsin. It is hoped the hall viable projects. Investors take historical will operate much the way it did for farmers' buildings and convert them into apart­ social groups in 1870, the year the Club was ments. It is an extraordinary way in which formed. First Capitol at Belmonu a new site, historic preservation is helping Wisconsin, was dedicated a week ago today. Other not only to improve its housing stock, but to possible sites include the H. H. Bennett improve communities, and downtown ar­ Studio in Wisconsin Dells and Black Point eas. on Lake Geneva. Both would put the Soci­ "Historic preservation is now sitting at ety in front of very different and important the table with other agencies in the devel­ audiences. The Civil War re-enactment at opment of the state land-use plan. A series Wade House continues to grow. Last Sep­ of workshops have been held on how to tember over 12,000 people attended the preserve historic barns, and to our surprise, two-day encampment. Yet another prop­ we had to turn people away. erty, the Lunt-Fontanne home. Ten Chim­ "The office of school services became neys, at Genesee Depot, Wisconsin, is in the fully operational in 1995-1996. It has now hands of a sympathetic owner who is work­ begun to produce not only publications but ing with the State Historical Society to pre­ programs around the state and in the serve that important property's future. schools. That program will accelerate, and "There have been many successes in in many ways make as much of an impact for 1995-1996. When I talked to you last year in the Societ)' as any other program. the Al. Ringling Theatre in Baraboo, the "Since becoming the state historian. Dr. horizon was much less clear than it is in Michael Stevens started a publication se­ June, 1996. The budget bill was still under ries, 'The Voices from Wisconsin's Past.' consideration. We have come through some Voices from Vietnam is a powerful and ex- very roiled and troubled waters since then. traordinar)' volume in that series. It pro­ The Society is financially on fairly firm vided the basis to collect statewide the ground. I have talked about the successes of papers, letters, memorabilia, or other ma­ the past. I now turn to my very good friend terials describing Wisconsin's experience and very esteemed colleague Bob in the Vietnam War. Thomasgard for the rest ofthe report." "The reading discussion series thatjohn Kaminski and I began with the bicentennial Mr. Thomasgard began his report indi­ ofthe U.S. Constitution in 1987 has contin­ cating Dr. Muller had been a great spokes­ ued non-stop from that date. They have man for the Society. "Listening to some of

146 PROCEEDINGS: 1995-1996

the issues Nick discussed, it is difficult to preserve, conserve, and interpret that site separate the past from the future. Although to the public. It focuses on all parts of the the Society has achieved some progress, mission statement. more progress is necessary. "We, like other people, have competi­ "The Society continues to receive re­ tion. During the director-search process, I quests to preserve cultural resources. Dr. asked several of the candidates a question Muller, in his report, mentioned Ten Chim­ about our competition. It is not a question neys, the H. H. Bennett Studio, and Black many of us in the Society ask ourselves. In Point. A number of requests over the last some ways we have monopolies on a variety several years from the Department of Natu­ of services, but over time monopolies disap­ ral Resources suggested that other historic pear, and competitors arise. It helps drive resources they now control come under the the need to provide better and relevant jurisdiction of the Society. Obvious con­ services to people. We must determine what cerns include adequate staff and budget our customers and users want, and whether and whether we have enough resources to we are providing those services effectively take care ofwhat we already have. However, for the public. such requests are a positive reflection on "In the area of private funding, much our past accomplishments. Many organiza­ has been accomplished, but more must be tions and individuals are looking to the done. The planned-giving program is an Society even more than they have in the example. Fundraising is paying dividends past as a place to get things accomplished. and will continue to do so with assistance That is a credit, not only to Nick, but to all from the Board of Curators and the Wiscon­ past directors, and to the Board. .sin History Foundation. "We must take advantage of new tech­ "A good share ofwhat I have discussed nologies. Data processing is very heavily here will require choices, more choices imbedded in the agency. People have ac­ than we probably have had to make in the cess to the internet. For quite some time, past. There is a tremendous momentum the OCLC and REIN national databases behind what the Society does in collecting have been used in the library and archives, and providing public services. The Society respectively. New Minolta copiers in the may be faced with some hard choices; it is library allow visitors to photocopy pages of not immune from that process. a book right side up, increasing copying "We must look at new revenue sources. speed with less stress on bindings. The Soci­ David Pamperin, our Historic Sites Admin­ ety must take advantage of and fund other istrator, is analyzing and developing a five- technologies, such as CD-ROM. year schedule of incremental fee increases "Dr. Muller has also mentioned a num­ and programmatic planning that meet pro­ ber of activities relating to preservation and fessional historic site standards. It is antici­ conservation. We have enormous collec­ pated that other state historical organiza­ tions, but nowhere near the resources to be tions will follow this model. Five years from able to preserve and conserve those assets. now, the sites program should repeat the Conservation and preservation require even process to remain ahead ofthe curve. Pru­ greater visibility. dent management of the sites requires an "Dr. Muller mentioned several facilities incremental fee increase plan. projects. These projects have provided the "One way in which the Society tries to best opportunity to convince the Division reach its users and customers is through a of Facilities Development and the Legisla­ facility such as the Northern Great Lakes ture ofthe importance ofthe Society's mis­ Regional Visitor Center. The center will sion to preserve history. The Villa Louis create a presence in northern Wisconsin project is a tremendous example of marry­ that will be a tremendous benefit to the ing fund raising with the need to better Society as well as that part of the state.

147 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY WINTER, 1996-1997

"The Robinson/Herrling sawmill and projects for which funding is not otherwise dam at Wade House will provide an exciting available." new kind of interpretation that is found in very few places in this country or Canada. There was no old business to come be­ "With all of those kinds of problems, fore the membership at this time. challenges, and issues on the table, the There was no new business to come major asset the Societ)' has is its staff and before the membership at this time. boards. We have continued to fill vacant The 150th annual business meeting ad­ positions with talented, experienced, and journed at 9:10 ,\.M. energetic people. The Society continues to get better with a dedicated, involved Board Respectfully submitted, of Curators. The Wisconsin History Foun­ dation continues to provide an increasing ROBERT B. THOVL'VSGARD, JR. amount of vital support for programs and Acting Secretary

Digest of Board Actions

At Madison, October 20, 1995 Jeffris Family Foundation for underwrit­ ing the planning and the first important • Approved a resolution expressing deep phase ofthe interior renovation of Villa concern about the difficulty Mr. Coates Louis. The Board of Curators accepts isexperiencingwith his back, disappoint­ the $600,000 grant for this purpose with ment that he could not preside over the the express recognition of the impor­ first meeting during his tenure as Presi­ tance and value of completing the entire dent, and sent best wishes for a speedy master plan to make Villa Louis the pre­ and full recover)'; miere example of a country Victorian • Approved a resolution of appreciation house in the nation; for Dr. Fannie E. Hicklin recognizing Elected Mrs. Patricia A. Boge (LaCrosse) her service with distinction as President (replacing Mr. Harry F. Franke) to a two- of the Board of Curators; year term ending December, 1997, or • Approved the minutes of the June 15, whenever her successor is duly elected; 1995, meeting at Baraboo; and Mr. William F. Greenhalgh • Approved the strategic plan narrative, as (Baraboo) to complete a term ending distributed, and approved in principle December, 1997, vacated by the resigna­ the goals and objectives for 1996-1998; tion of Secretary Carol Skornicka; • Accepted the state relations committee Adopted a resolution of appreciation recommendation to move Founders Day for Ms. Sharon Mulak for her twenty activities from February to the fall ofthe years of service and Mr. John Peters for year; his thirty years of service as head of gov­ • Approved the applications for affiliation ernment documents; of the Hmong Cultural and Historical Approved a resolution of appreciation Society (Winnebago County) and the to the museum staff for a dedicated ef­ Portage Historical Society (Columbia fort in realizing the opening ofthe third County); and fourth floors of the State Historical • Expressed deep appreciation to the Museum.

148 PROCEEDINGS: 1995-1996

At Wisconsin Dells, February 24, 1996 the State Historical Society and Circus World Museum; • Approved the minutes of the October Expressed its deep gratitude and admi­ 20, 1995, meeting as circulated; ration for the extraordinary contribu­ • Accepted recommendation ofthe mem­ tions that Professor Merle Curti has made bership task force to award a life mem­ to the field of history in Wisconsin and in bership to Mrs. Connie Meier; the United States generally, and ex­ • Bestowed the distinguished title of Fel­ tended its wishes for a speedy recovery low of the State Historical Society of from his present illness. Wisconsin on Dr. Leslie H. Fishel, Jr.; • Approved the applications for affiliation ofthe Knox Creek Heritage Center (Price At Madison, June 20, 1996 County), Moquah Heritage Society (Bayfield County), Lebanon Historical • Moved that the Board of Curators con­ Society (Dodge County), and Stone Lake vene in closed session to discuss person­ Area Historical Society (border of nel matters as provided in section 19.85 Washburn and Sawyer counties); (I) (c), Wisconsin Statutes; • Approved the requests for continuance of • Moved that the Board of Curators recon­ affiliation (end of probationary period) of vene in open session; the Albany Historical Society (Green • Approved the Villa Louis remodeling County), Stratford Area Historical Society and restoration project; (Marathon County), and West Salem His­ • Approved the applications for affiliation torical Society (La Crosse County); of the Osseo Historical Society • Adopted the "Strategic Plan, 1995-1999"; (Trempealeau County) and the Wiscon­ • Re-elected to the Board of Directors, sin Pottery Association (Dane County); Historic Sites Foundation, Inc., Mr. Fred • Approved the continuance of affiliation Pfening (Columbus, Ohio), Mr. James (end of probationary period) ofthe Black Kiefer (Baraboo), and Mrs, Renee Boldt Earth Historical Society (Dane County) (Appleton), to two-year terms expiring and the Clinton Community Historical December 31,1997, or until their succes­ Society (Rock County); sors shall be named; • Bestowed the distinguished title of Fel­ • Adopted a resolution of appreciation low of the State Historical Society of for Mr. Gerald Raymond Eggleston for Wisconsin on Dr. Joan E. Freeman; twenty-nine years of service on the occa­ • Approved the deaccession of four items sion of his retirement; from the collections of the Madeline • Adopted a resolution of appreciation Island Historical Museum; for Mr. Greg Parkinson recognizing his • Expressed its heartfelt thanks to Dr. H. decade of strong leadership at Circus Nicholas Muller III, recognizing his de­ World Museum; cade of strong leadership as director of • Expressed its appreciation to Mr. Clark the State Historical Society of Wisconsin. Wilkinson, its late, former colleague, recognizing his many contributions to

149 V\TSCONSIN NLAG.AZINE OF HISTORV WTNTER, 1996-1997

is awarded for research at the graduate Alice E. Smith Fellowship level and beyond in Wisconsin and U.S. business and economic history, with prefer­ CAROLINE WALDRON, a doctoral candidate at ence given to topics on Wisconsin and the the University of Illinois at Urbana- American Midwest and/or for research us­ Champaign, is the 1996-1997 recipient of ing the collections of the State Historical the Alice E. Smith Fellowship. Ms. Waldron Society of Wisconsin. The fellowship is is working on a dissertation titled, "Prairie named for the late John C. Geilfuss, past Immigrants: Class Formation, Racial Con­ president of the Board of Curators of the sciousness, and American Identity in the Society and retired chairman ofthe board Illinois River Vallev Mining Towns, 1894— of Marine Corporation and Marine Na­ 1924." tional Exchange Bank. The choice of the THE ALICE E. SMITH FELLOWSHIP, which Geilfuss Fellow is made by a committee carries an outright grant of $2,000, honors selected by the Society, which reserves the the former director of research at the State right not to award the fellowship in any Historical Societ)' of Wisconsin who retired given year. Applicants should submit four in 1965 and died in 1992. The fellowship is copies of a current resume and four copies awarded annually to a woman doing re­ of a letter of not more than two pages, search in American history, with prefer­ describing their background and training ence given to applicants who are doing in historical research and a description of graduate research in the history of Wiscon­ their current research work. This descrip­ sin or ofthe Middle West. The choice ofthe tion should include the proposal, types of fellow is made by a committee selected by sources to be used, possible conclusions, the Society, which reserves the right not to and the applicant's conception ofthe work's award the fellowship in any given year. The significance. applicant should submit four copies of a two-page, single-spaced letter of applica­ Applications must be received by Febru­ tion describing her training in historical ary 1 of each year and should be addressed research and summarizing her current re­ to: Dr. Michael E. Stevens, State Historian, search project. This description should in­ State Historical Society ofWlsconsin, 816 clude the proposal, t)'pes of sources to be State Street, Madison, Wisconsin 53706- used, possible conclusions, and the 1488. applicant's conception ofthe work's signifi­ cance. Applications must be received by July 15 of each year and should be addressed to: Amy Louise Hunter Fellowship Dr. Michael E. Stevens, State Historian, State Historical Societ)' ofWlsconsin, 816 State Street, Madison, Wisconsin 53706- FELICIA A. KORNBLUH, a doctoral candidate 1488. at Princeton University, is the 1996 recipi­ ent of the Amy Louise Hunter Fellowship. Kornbluh will use the award to work on her John C. Geilfuss Fellowship dissertation, "A Right to Welfare?: Poor Women, Professionals, and Poverty Pro­ JENNIFER KLEIN, a doctoral candidate at the grams, 1935-1975." University of Virginia, is the 1996 recipient THE AMY LOULSE HUNTER FELLOWSHIP car­ of the John C. Geilfuss Fellowship. Klein ries an outright award of $2,500. The fel­ will use the fellowship to work on her disser­ lowship is awarded in even-numbered years tation, "Managing Security: The Business at the graduate level and beyond for re­ of American Social Policy, 1920's-1960's." search on topics related to the history of THE JOHN C, GEILEUSS FELLOWSHIP carries women and public policy, broadly con­ an outright grant of $2,000. The fellowship strued, with preference given to Wisconsin

150 PROCEEDINGS: 1995-1996

topics and/or for research using the collec­ The WUliam Best Hesseltine Award tions ofthe State Historical Society ofWls­ consin. Dr. Amy Louise Hunter headed the THE THIRTIETH ANNUAL William Best Wisconsin Bureau of Child and Maternal Hesseltine Award for the best article to be Health from 1935 through 1960. The published in the Wisconsin Magazine of His­ Hunter Fellowship was established in her tory during 1994-1995 was given to memory through a bequest left by her hus­ Catherine Cleary for her article "Married band, Frederick G. Wilson. The choice of Women's Property Rights in Wisconsin, the Amy Louise Hunter Fellow is made by a 1846-1872," in the Winter, 1994-1995, is­ committee selected by the Society, which sue. reserves the right not to award the fellow­ Established in memory ofthe past presi­ ship in any given year. Applicants should dent of the State Historical Society ofWls­ submit four copies of a current resume and consin and distinguished University ofWls­ four copies of a letter of not more than two consin professor. The William Best pages, describing their background and Hesseltine Award consists of $100. There is training in historical research and a de­ no deadline for submissions, and manu­ scription of their current research work. scripts may relate to the history ofWlscon­ This description should include the pro­ sin and the Middle West or to themes of posal, types of sources to be used, possible larger national interest. conclusions, and the applicant's concep­ A retrospective on Professor Hesseltine tion of the work's significance. appeared in the Winter, 1982-1983, issue Applications must be received by May 1 of the Magazine. of even-numbered years and should be ad­ The editors ofthe Magazincwould like to dressed to: Dr. Michael E. Stevens, State acknowledge the long and valuable service Historian, State Historical Society of Wis­ of Allan G. Bogue, Richard N. Current, and consin, 816 State Street, Madison, Wiscon­ Reginald Horsman as the judges of the sin 53706-1488. Hesseltine Award.

151 Wisconsin History Foundation

STABLISHED in 1954 as a private, non-profit corpora­ E tion, the Wisconsin History Foundation has the sole purpose of assisting the State Historical Society in ways mutu­ ally agreed upon by the Foundation's Board and the Society's Board of Curators. This assistance supports a wide range of activities for which no public or unbudgeted private funds are available, including research projects, television programs, publications, professional education of staff, and building construction at our historic sites. The Board of the Foundation includes members of the Society's Board of Curators as well as other distinguished citizens interested in the history of Wisconsin and in the objectives of the Society. The Foundation derives its chief source of income from gifts and grants. Donations to the Foundation are tax-deductible.

Officers

GEORGE L. VOGT, Secretary ROCKNE G. FLOWERS, President DELORES C. DUCKLOW, Assistant Secretary GLENN R. CO.ATES, 1st Vice-President EUGENE L. SPINDLER, Assistant Treasurer M.ARGARET B. HuMLEKER, 2nd Vice-President W. PHARIS HORTON, Assistant Treasurer RHONA VO(;EL, Treasurer and Assistant Secretary

Board of Directors Term Expires 1996 l^erm Expires 1997 Term Expires 1998

BRUCE T. BLOCK GLENN R. CO.ATES JAMES B. BURT Milwaukee Racine Madison ROCKNE G. FLOVNTRS WI PILARIS HORTON DON R. HERRLING Madison Madison Appleton GARY P. GRUNAU M.AR(;ARET B. HUMLEKER GEORGE H. MILLER Milwaukee Fond du Lac Ripon RHONA VOGEL ROYC. LABUDDE GERALD D. VISTE Brookfield Milwaukee Wausau ROBERT S. ZIGM,AN ROBERT B. L. MURPHY EDWIN P. WILEY Mequon Middleton Milwaukee MRS. CAROL T. TOUSSAINT Madison

Directors Emeritus MRS. IRA BALDWIN Madison THOMAS H. B/VRLAND Eau Claire COLLINS H. FERRIS Madison

152 Historic Sites Foundation

N 1960 the Historic Sites Foundation was established I as a private, non-profit corporation for the sole purpose of assisting the State Historical Society's historic sites program at Baraboo. It currently serves as the management corporation, for the Society, ofthe Circus World Museum in Baraboo. The Foundation's Board includes members ofthe Society's Board of Curators as well as distinguished citizens with an interest in circus history and in the Society itself. Its sources of income are Circus World Museum admissions and related revenue, gifts, and grants. Gifts to the Foundation are tax-deductible.

Officers

JOHN C. GOODALL,JR., President RENEE BOLDT, Secretary FRED A. RJSSER, Vice-President JAMES L. KEEEER, Treasurer

Board of Directors

Term Expires 1996 Term Expires 1997

JOHN C. GOODALL, JR. PATRIC:IA A. BOGE Northbrook, lUinois La Crosse FRED A. RISSER RENEE BOLDT Madison Appleton WAYNE MCGOWN J.AMES L. EJEFEER Madison Baraboo JAMES R. UNDERKOFLER FRED D. PEENING III Middleton Columbus, Ohio WILLLAM GREENHALGH Baraboo

C. P. Fox"^ Baraboo M.AYOR DEAN STEINHORST Baraboo WILLIAM J. HARDER Baraboo

Ex Officio GEORGE L. VOGT Madison Director, State Historical Society cf Wisconsin

^^Serves at pleasure of Governor

153 1995-1996 Revenues (Actual)* Total $15,610,627

State Appropriations 10,280,294 Earned Income $3,586,018

Gifts, Donations, Endowments $927,869

Federal Grants and Contracts $816,086

*Based on preliminar)'year-end financial information

Expenditures (Actual) Total $15,434,639 Archives T,518,908

Historic Sites Librar)' $3,438,523 $1,928T50

Microfilm Lab Executive Office $261,392 $329,128 Administrative Services Debt Service $627,052 $1,216,217 Physical Plant $4i 4,605 Management Support Services Museum $639,205 State Reladons $2,195,608 $267,458 Public History $929,815 Historic Preservation 154 1,668,578 1996-1997 Revenues (Budgeted) Total $15,475,400

State Appropriations Earned Income, 10,107,600 $3,754,700

Gifts, Donations, Endowments $676,700

Eederal Grants and Contracts $936,400

Expenditures (Budgeted) Total $15,475,400

Archives $1,481,000

"\ Historic Sites 9.6'•>%^ \ $3,327,100 Library $1,982,100, 21.5% 12,8% Executive Office Microfilm Lab $336,600 $259,900 ^^^^2^ 4.7% Administrative Services Debt Service 6.5% $723,600 $1,007,400 3.7%/ Physical Plant Management SupportV 3.9%. ^"-^W ,$571,400 Services \ 14.5% $598,600 s^^^g Relations- 5.4% / Museum $283,000 11.7% \ / $2,255,400 Public History $843,600 Historic Preservation -. r^- $1,805,700 UNITED STATES Statement of Ownership, Management, and Circulation POSTAL SERVICET (Required by 39 USC 3685)

1. Publication Title 2. Publication Number 3. Filing Date

Wisconsin Magazine of History 0 0 4 3 - 6 5 3 4 8/20/96 4. Issue Frequency 5. Number of Issues Published Annually 6. Annual Subscription Price

Quarterly 4 $30.00

7. Complete Mailing Address of Known Office of Publication (Not printer) (Street, city, county, state, andZIP+4) Contact Person Paul Hass Telepfione 816 State Street - Madison - Wisconsin - 53706 -1488 608/264-6461 8. Complete Mailing Address of Headquarters or General Business Office of Publisher (Not printer)

516 State Street - Madison Wisconsin - 53706-1488 9. Full Names and Complete Mailing Addresses of Publisher Editor, and Managing Editor (Do not leave blanic) Publisher (Name and complete mailing address) The State Historical Society of Wisconsin 816-State Street - Madison WI 53706-1488

Editor (Name and complete mailing address) Paul Hass The State Historical Society of Wisconsin 816 State Street - Madison - WI - 53706-14! Managing Editor (Name and complete mailing address)

10. Owner (Do not leave blank. If the publication Is owned by a corporation, give the name and address of the corporation immediately followed by the names and addresses of all stockholders owning or holding 1 percent or more of the total amount of stock. If not owned by a corporation, give the names and addresses of the Individual owners. If owned by a partnership or other unincorporated firm, give its name and address as well as those of each individual owner If the publication Is published by a nonprofit organization, give its name and address.)

Full Name Complete Mailing Address State Historical Society of Wisconsiji i16 State Street, Madison, WI 53706- ^\-4Si.

11 - Known Bondholaers, Mortgagees, and Other Security Holders Owning or Holding 1 Percent or More of Total Amount of Bonds, Mortgages, or other Securities. If none, check box D None Full Name Complete Mailing Address

N/A N/A

12. Tax Status (For completion by nonprofit organizations authohzed to mail at special rates) (Check one) The purpose, function, and nonprofit status ot this organization and the exempt status for federal income tax purposes; D Has Not Changed During Preceding 12 Months n Has Changed During Preceding 12 Months (Publisher must submit explanation of change with this statement)

PS Form 3526, September 1995 (See Instructions on Reverse) 13. Publication Title 14. Issue Date for Circulation Data Below The Wisconsin Magazine of History Summer 1996 15. Average No. Copies Each issue Actual No. Copies of Single issue Extent and Nature of Circulation During Preceding 12 Months Published Nearest to Filing Date

a. Total Number of Copies (Net press run) 6000 6000

(1) Sales Through Dealers and Carriers, Street Vendors, b. Paid and/or and Counter Sales (Not mailed) Requested Circulation (2) Paid or Requested Mail Subscriptions (Include 4880 advertiser's proof copies and exchange copies) 51 00

c. Total Paid and/or Requested Circulation ^ 51 00 4880 (Sum of 15b(1) and 15b(2)) r

d. Free Distribution by Mail (Samples, complimentary, and other free) 584 567

e. Free Distribution Outside the Mail (Carriers or other means) 477 477

f. Total Free Distribution (Sum of 15d and 15ej ^ 1059 944

g. Total Distribution (Sum of 15c and 15f) ^ 5577 5824

(1) Office Use, Leftovers, Spoiled 423 176 h. Copies not Distributed (2) Returns from News Agents

i. Total (Sum of ISg, 15h(1), and 15h(2)) ^ 6000 6000

Percent Paid and/or Requested Circulation (15c/15gx 100)

16. Publication of Statement of Ownership Publication required. Will be pnnted in the _ . issue of this publication. D^ublication notfequire^. , Publisher, Business Manager, or Owner Date

I certify that all information furnisheo on this form is true and complete. I understand that anyone who furnishes false or misleabingMnformation on this form or who omits material or Information requested on the form may be subject to criminal sanctions (including fines and imprisonment) and/or civil sanctions (including multiple damages and civil penalties).

Instructions to Publishers

1. Complete and file one copy of this form with your postmaster annually on or before October 1. Keep a copy of the completed form for your records. 2. In cases where the stockholder or security holder is a trustee, include in items 10 and 11 the name of the person or corporation for whom the trustee is acting. Also include the names and addresses of individuals who are stockholders who own or hold 1 percent or more of the total amount of bonds, mortgages, or other securities of the publishing corporation. In item 11, if none, check the box. Use blank sheets if more space is required. 3. Be sure to furnish all circulation information called for in item 15. Free circulation must be shown in items 15d, e, and f. 4. If the publication had second-class authorization as a general or requester publication, this Statement of Ownership, Management, and Circulation must be published; it must be printed in any issue in October or, if the publication is not published dunng October, the first issue printed after October. 5. In item 16, indicate the date of the issue in which this Statement of Ownership will be published. 6. Item 17 must be signed. Failure to hie or publish a statement of ownership may lead to suspension of second-class authorization.

PS Form 3526, September 1995 (Reverse) Contributors

NEIL SCHMITZ is a professor of English at the LARRY SKI.EN.AR received degrees from State University of New York at Buffalo. He Baldwin-Wallace College (B.A., English, is the author of OfHuck and Alice: Humorous 1959) and Indiana University (M.A., En­ Writing in American Literature (1984) and glish, 1961). Eor the next thirty years he has written widely on nineteenth-centur\', worked for the Defense Department as an modern, and contemporar)' American lit­ analyst, staff officer, and manager. He re­ erature. His most recent essays are "Black tired in 1991, and since then has spent Hawk and Indian Irony" in the Arizona much of his time painting, writing poetrv', Quarterly (Winter, 1992), "Mark Twain's and doing research on the Little Big Horn. Civil War" in The Cambridge Companion to He is currently writing a book on the sub­ Mark Twain (1995), and "Faulkner and the ject. Post-Confederate" in F'aulkner and the Cul­ tural Context (1997).

158 Corporate Sponsors

AAL MADISON GAS AND ELECERIC COMPANY Appleton Madison AD.VIANCO, INC. MARSHALL A,ND ILSLEY FOUNDATION, INC. Ripon Milwaukee THE ALEXANDER (>)MI>..\NIES MARSHALL ERDMAN .AND ASSOCIATES, INC. Madison Madison A,MERIC.AN FAMILY INSURANCE GROUP MENASHA CORPORATION FOUNDATION Madison Neenah APPLETON MILLS FOUNDATION NELSON INDU.STRIES, INC. Appleton Stoughton BANTA CORPOR..\TION FOUNDATION, INC. NORTHWE.STERN MUTUAL LIFE INSURANCT. (COMPANY Menasha Milwaukee THE CAPITAL TIMES/WLSCON.SIN STATE JOURNAL PARKER PEN USA LIMITED Madison Janesville CAPITOL POLICE PLEA.SANT COMPANY Madison Middleton J. I. CASE RACINE FEDER.ATED, INC. Racine Racine CONSOLID.VLED PAPERS FouND,vnoN, INC. RAYOVAC CORPOR.ATION Wisconsin Rapids Madison CREAT^'E FORMING, INC. RIPON FOODS, INC. Ripon Ripon J. P. CULLEN AND SONS, INC. RURAL INSURANIT. COMPANIES Jane.sville Madison CUNA MUTUAL GROUP FOINDATION, INC. TRAPPERS TURN GOLF COURSE Madison Wisconsin Dells FIRSTAR BANK OF MADLSON TWIN DISC, INCORPORATED Madison Racine GENERAL CASUALTY IN.SURANCE (>).MPANIES UNITED WISCONSIN SERMCES FOUNDATION, INC. Sun Prairie Milwaukee GERE CORPOR,\TION WISC-TV3 Janesville Madison GOODMAN'S, INC. WALGREENS Madison Madison GRUNAU COMPANY, INC. WEBCRAFTERS-FRAUTSCHI FOUNDATION, INC. Milwaukee Madison HARI.EY-D.AVIDSON, INC. THE WEST BEND CO.MPANY Milwaukee West Bend THE HOUSE ON THE ROCK WINDWAY FOUNDATION, INC. Spring Green Sheboygan JOHNSON CONTROLS FOUNDATION WLSCONSIN ENERGY CORPORATION FOL'ND.ATION, INC. Milwaukee Milwaukee KOHLER CO. WISCONSIN PHY-SICI.ANS SERVICE Kohler Madison LANDS' END, INC. WISCONSIN POWER & LKTEE (COMPANY Dodgeville Madison Patrons

DR. DEAN M. CONNORS MR. THO.MAS M. JEFFRIS II Mineral Point Janesville MR. JOSEPH M. DERO.SA MESS RUTH DEYOUNC; KOHLER Wauwatosa Kohler MRS. GERALDINE N. DRISCOLL MR. AND MRS. 1R\"IN .S.ATHER Winneconne New Richmond DR. ROBERT H. IRRMANN MR. AND MRS. D.AVID STUCKI Madison Madison MRS. K. W. JACOBS, JR. Hartford

Felloivs

RICHARD N. CURRENT ROBERT C. NESBIT Massachusetts Washington LESLIE H. FKSHEL, JR. WILLIAM F. THOMPSON, JR. Madison Madison JOAN E. FREE.MAN Madison

Curators Emeritus

E. DAVID CRONON HOWARD W. MEAD Madison Madison JANET S. HARTZELL ROBERT B. L. MI RPHY Grantsburg Middleton N.ATHAN S. HEFFERN.AN PH\LLIS C SMYTHE Madison Milwaukee ROBERT H.IRRMANN ROBERT S. ZIG.MAN Madison Mequon HELEN E. JONES Fort Atkinson

Life Members

DR. EDWARD P. ALEXANDER MR. WILLLAM K. HARDING MR. AND MRS. JOHN H. MURPHY MR. J. R. A,\IACKER MR. THOMAS E. HAYES MR. JOHN T. MURPHY MESS EMMELINE ANDRUSKEVICZ MR. JO.SEPH F. HEIL, SR. MR. AND MRS. ROBERT MURPHY MISS HELEN C. ANDRUSKEVICZ MR. GERALD E. HOLZM.AN DR. AND MRS. EUGENE NORDBY MR. DENNIS ANTONIE MRS. PETER D. HUMLEKER, JR. MRS. LORETTA B. PECK Ms. MARION KUEHL .APPLEG.ATE MR. VIRGIL GEORGE JACKSON MRS. A. J. PEEKE MS. POLLY ATHAN MS. CAROLYN JOHNSON MR. AND MRS. LLOYD PETTIT DR. .AND MRS. IRA BALDWIN MR. AND MRS. WILLIAM KAESER MR. JOHN J. PHILIPPSEN MRS. J.ANE K. BILLINGS MR. AND MRS. RASMUS B. A. KALNES MRS. JOHN W. POLLOCK MR. ROBERT E. BILLINGS DR. JOHN P. KAMINSKI MRS. LUMANA MARY SIBERZ MR. AND MRS. OSCAR BOLDT MRS. HARVEY B. KREBS MR. AND MRS. PHILIP SILLMAN Ms. IRENE DANIELL BOSSE MR. ROY C. LA BUDDE MR. JOHN S. SKILTON MR. P.AUL L. BRENNER MR. ALFRED A. LAUN III MRS. CLAUS SPORCK MR. LOUIS H. BURBEY MR. JOHN I. LAUN MR. JOHN STEINER MR. THOMAS E. CAESTECKER MR. MARVIN MAASCH MR. FRED J. STRONG MRS. FRANCISJ. CONW.AY DR. EUGENE I. MAJEROWICZ MRS. MILLIE TAIT MISS LOUISE H. ELSER MR. C. L. MARQUETTE MR. AND MRS. DUANE VETTER MR. .AND MRS. JOHN E. FORESTER MRS. MARY C. MARTIN MRS. WILLIAM D. VOGEL MR. AND MRS. WALTER FRAUTSCHI MR. AND MRS. DANIEL F. MCKEITHAN, JR. MR. WALTER L. VOGL DR. PAUL W. GATES Ms. CONNIE MEIER MR. WALTER J. VOLLRATH MR. TERRY L. HALLER MRS. BESSIE MELAND MR. AND MRS. FRANCIS WENDT MR. .AND MRS. TOM HANSON MR. P. O. MINTZLAFF MR. JOHN WYNGAARD THE BOARD OF CURATORS

THOMAS H. BARLAND VlVLAN I,. Gl ZNICZAK VIRGINIA R. M.ACNEII. Eau C;iaire Franklin Bayside JANICE M. BEAUDIN CHARLES E. HAAS GE()R(;E H. MILLER Madison La Crosse Ripon JANE B. BERNHARDT BETTE M. HAYES DouGiAS A. 0(;iLviE Cassville De Pere Horionville PATRICIA A. BOGE FANNIE E. HICKLIN JERRY Piiii I IPS I,a Crosse Madison Bayfield DAVID E. CIARENBACH RICHARD H. HOLSCHER MARY Ct)NNOR PIERCE Madison Milwaukee Wisconsin Rapids GLENN R. COATES GREGORY B. HUBER FRED A. RISSER Racine Wausau Madison JOHN M. C:()OI'ER, JR. MRS. PETER D. HI MEEKER. BRIAN D. RUDE Madison Fond du Lac Coon Valley NESS FI.ORES THOMAS MOUATJEFFRIS II JOHN M. RUS.SELL Waukesha Janesville Menomonie STEPHEN |. FREESE RA.S.MUS B. A. K.AI NES MARY A. SATHER Dodgeville Eagle New Richmond PAI I C. GARTZKE RUTH DE YOUNG K{)IILER GERALD D. VISTE Madison Kohler Wausau SHARON L. LEAIR Genesee Depot

L/\WRENCE T. RIORDAN, President, Friends ofthe Stale MARVEL ANDER.SON, President ofthe Wisconsin Council Historical Society of Wisconsin for Local History ROCKNE G. FLOWERS, President of the Wisconsin History DAVID W. OI.IEN, Senior Vice-President, University Foundation ofWlsconsin System

Friends ofthe State Historical Society of Wisconsin

Officers LAWRENCE T. RIORDAN, Wausau NANCYJ. EMMERT, Madison President Treasurer JENNIFER E.AC^ER EHLE, Evansville JENNIFER EA(;ER EHLE, Evansville Vice-President Past President KATHY L. RIORDAN, Wausau DELORES C. DUCKI.OW, Madison Secretary Staff Liaison

Trustees NANCY B. ALLEN BARBARA J. KAISER West Bend Madison RUTH WHITE ANDERSON DoNNA M. KALNES Edgerton Eagle Ai.ETA BARMORE CHRIS KERWIN Middleton Madison SHIRLEY BARTI EY BARBARA A. NORDSTROM Bloomington Manitowoc LAWRENCE BEHI.EN M.ARt.i'ERiTE OTTO Green Lake Racine PATRICIA CXXTIRAN KATHY L. RIORDAN De Pere Wausau Jo GREENHAL(;H MARK H. SURFI'S Madison Manitowoc HAR\A H.ACHTEN GEORGE A. TAI BOI III Madison Madison F.ANNIE E. HlCKl.lN JACK WIEDABACM Madison Fox Point THE HISTORICAL SOCIETY SHALL protnole a wider appreciation ofthe American heritage zvilh particular emphasis on the collection, advancement and dissemination of knoiuledge ofthe history of Wisconsin and the West. —Wisconsin Statutes, Chapter 44

uiii(X:iH»^i"i

Edxniii Willard Dcttiitig'.s classic piiinling of jrini Sicotel iirriving in (inrii lia\ in ie>34. ,\ scholar remeitdicrs it. page 104.

o/WISCONSIN ft.n.:,'d rhroufl. Iht fail J