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A Gigantic Little Circus An Equal Voice in Milwaukee The Menomonie Photographs of Albert Hansen i ' - 181855 9/16/03 10:29AM Page 2
WHS Image ID 7953
uring his youth and as a young man, Albert Hansen pho tographed small-town life in Menomonie and at Stout Institute. DThe Red Cedar River, ca. 1910, provided the backdrop for this young woman, whose face graces the front cover. Hansen's images of early twentieth-century Menomonie reveal the cultural transformations many small communities throughout the nation experienced as techno logical and societal changes affected life on the former frontier. More of Hansen's photos and a brief essay about him appear in this issue. m State Historian Michael E. Stevens
Editor J. Kent Calder
Managing Editor Diane T. Drexler
Associate Editor Margaret T. Dwyer
Production Manager Deborati T. Johnson
Reviews Editor Masarah Van Eycl<
Research and Editorial Assistants Joel Heiman, John Nondorf, Dave Wasl Designer The AVS Group The Wintermutes' THE WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY, Gigantic Little Circus published quarterly, is one of the many benefits of membership in the Wisconsin Historical Society. Indi By Milton J. Bates vidual memberships are $37.50 per year; senior citi zen individual, $27.50; family, $47.50; senior citizen family, $37.50; institutional, $55; supporting, $100; sustaining, $250; patron, $500; life (per person), $1,000, Speaking with an 18 To receive the Wisconsin Magazine of History, Equal Voice join the Society! To join or to give a gift membership, send a check to Membership, Wisconsin Historical The Reform Efforts of Milwaukee's Society, 816 State Street, Madison, Wl 53706-1482, or call the Membership Office at 888-748-7479. You Mary Blanchard Lynde can also join via e-mail, [email protected], or at the Society's Web site, www.wisconsinhisto- By Ellen D. Langill ry.org (click on "Become a Member"). You can support other Wisconsin Historical Soci ety programs by making a donation to the Wisconsin Historical Foundation (608-264-6585). A Menomonie Perspective JO The WMH has been published quarterly since 1917 by the Wisconsin Historical Society (Phone The Photographs of Albert Hansen 608-264-6400). Copyright © 2003 by the State His torical Society of Wisconsin. Permission to quote or By Anne Hansen othenA/ise reproduce portions of this copyrighted work may be sought in writing from the publisher at the address above. Communication, inquiries, and manuscript submissions may also be addressed to [email protected]. Information about the maga An All-American in 38 zine, including contributor's guidelines, sample arti cles, and an index of volume 84 can be also be found All Respects at the Society's Web site by following the "Publica tions" link from the home page. The Letters of Dave Schreiner Photographs identified with PH, WHi, or WHS are By Ellen D. Goldlust-Gingrich from the Society's collections; address inquiries about such photos to the Visual Materials Archivist, and Kurt Gingrich 816 State Street, Madison, Wl 53706-1482. Many WHS photos are available through the Wisconsin Historical Images digital service available on the Web site. (From the home page, click "Archives.") The Wisconsin Historical Society does not assume responsibility for statements made by con tributors. ISSN 0043-6543. Periodicals postage paid at Madison, Wl 53706-1482. Back issues, if avail Editors' Choice 50 able, are $10 plus postage (888-748-7479). Micro filmed copies are available through University Letters from Our Readers 55 Microfilms, 300 N. Zeeb Road, Ann Arbor, Ml 48106. Back Matters 56 On the front cover: A serene face provides a compelling study for photographer Albert Hansen, ca. 1910. WHS Image ID 7953 VOLUME 87, NUMBER 1 / AUTUMN 2003 181855 9/16/03 10:30AM Page 2 The hand-carved marionette used in the Wintermute Brothers' Circus now sits in the Bark River Woods Historical Society in Hebron, Jefferson County. Joel Heiman 181855 'ilX&lQ^ 10:31AM Page 3 <> WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY THE WINTERMUTES' By Milton J. Bates NTE^KiUTE'S DOUBLE SHOW Circus World Museum Wintermute Circus lithograph poster, ca. 1908. he Hebron Town Hall, in Jefferson County, has red and white striped clown suit occupies the case, along with served many hinctions since it was built in 1902. an animal trainer's whip, a fez with tassel, two juggler's Indi TToday it is on the National Register of Historic Places. an clubs shaped like bowling pins, an aerialist's harness, sev It is also the home of the Bark River Woods Historical Soci eral big top tent stakes, a circus handbill, and an assortment ety, which maintains a small museum on the second floor. of photos and newspaper clippings. The people who used Mounting the stairs, the visitor enters a large open room with these items are buried, most of them, on a hilltop cemetery a a stage at the opposite end. Stamped tin covers the ceiling and half-mile away. This display case, smaller than a coffin, is the walls, giving the room the appearance of an enormous old- last resting place of a circus that once required fifteen wagons fashioned breadbox. Footsteps echo as one strolls past the to haul its wonders from one midwestern community to exhibits of farm tools, household implements, schoolroom another. furnishings, and American Indian artifacts. Near the stage is The marionette is at rest now, and the stripes on its clown a glass-topped wooden case whose contents seem out of place suit have faded. A century ago, when they were still a vivid in a collection devoted largely to the workaday struggle red, the little wooden figure held the attention of several for subsistence. A hand-carved marionette dressed in a hundred men, women, and children seated on bleachers AUTUMN 2003 # •£> 181855 9/16/03 10:32AM Page 4 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY = ITHEGBEIITMELBOURNIS^ double Arena. MAMHOIH MlSftM M>,^g^ ^^"^^^ Wild Bca-sts and ^^g^fi^n Circus ... rerforming Animals BH^IH A\endgerie ^nH^^^ngk Museum, liippodrome Wallace ^^^^^^^P^^ Hlld Animdl Show Wmf^^W ^'•fPHUNT ACT "^sP^k^^^^^^V ^lu'"3'°.. -r-^l^^ ^K^/l^} ^t^^^^SP^^K^f ^ ^' Joseph I » III ur Big Uniled Sliows m ''HMIML BEMS GKEAr MELBOUHN B g Uniled Shows XRrmEINDOUS JERICHO 2 Performances Dail\ Holiday Parade A courier for the Great Circus World Museum Melhourn show included the elephant Jericho, also called Jargo (ca 1904). i AUTUMN 2003 181855 9/16/03 10:32 AM Page 5 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY Thomas, Harry, and Halsey Wintermute. Setting up the Wintermute Brothers main tent in South Shore, South Dakota, 4 July 1906. Circus World Museum Circus World Museum. WINTER - N45-14-5 Interior of Wintermute Brothers main tent, measuring 80 by 140 feet (ca 1905). Circus World Museum Bills posted for Great Melhourn show in Bush City, Minnesota, on 9 June 1904. CF9135 AUTUMN 2003 181855 'il\&l02 10:32 AM Page 6 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY beneath the billowing roof of a great tent. A steady undercur tions on the word "Show," such as "Colossal Shows," "Five rent of sound rose from excited children and shushing par Big United Shows," "Circus," "Museum and ents, animals in harness and candy vendors, luffmg tent Menagerie," "Gigantic Shows," "New Gigantic walls and straining guy ropes. A heady bouquet of Shows," and "Wagon Shows." Like other business canvas, sawdust, animal dung, popcorn, and sweat es, circuses used the word "Brothers" to project suffused the air. Despite these distractions, all eyes an image of solid management and deep pock were focused on the center ring, where the minia ets. In 1901, after the Wintermutes were well ture clown gamboled on a miniature stage. Laughing established, they began to call their circus the at his physical antics and outrageous repartee, the Great Melbourne United Shows, perhaps count audience almost forgot the slim, dark-haired ing on the association with an Australian young man with a mustache who loomed over port to lend their enterprise a touch of the stage, manipulating the marionette's exoticism. This was the name embla strings. zoned on their posters through 1909, John Harry Wintermute was the again with variations and some man's name. Known as Harry to his times without the final e in "Mel family and friends, he was the bourne." driving force behind this circus Apart from the posters, a and a man of many talents. calculated extravagance, the Besides the marionette show, his brothers kept their expenses repertoire included a ventriloquist low by making the most of fam act, an "Irish turn" (probably a ily talent. Thomas, the acro humorous ethnic impersonation), a bat, trained his son, Thomas magic show in which he appeared as Clarence, as a wire-walker and "Ching Ling Foo, the famous Chinese hurdler. Halsey's wife, Maggie, was conjurer," a balancing act with spinning an aerialist. They filled out the pro plates, and a "philosophical fan trick" gram with acts drawn from the pool of wherein he transformed a single sheet of regional, largely anonymous talent. Reflect paper into more than fifty objects. He was the ing on the Wintermute rosters in Badger ringmaster and played an alto horn in the State Showmen, their authoritative survey of band. His more prosaic roles included ticket- Wisconsin circuses, Fred Dahlinger Jr. and seller, boss canvas-man, and master of trans Stuart Thayer observe that "name after name portation. ^ appears that just as quickly disappears. Even a To another performer it seemed as though seasoned researcher finds none that have any Harry was "pretty nearly the whole show him future in the business. It is as if their one bright self "2 But he got plenty of help from his moment of fame came in their listing with this younger brothers, Thomas and Halsey. obscure wagon show."* Thomas spelled his brother in the center ring Unlike the many circus performers who fol with a show featuring trained dogs, ponies, lowed their parents on the sawdust trail, Harry and goats. He even trained a dog to play (sort Wintermute and his brothers came from a family of) a scaled-down piano. Thomas was also the of farmers. What enticed them into this line of troupe's juggler and acrobat. Halsey worked work? We lack a definitive answer to that question behind the scenes as the show's publicist, its because the Wintermutes, unlike P. T. Barnum "crackerjack advance agent."^ While his older and other voluble showmen, left no personal brothers diverted the people in one communi memoirs apart from scattered remarks in ty, he was already in another, distributing newspaper interviews. James Wintermute, handbills (called "couriers" or "heralds," one of Halsey's grandsons, speculates depending on their format) and that the brothers grew tired of farm hanging posters on fences, walls, life and hankered after adventure.^ barns, and billboards. ^fc— Harry listed his occupation as Besides announcing the marvels Circus World Museum "pedler" on the 1880 federal census, about to unfold, the posters imprinted Oscar Schmitt, a Wintermute Brothers Circus performer. which suggests that as a young man of the show's "brand name" in the public nineteen he was restless and looking mind. The Wintermute brothers tried on several labels for opportunities on the open road.^ over the years. Starting out around 1884, they called That same year the legendary circus figure George their circus the Wintermute Brothers Show. They W. Hall purchased a twenty-acre farm in Evansville, retained that name through the 1900 season with varia- thirty-two miles southwest of Hebron, and made it the H AUTUMN 2003 181855 9/16/03 10:32 AM Page 7 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY headquarters of his show.^ Known as "Popcorn" from his boyhood days as a "candy butcher" or refreshment ven dor with the circus, Hall had already acquired considerable show experi ence. The circus dynasty that he estab lished in 1880 lasted for several generations and eventually drew the Wintermutes into its orbit. For young Harry, Popcorn George may have rep resented an exciting alternative to farming. James Wintermute believes that the boys' interest was further whetted by their parents' tales of circuses based in the East. This is plausible, considering that the parents came to Wisconsin around 1860 from an area just across the Hudson River from Westchester and Putnam Counties in New York State. Those counties are known as the "cradle of the American circus" because so many shows originated there. John and Sarah Gonklin Win termute may therefore have seen cir cuses and told the boys about them. Perhaps this is why John Wintermute supported his sons in an enterprise that most farmers would have considered frivolous at best, disreputable at worst. Returning home after one unsuccessful season, the brothers fully expected a lecture on the folly of circus life. Instead, their father told them: "Never mind, boys. You've got to take bumps in every business. You're young yet and you can stand it. Get some more PH 2987 horses and go ahead again. "^ Some local boys discovered an alternative to the twenty-five cents circus admission. heir youth was indeed an asset, for circus troupers the fifteen wagons already mentioned plus two advance wag lived a hard life, especially those who relied on horse- ons. They performed in a tent that measured 80 by 140 feet. Tdrawn wagons for transportation. Prior to the Civil Smaller menagerie, sideshow, dressing, and cook tents com War, Wisconsin became the headquarters of many circuses pleted their canvas outfitting.^ because the state provided cheap land, abundant pasture and From early May through late September, sometimes water for livestock, and proximity to a growing population beginning earlier or finishing later, they followed much the that the eastern shows could not reach by wagon. By the same routine. Before the season opened they hired perform 1880s, however, when the brothers first set out from the fam ers and crew and planned their route. The Wintermutes' itin ily farm on the Bark Rver, both the eastern shows and the erary took them through small towns in Wisconsin, premier Wisconsin circuses headquartered in Delavan and Minnesota, Iowa, Illinois, Nebraska, Kansas, and South Baraboo had become large multi-ring extravaganzas that Dakota, though not all of these in a given year. They avoided traveled by rail from one major city to another. The Winter scheduling a performance too soon after a competing circus mute circus was thus an anachronism, a throwback to the would empty the townspeople's pockets. They favored com early shows that traveled overland in wagons, featured a ,'^, munities that were known or reputed to be friendly to cir one-ring show, and charged a quarter (increased to thirty- ^^ cuses, avoiding those that charged excessive licensing fees five cents in 1914) admission. At the height of their suc or gouged on lodging for performers and feed for animals. cess around the turn of the century, the brothers used They also avoided places where local riffraff and petty AUTUMN 2003 181855 9/16/03 10:32 AM Page 8 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY criminals made life difficult for themselves and their audience. between Cambridge and Edgerton, in relatively familiar ter A week or two before an engagement, the troupe's ritory, causing that day's show to be canceled.^2 advance man—Halsey, in the case of the Wintermute cir However early they rose, however frazzled by their jour cus—visited the community to pay fees, ney, the company had to be in tiptop form for secure lodging and livestock feed, hang This magazine cover highlighted the the afternoon and evening performances. posters, distribute handbills, and arrange Vanderburg Brothers Circus run by Under these conditions and surrounded by Franii and Zella Wintermute Hall in for advertising in the local newspaper. distractions, the aerialists performed feats in the 1920s and 1930s. Meanwhile, some distance in his wake, the which less than perfect timing could result in main company followed a predictable Circus World Museum serious injury or death. Though infrequent, daily schedule. Its members usually rose such accidents happened often enough that in between 2:00 and 5:00 a.m., depending 1881 the Milwaukee Sentinel called for legis on how far they had to travel to the next lation barring women and children from aer town on their itinerary. On reaching the ial acts.i^ After the evening show the troupers outskirts of the community, they sent the considered themselves lucky to get a few work crews ahead to raise the tents and set hours' sleep in a local hotel or, failing that, up the "blues," or bleacher seats, while the on the ground beneath a circus wagon. The staff and performers changed into their next day the show went on in another town, costumes. The circus arrived with a flour regardless of fatigue and minor injuries. ish, its bandwagon leading a parade of wag Such was life in a small wagon show ons and animals down the under ordinary conditions, main street. It put on a and routine could turn to matinee show at two catastrophe in a heartbeat. o'clock and an evening The huge canvas tents that show at eight, each pre had liberated circuses from ceded by a half-hour musi large halls in big cities were cal entertainment. Before vulnerable to fire, storm, the sun rose the next and wind. Tent manufac morning it was back on the turers treated the canvas road, traveling to the next with a mixture of naphtha venue.1° and paraffin, rendering it This was the routine waterproof but vulnerable virtually every day but to carelessly tossed matches Sunday, when the troupe and—prior to electrical observed a day of rest by lighting—open-flame meth repairing equipment and ods of illumination. A bliz laundering costumes. The zard caused the Great Wintermutes' itinerary for Melbourne tent to collapse the beginning of the 1907 in late April 1907, forcing season is typical. The cir cancellation of the Edgerton cus was scheduled to play Handler with dogs and ponies featured in Wintermute Brothers Circus. and Stoughton shows listed thirteen Wisconsin com- in the itinerary above. For muni ties—Whitewater, tunately, this caprice of Edgerton, Stoughton, Brooklyn, Belleville, New Glarus, Blan- nature caused no loss of life. In contrast, when lightning chardville, Argyle, South Wayne, Gratiot, ShuUsburg, Cuba struck the Rngling Brothers menagerie tent in Rver Falls in City, and Hazel Green—in fifteen days, covering a distance 1893, it killed seven people and seriously injured more than of 164 miles. twenty others.^^ The life was demanding, both physically and emotionally. The larger exotic animals posed another kind of risk. Dur The roads were poorly maintained and apt to turn into a ing the nineteenth century, the Wintermute shows featured quagmire during spring rains. "For the first 63 days," the domestic animals such as Thomas's dogs, ponies, and goats. Wintermutes reported to the entertainment trade magazine In nearby Evansville, however, George W. Hall and his fam Billboard in 1902, "we had rain every day but nine, and so ily developed shows with elephants and large cats in addition far have had no dry week.''^^ On uphill hauls, the per to unusual domestic animal acts, such as "talking" pigs. formers often dismounted from the wagons to avoid Popcorn George's daughter Mable (sometimes spelled straining the draft animals. The routes were poorly Mabel) was still a teenager when she performed with Big marked, and a mistake could cost them dearly. In 1901 Charlie, an elephant billed as "Jumbo the Second.''^^ three Great Melbourne wagons took a wrong turn Unlike the original Jumbo, which P. T. Barnum had AUTUMN 2003 181855 9/16/03 10:33 AM Page WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY purchased from the Royal Zoological Gardens in England for $10,000 (equivalent to nearly $170,000 today), this Jumbo had a nasty temper. One day, after appearing for years in the ring with Mable, Big Charlie suddenly picked her up with his trunk, whirled her around, and threw her into a barn wall. It was either Big Charlie or anoth er elephant that attacked her father, knocking Popcorn George unconscious and crushing his hip.'^ They could have fared much worse. When an elephant misbehaved in Racine in 1898, its handler jabbed it behind the ear. The New York Clipper, an entertainment trade magazine, recounts what happened next: "This infuriated the animal, and with a roar he rushed for Anderson, grabbing him with his trunk, and, lifting him as though he were a peanut, he dashed him three or four times against the ground, hammered him against the water trough, and then threw him on the ground, stood over him, buried his tusks in him and disemboweled him,"'' otwithstanding such risks, the Wintermutes began early in Nthe twentieth century to lease large animal acts from the Hall family circuses. Advertising for the Great Mel bourne Big United Shows of 1907 fea tured Jargo (also called Jericho) the Performing War Elephant and Wallace the Untamable Lion, Jargo was described as battle-scarred yet gentle enough for children to ride, "A verita ble moving mountain of flesh beneath whose mighty tread the very earth doth tremble, selected in part on account of his great intelligence and docility,"'^ Bark River Woods Historical Society That characterization, together with Harry Wintermute in retirement. the claim that Jargo had cost the Win 'erforming his "philosophicalfan trick " termutes $10,000, was perhaps meant to recall Barnum's gentle giant. George's circus and remained at large until Thursday, During Wild animals posed a threat not only to those who trained that time it was reported to have killed three head of cattle and performed with them but also, on occasion, to innocent and seven sheep belonging to one farmer and two sheep bystanders. Suitably restrained or caged, a dangerous animal belonging to another, A group of thirty armed men finally was sure to produce a pleasurable frisson in the circus-goer. cornered the animal in a woods three miles southeast of Banking on this psychology, the Wintermutes boasted Evansville, Though they shot the leopard at close range, it that Wallace, their "untamable" lion, had killed five sprang upon two men in its death throes, injuring both seri trainers, A wild animal on the loose was another matter. ously,'^ One Sunday in 1901 a leopard escaped from Popcorn The circus animal run amok was a spectacular viola tion of civil order. Though rare, it symbolized threats of a AUTUMN 2003 181855 9/16/03 10:33 AM Page 10 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY less spectacular but more insidious nature. One of these was economic. Financially, circuses benefited the towns in which they were headquartered, particularly when circus entrepre neurs contributed their skills and resources to civic improve ments. Popcorn George cultivated the good will of Evansville residents by donating generously to civic projects, shrewdly publicizing his largesse in each case, Harry Wintermute served on the local board of supervisors and the school board,20 Communities along the circus route, however, regarded the shows as a drain on their economy. Though circuses spent money locally, they also siphoned off quarters that might oth erwise have gone to local merchants. Each turn-of-the-centu- ry quarter was worth about five dollars in today's currency. To compensate for the loss of income, communities imposed licensing fees and taxes. The Wintermutes realized that they could not afford to lose the good will of client communities by exposing them to financial loss. When forced to cancel a show in Stoughton, for example, they returned to settle accounts and, incidentally, secure favorable publicity. The local news paper reported that the brothers came to town and paid all their bills, "which [spoke] well for the company,"2i esides the monetary threat there was the moral. Today we think of the circus as family entertainment. Before Bthe Civil War, however, communities regarded circus es much as they regard exotic dance clubs today. Antebellum shows often appealed to the baser instincts of their largely male clientele with titillating or obscene performances. The equestriennes and women aerialists wore stockings and knee- length skirts—later, tights—in a day when decent women did not dress in that fashion,22 Drunkenness and petty crime flourished in the vicinity of the big top. Clergymen conse quently inveighed against circuses from their pulpits, and con gregations disciplined members who failed to heed the warning. When the first circus came to Prairieville (Wauke sha) in 1843, the First Congregational Church summoned circus-going members duly reported the number of pockets picked, to appear and confess their error publicly. homes burglarized, and citizens duped by The church excommunicated one man who skin games, three-card monte, and shell remained unrepentant. When the next cir Drunkenness and petty games. cus visited in 1846, the same congregation By the end of the nineteenth century charged a woman member with "attending crime flourished in the most people regarded the circus more favor during the present summer in the Village of ably due to changes in social mores and in Prairieville a certain low theatrical perform vicinity of the big top. the circus itself Those who still objected to ance commonly known as a circus,"2^ shows under the big top could enjoy anoth Communities objected not only to the er component of the circus, the menagerie. content of the shows and the behavior of Originally a separate enterprise, the travel patrons but also to the unsavory character of camp followers. ing zoo merged with the circus in 1828, Unlike the rest of the When a circus came to town, the local newspaper typically show, the menagerie was exempt from state laws against lewd warned its readers to beware of grifters and petty criminals. In behavior,25 Far from being a source of temptation, it was pro July 1880, for example, the Milwaukee Sentinel advised moted as an education in the wonders of God's creation. Cir Racine residents "to keep their back doors locked and to cuses often charged separate admissions to the menagerie watch their premises closely to-day, as there is a circus in and big top show, allowing church members and even cler town, and it is expected a lot of thieves and burglars are gy to enjoy the circus without damage to their reputations. following it,"2* When a circus departed, the newspaper Like today's Hollywood executives who calculate the dif- \^ AUTUMN 2003 181855 9/16/03 10:33 AM Page 11 WISCONSIN MAG r-^SS||g|P>lk*?2ii^- 181855 9l\6lQ2 10:33AM Page 12 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY ^ ference --.-^ between a PG-13 and an R rating in dollars and cents, circus entrepreneurs began to see the bottom-line advantage in \ producing shows for women and chil dren as well as men, for church-goers as well as church-abstainers. Circus proprietors wrote sobriety and decent behavior clauses into contracts with their employees,2^ The larger shows, such as Barnum & Bailey and Rngling Brothers, hired Pinkerton agents to police the show grounds. Most important, they publicized the probity of their shows and promised uplift ing, educational entertainment. The Wintermutes were among those who cultivated a reputation as a "Sunday School" show. In their advertising they promised entertainment "as pure in its entirety as the crystal springs. Not a spot upon its untarnished name,"2' The Wintermutes promised not only to run a clean show Erma Ward, of the Sells-Floto Circus, themselves, but also to drive the moneychangers from their dressed in the manner temple, "Our past reputation for presenting only strictly typical of early moral and refined entertainments," an 1892 courier twentieth-century announces, "is a sufficient guarantee for the future, and we women aerialists. invite the attendance of ladies and children, who may rest assured that they can visit OUR FIVE BIG UNITED SHOWS with safety and propriety. No thieves, gamblers, or fakirs of any description, will be tolerated with or about our Five Big Shows, and no 'games of chance' to cheat the unwary by unscrupulous mountebanks," The courier goes on to offer a $1,000 donation to any charity if a patron could prove that The Wisconsin Historical Society Margaret Humleker, Fond du Lac Vice-President: Edwin P. Wiley, Milwaukee John Kerrigan, Dubuque, lA Treasurer Rhona E. Vogei, Brookfield Director. Robert B. Thomasgard, Jr. Ellen D. Langill, Waukesha Secretary: John D. Singer, Madison Genevieve G. McBride, Milwaukee Asst. Treasurer & Asst. Secretary: W. Pharis Horton, Officers Judy Nagel, DePere Madison Janice M. Rice, Stoughton Hartley B. Barker, Scottsdale, AZ. President: Patricia A. Boge Fred A. Risser, Madison Thomas H. Barland, Eau Claire (emeritus) President Elect: Mark L. Gajewski John M. Russell, Menomonie Patricia A. Boge, La Crosse Treasurer Anne M. West John Schroeder, Milwaukee Robert M. Boiz, Madison Secretary: Robert B. Thomasgard Dale Schultz, Richland Center James D. Ericson, Milwaukee Anne M. West, Milwaukee Rockne G. Flowers, Madison Board of Curators Carlyle H. "Hank" Whipple, Madison John J. Frautschi, Madison Mark L. Gajewski, Madison Ruth Barker, Ephraim Ex-officio Board of Curators Richard H. Hoischer, Lake Tomahawk Thomas H. Barland, Eau Claire Margaret B. Humleker, Fond du Lac Murray D. "Chip" Beckford, Cascade Dolores C. Ducklow, President, FRIENDS of the Ralph C. inbusch, Jr., Fox Point Patricia A. Boge, La Crosse Society W. Robert Koch, Madison Mary F. Buestrin, Mequon John Grek, President, Wisconsin Council for Roy C. LaBudde, Milwaukee Thomas E. Caestecker, Green Lake Local History Paul Meissner, Milwaukee John M. Cooper, Jr., Madison Bruce T. Block, President, Wisconsin Historical George H. Miller, Ripon (emeritus) William J. Cronon, Madison Foundation Jodi Peck, Fox Point Craig Culver, Prairie du Sac David W. Olien, Senior Vice President, University of Peggy A. Rosenzweig, Wauwatosa Laurie Davidson, Marinette Wisconsin System Richard L. Schmidt, West Bend Ness Flores, Waukesha Robert B. Thomasgard, Madison Stephen J. Freese, Dodgeville The Wisconsin Historical Foundation Carol T. Toussaint, Madison (emerita) Mark L. Gajewski, Madison Robert S. Zigman, Milwaukee Charles E. Haas, La Crosse President: Bruce T. Block, Milwaukee Beverly A. Harrington, Oshkosh Vice-President: Daniel W. Erdman, Madison Fannie E. Hicklin, Madison Vice-President: Waiter S. Rugland, Appleton John O. Holzheuter, Mazomanie Vice-President: Sheldon B. Lubar, Milwaukee Gregory Huber, Wausau AUTUMN 2003 181855 9/16/03 10:33 AM Page 13 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY the Wintermutes had ever permitted dishonesty in connection with their show. As far as we know, the brothers never had to make good A Shriner Circus on that offer, and they reaped the rewards of savvy marketing sideshow offered the to their niche clientele: the small towns that were bypassed by kind of entertainment the railroads and consequently by the larger circuses. Their that the Wintermute efforts generally met with favorable reviews, though like all Brothers banned from seasoned troupers they had to shrug off the occasional pan, as their "Sunday School" show. when a Richland Genter newspaper dismissed a show as "rot ten from start to fmish."28 With their profits they were able to add 115 acres to their headquarters on the Bark River in the WHi(X3)48383 fall of 1900.29 In subsequent years they also wintered in nearby Whitewater or Fort Atkinson. The first decade of the twentieth century was a period of transition. While the show was touring Iowa in 1905, Thomas Wintermute developed appendicitis and died following an unsuccessful operation.^'^ Soon after, Halsey and his wife retired and took up full-time farming. Harry had therefore to look outside the family for partners. He ran the show in 1906 and 1907 with Clarence H. Black, then became the sole owner until 1910, when he joined George W. Hall Jr., Popcorn George's son, in a venture called Vanderburg Brothers Trained Animal Show. The name was apparently meant to recall the legendary animal trainer, Isaac A. Van Amburgh. Both of the George W. Halls had toured with the Great Van Amburgh Gircus before striking out on their own, and both featured exotic animals in their shows.^^ By 1912 Harry Wintermute and George W. Hall Jr. were running sepa rate shows under their family names. When Hall retired after that season, Harry formed a partnership with George's son, Frank, for the 1913 sea son. The name of the 1914 Wintermute and Hall Wagon Show reflected the merger of the two circus families. So it was called, with variations, through 1917; and so it might have remained for many years, but for personal tragedy. Harry's wife, Glara, had died in 1908, three years after their mar riage, leaving him with an infant son, Ralph. When his son turned ten, Harry quit the circus to spend more time with the boy. But time had run out, for Ralph died in 1918, just as Harry was completing their new home in Hebron. AUTUMN 2003 181855 9/16/03 10:33 AM Page 14 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY I Free of parental responsi a long history of business bilities but too heart-strick ties. Eight weeks later the en to return to circus life, newlyweds were touring Harry remained on his with the circus of George farm, raising chickens and W. Hall Jr., which fea rabbits. Though he remar tured Frank's large animal ried in 1920, he did not acts. start a second family. The Zella, only twenty at man who identified him the time, hated circus life self in the 1910 federal at first, especially sleeping census as a "show man" in a tent and eating under described himself a decade the stars in remote parts of later as a "general farmer."^2 the Midwest. The couple For friends and neigh quarreled and might have bors Harry occasionally dissolved their partnership performed the feats of leg but for marriage counsel erdemain that had delight ing from an unlikely ed small-town audiences. source. The circus clown A devout Christian Scien made the young bride his tist, he studied the Bible special project that season, and read voraciously in improvising humorous religious history, often songs as he drove the deploying his knowledge wagon behind Frank and against religious intoler Zella's. "Thank God for ance. "At one time," that clown, James Mur according to his obituary phy," Zella remarked in the Whitewater Regi.s- many years later. "He was ter, "he was known as an always trying to lift my agnostic but that was not spirits with pranks and so. He was a student of the jokes."^^ Bible and finding contra Overcoming her shy dictory statements therein ness, Zella became a fea he took delight in con Joel Heiman tured performer as the founding any fundamen Juggler's Indian clubs, a fez, and a whip used in the Wintermute Brothers Circus. trainer of Jargo the Per talist who would debate forming War Elephant. A with him."^^ Harry delivered a lecture on "Religious Inequal herald from about 1915 describes her as "A Little Lady ity" in the same town hall that currently displays his clown weighing scarcely 100 lbs., [who] yet controls the Largest of marionette and a photograph of his "philosophical fan" act. all Big beasts as with a magic wand." In the illustration on the Hebron's sleight-of-hand man became ill during a church herald a towering bull elephant with prominent tusks dwarfs service in 1939, and died several days later of peritonitis, pre a miniscule "Mile. Zella."^^ Zella's performances required sumably without benefit of a doctor. extraordinary physical courage. Her nephew recalls one act in particular that caused the noisiest audience to hold its breath: ith Harry's retirement in 1918, the Wintermute Zella lay on a colorful blanket in the center ring as an ele name disappeared from circus posters. Harry's phant stepped over her, one foot at a time.^^ Yet it was her Wnephew, Thomas Clarence Wintermute, might moral courage that circus life tested to the utmost. have carried on the family tradition, but the young wire-walk Much had changed since the early days of the American er and hurdler died in Georgia in 1918, while serving in the circus, especially for women performers. Due partly to the military. It was Halsey's daughter Zella who took up the stan female physical culture movement of the 1880s, women no dard, though she was not supposed to have a career in the cir longer risked moral censure when dressed for physical exer- cus. Her parents had tried to protect her from circus fever by tion.3^ A shrewd circus publicist could have it both ways, leaving her with a grandmother when they went on appealing simultaneously to prurient and hygienic interest. tour.^* Their efforts came to naught when Frank Hall, Thus a 1923 courier for the George W. Hall show con Popcorn George's grandson, noticed the petite young tains this teaser, bracketed by drawings of equestriennes: woman with auburn hair when he delivered an ele "Most Beautiful Women in the World Whose Perfect phant to the Wintermutes. He made Zella his wife in Forms and Loveliness demonstrate the result of Continu 1912, forging a marital bond between two families with al Physical Exercise." AUTUMN 2003 181855 9/1S/03 10:34AM Page 15 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY Other unpleasant features of circus life had not disap peared. Small towns still turned out their quota of rowdies WE ffiODOCE M08E WILD BEASTS IN PUBLIC PAIUDE TUiN HJNf SHOWS EJNIBIT FOB GAIN who showed up spoiling for a fight, often the braver for drink. When these baited the circus people beyond endurance, a trouper might respond with the taunt "rube!"— the signal for the company to gather and confront the heck WORLDS BESr SHOWS AND TRAINED WILD ANIMAL EJ(HIBITION i lers.^^ One of Zella's friends recalls her telling of these imbroglios and speculates that they helped to steel her for some of the clients she encountered in her second career, as a welfare caseworker.**^ But that was later. After one season with George Hall Jr., Ml"'[""'I Frank and Zella became Harry Wintermute's partners for the -.-^.^•i-^^'^ 1913-1917 seasons. Shortly before the 1914 season the cou ^^kniMj^M^Mli^^ -^*^^--:, i^;^ ple lost their firstborn, Lenora Jessie Hall, to pneumonia. .o^.^r^'^Ti's;:: s-r^^r.i'' V/M CJv. :Yo v^.u So Muc hit^,?r Fw Vour Mo' ?, - ?.- --^^ Deeply affected by the loss, they postponed having another child for ten years. Following Harry's retirement they tried going it alone for a season, then joined the Campbell Broth ers railroad circus (Frank's aunt Mable was the wife of William P. Campbell) until they could start their own wagon show in 1921. Zella gave birth to their daughter Bonniejean in July 1924, while the show was playing in Argus, Indiana. Frank hired a minstrel band to play outside the hospital, a fit ting welcome for a child who would spend the first twelve years of her life traveling with her parents' circus. At first Frank and Zella called their show the Hall Broth ers Circus. Because Frank's brother ran a show under the CAPT. LOUIS STANDISH T. COMICAL BEARS same name, they changed theirs to the Vanderburg Brothers nw Pavilion rtacUy liku . Circus in 1926, reviving the name that Harry Wintermute and George Hall Jr. had used sixteen years earlier. The late THE GfiEATEST PERFflRMING 1920s were good years for Frank and Zella. They replaced ELtpyNTACToB,^rrr.o Ml IF 7FII A "E Olfir L.DT IlEPHakT their wagons with red trucks in 1926, touring with as many as lfJL.i.Li LLLLftf 7BSIKR IN liEfllOl. rdfihinjt urarorly JOO lb.., y„, control. fifteen vehicles. They expanded their tent show from one ring BIR hi>nu Oi with a tn-isle wini. Whru ou Ml! RO fl*a>' f«Unj( you havi- ,«,i|y to two and employed Zella's younger sister, Zetta, and her •Man loho worlh (wi™ ,(« pH« of «lmiiJon. ' husband, Charles Wesley Beetow. Zetta and Charles's son The Musical Ponies remembers Zella as a "grand lady" during this period, espe Wbo plo>. {ana\»r min corrolly on Swwi cially when mounted on a beautiful white horse at the head of FUNNY CLOWNS the circus parade or leading the grand entry into the big *Vlr* ."' '•""-""'— '">" ift- C.«n j„,„ tent."*' She was not only a featured performer but also the of -no^an UIM.. troupe's bookkeeper. DtNSOFlJAIiTwiijBEml A TROUPE Of ASTONISHINC ATHLETES A u-oup* o( jusjtlm. a l^ wire y/tlkm, inn prrloi An (hi \tuk4vi anl Orii Uinw you wDluw will, ui . hen the economy collapsed in 1929, fewer people iKoliim Jf>1oJ^[.Jy new Ic Ihr pubUt. could afford the price of admission. The Vander GRAND FREE STREET I'ARADE Wburg show did not venture out in 1930 or 1931.^2 Back on the road in 1936, it faced the ultimate setback. That August Frank suffered a ruptured appendix in Hutchinson, One Day And iXJORS Oi'liU AT I, IVight Only Minnesota, and died of a blood clot in the local hospital. It l-*0 Pl-H[.-ORMANi t:S AT Jul A- ;,,,l n. M was a somber day when his widow, then forty-four and the WILL EXHIBIT EXACTLY flS ADVERTISED AT mother of a twelve-year-old, assembled the Vanderburg company to tell them the sad news, pay their wages, and bid them farewell. Zella soldiered on through the 1937 season, ADULTS •o CHILDREN ,,Z taking the aerialists Lew and Elsie Christensen as partners. L After wintering in Missouri, they set out the following spring. Playing to tiny audiences, clearing barely Circus World Museum enough to keep their trucks in gasoline, they finally The standard courier, posted by the advance man a few days before the reached the end of their sawdust trail in July 1938. It show, enticed the local community into a day away from duty. was also the end of a circus dynasty that had lasted for AUTUMN 2003 181855 9/16/03 10:34 AM Page 16 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY two generations on the Wintermute United Shows promised encounters side of the family and three on the with Japanese performers, a German Hall. trainer who had spent years studying In need of a job to support herself elephants in India, the Ghinese conjur and her daughter, Zella took a position er Ghing Ling Foo, clowns of all as a caseworker in the Walworth nationalities, an /African lion, tropical County Welfare Department and stuck monkeys and snakes, acrobatic dogs with it for twenty-two years. Though from England, Spanish macaws, Aus she joined the Whitewater and Bark tralian love birds, Mexican cougers, River Woods Historical Societies, she and an elephant formerly owned by a declined invitations to speak about her king—all preceded by a street parade circus experiences. Shyness may "rivaling in radiance and beauty, the account for her reticence, together processions of the orient."*^ Who could with the sense that those summers resist, even though the "foreign" per under the big top were not yet "histo formers looked suspiciously like fellow ry" of the kind to be found in museums midwesterners. By today's standards, and libraries. "Oh, my show years the old circuses are open to the charge were so long ago," Zella told an inter of racism because they often dealt in viewer in 1977, when she was eighty- racial stereotypes, particularly in the five; "but I've never been able to get minstrel sideshows. On the whole, the circus out of my blood. I dream all however, they left the provinces a bit the time of being with the circus and less provincial than they found them. Frank. "43 The Wintermute brothers could not The demise of the Wintermute and have foreseen that the tools of their Hall wagon shows reflects the fate of trade would share a room in the small circuses throughout the country. Hebron Town Hall with their neigh In 1903, when the Wintermute Broth bors' farm implements. They would ers Great Melbourne show was at the nevertheless have seen the fitness in peak of its form, there were ninety- such an arrangement. Their play, too, eight circuses in the U.S. By 1956, was hard work, often pursued in defi when the Ringling Brothers and Bar ance of physical hardship and personal num & Bailey Gircus abandoned its The tiny hand of the Wintermute marionette is a tragedy. In its own way it bolstered the big top shows, there were only thir testament to the fine craft work of its maker. It needed work ethic. "Stop the plow," urges one teen.** According to one historian, the to be, as the marionette shows were an important part Great Melbourne courier; "hang up circus declined in part because of the of the Wintermute Circus. the scythe, take a day off. You can automobile, which monopolized the make it up." When the soil resisted the urban space that circuses need for their plow and draft animals balked, when parades and tents. Moreover, labor muscles ached from swinging a scythe, costs rose with the unionization of cir In 1903,... there were it was refreshing to enter an arena cus workers, and new forms of enter where the stuff of daily life—flesh and tainment—particularly movies, radio, ninety-eight circuses wood, leather and steel—seemed to and television—competed for people's take a holiday from the laws of nature. attention. Today the circus generates in the U.S. Was a day at the circus an expense or an interest that is as much historical an investment, so calculated? Farmers and educational as it is recreational. By 1956,... there were who took the long view were inclined Yet it still casts its spell on those who to agree with the Wintermutes: You visit the Gircus World Museum in only thirteen. could make it up. ^!k Baraboo or watch the annual circus parade in Milwaukee. These conjure Acknowledgments up the golden age of the wagon shows, with their ornate wag For their assistance in locating materials related to the ons, elaborately harnessed draft animals, and costumed Wintermute Gircus I am grateful to Fred Dahlinger, Jr., liverymen. director, and Erin Foley, archivist, of the Robert L. Parkinson In its heyday the circus provided not only spectacle and Library and Research Genter, Gircus World Museum; Olive athleticism but also an occasion for vicarious travel. Gross, president of the Bark River Woods Historical Soci Patrons could experience exotic places, cultures, and ani ety; and Sue Hartwick, director, and Karen O'Gonnor, mals without leaving home. The Great Melbourne curator, of the Hoard Museum in Fort Atkinson. AUTUMN 2003 181855 SjX^il^Z 10:34 AM Page 17 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OE HISTORY Notes ^^Stoughton Courier, 3 May 1907 (clipping at the CWM). iRarry Wintermute's contributions are mentioned in a 22janet M. Davis, "Instruct the Minds of All Classes: The herald for Wintermute's [sic] Double Show of about Circus and American Culture at the Turn of the Cen 1910 and an unpublished manuscript by Frank D. About the Author tury" (doctoral dissertation. University of Wiscon Robie, "Of Millman, Melbourne and Wintermutes," Milton J. Bates is a professor of Eng sin-Madison, 1998), 107. page 2, both at the Circus World Museum (hereafter 2^Terry Biwer Becker, "'What's Coming? Why Fun Is CWM); ''Aged Showman Back on Farm," a clipping lish at Marquette Coming!': The Circus in Waukesha County, 1843- from an unidentified newspaper in the Bark River University. His 1910," Landmark 41, nos. 2-3 (Summer-Autumn Woods Historical Society Museum (hereafter 1998): 14, 17. BRWHS); Harry's obituary in the Whitewater Press, 1 most recent book , ^'^Milwaukee Sentinel, 23 July 1880, 3. In the next sen June 1939, 1; and Billboard, 27 September 1902, 6. The Wars We tence, "skin games" refers generically to cheating or ^Bird Millman, in an interview quoted in Robie, "Of swindling games; in three-card monte a person bets on Millman," 2- Took to Vietnam: the location of one of three cards that are shown face ^The piano, manufactured by the Shoenhut Company, Cultural Conflict up, then turned face down and shifted around. is at the Hoard Museum in Fort Atkinson. C. P. Fox 25Davis, "Instruct the Minds," 22-23. mentions Thomas's other skills in 'The Wintermute and Storytelling 26Dahlinger and Thayer, Badger State Showmen, 101. Bros. Circus," Bandwagon, November-December 1959, (1996), won the 2*? Undated Great Melbourne courier (CWM). The 19. Harry Wintermute praises Halsey's skill as publicist Council for Wis quotation in the next paragraph is from an 1892 couri in "Aged Showman" (BRWHS). er for the Wintermute Bros. Five Big United Shows, ^Fred Dahlinger, Jr., and Stuart Thayer, Badger State consin Writers award for a scholarly also at the CWM. Showmen: A History of Wisconsin's Circus Heritage (Madi book and the National Jesuit Book ^^Clipping from the Richland Center Republican Observ son: Grote, 1998), 105-6. er, 3 September 1908, at the CWM. ^Letter to the author, 15 February 2001. I Award in literature. He is currently writ '^'^New York Clipper, 24 November 1900, 868. Recorded ^Tenth Federal Census, Population Schedule for ing a book about the Bark River in in Jefferson County Deed Book v. 112, 153. Hebron Township, Jefferson County, Wisconsin. ^^Jefferson County Union, 7 July 1905, 1. '^Ruth Ann Montgomery, Evansville: Glimpses of the southeastern Wisconsin. ^^The adoption of the Vanderburg name is reported in Grove (Evansville, Wl: RA. Montgomery, 1990), 84. ^^1 Billboard 3 August 1907, 23. Jensen speculates on its ori- ^Quoted in "Aged Showman" (BRWHS). ^^^ gin in The Biggest, p. 89. The senior George Hall's Van ^Billboard, 27 September 1902, 6. The New York Clipper Amburgh connection is mentioned in C. Beerntsen, of 26 March 1892 mentions a new menagerie tent, "George W. 'Popcorn' Hall's Circuses," Bandwagon, measuring 60 by 90 feet. January-February 1970, 16; the junior George Hall's is recorded in the Chang ^''Dahlinger and Thayer, v-vi. The show times are from Wintermute handbills (CWM). Reynolds Elephant Biographies no. 733 ("Pearl") at the CWM. The 1907 itinerary described in the next paragraph is also at the CWM. s^Thirteenth and Fourteenth Federal Censuses, Jefferson County, Hebron Township. ^'^Billboard, 27 September 1902, 6. ^^Whitewater Register, 1 June 1939,1. For Harry's lecture and the circumstances of his death, '^^Wisconsin Tobacco Reporter, 10 May 1901 (clipping at the CWM). see "Aged Showman" (BRWHS) and in the Jefferson County Union, 2 June 1939, 5. ^^Milwaukee Sentinel, 21 May 1881, 4. S'ijensen, The Biggest, 84. Doris Kolmos described the circumstances of Frank and i^WiUiani L. Slout describes the waterproofing of canvas and the fire hazard in Theatre Zella's meeting in a conversation with the author on 19 July 2001. in a Tent: The Development of a Provincial Entertainment (Bowling Green, OH: Bowling ^^Zella recalled her first season and Murphy in "Circus Wagons Roll Down Memory Green University Popular Press, 1972), 100. In 1902 the Great Melbourne circus Lane," Milwaukee Sentinel, 13 April 1977. advertised its use of electrical lighting at evening performances (herald at the CWM). 36Herald for Wintermute Brothers and Hall, dated ca. 1915 at the CWM. The Edgerton and Stoughton cancellations are mentioned in the Stoughton Courier 3'^Letter from Charles Beetow to the author, 21 July 2001. and the Wisconsin Tobacco Reporter, 3 May 1907 (clippings at the CWM). The Ringling ^^Davis, "Instruct the Minds," 111, 113, 127. The 1923 courier quoted below is repro Bros, lightning strike is recounted in Dean Jensen, The Biggest, the Smallest, the Longest, duced in Richard E. Conover, The Circus: Wisconsin's Unique Heritage (Baraboo: Circus the Shortest: A Chronicle of the American Circus from Its Heartland (Madison: Wisconsin World Museum, 1967), 32. House, 1975), 93-94. 39Davis, "Instruct the Minds," 242. ^^Janesville Gazette, 13 May 1908 (clipping at the CWM). '^'^Betty Boyd, in conversation with the author, 6 May 2001. i^Jensen believes that the elephant was Big Charlie [The Biggest, 82). According to 4iLetter from Charles Beetow to the author, 21 July 2001. Dahlinger and Thayer the attacker was an elephant named Empress [Badger State 42Letter of Frank Hall dated 13 February 1931 (CWM). Other information on this Showmen, 64-65). period is from "Circus Wagons Roll," p. 1, and an information form that Frank Hall ^^New York Clipper, 11 June 1898, 243. prepared in 1928 for the Circus Fans Association (CWM). i^These descriptions of Jargo and Wallace the lion in the next paragraph are from ^^"Circus Wagons Roll,' p. 1 undated couriers and heralds at the CWM. 44Davis, "Instruct the Minds," 317. i^Montgomery, Evansville, 154—5. 4^This quotation and the one in the next paragraph are from undated couriers at the 20Obituary in Whitewater Press, 1 June 1939, 1. CWM. WISCONSIN HISTORICAL SOCIETY BUSINESS PARTNERS Accurate Business Service Jackson County Bank Robert Cox Realty ADIVIANCO, Inc. Kikkoman Foods Roy Tull Real Estate & Appraisal Alliant Energy Corporation Kohler Company Rural Insurance Companies Alpha Investment Consulting Group, LLC Lands' End, Inc. Shafer Pharmacy, Inc. American Family Insurance Group Madison-Kipp Corporation Speckled Hen Inn Bed & Breakfast Appleton Papers, Inc. The Marcus Corporation Fou ndation Inc. SPEX Eyewear Robert W. Baird & Company Marshall & Isley Foundation, Inc. Springs Window Fashions Banta Corporation Foundation Marshall Erdman and Associates Sub Zero Foundation, Inc. The Baraboo National Bank Mead & Hunt Thrivent Financial for Lutherans Beyer Construction Mead Witter Foundation, Inc Trappers Turn, Inc. Boelter & Lincoln MGIC Twin Disc, Inc. Brian A. Mitchell Construction Michael, Best & Friedrich Urban Land Interests CGSchmidt Construction, Inc. Nelson Foundation U.S. Bank-Madison Chem-AI, Inc. Northern Lake Service, Inc. Voith Fabrics The Coburn Company Northwestern Mutual Life Insurance Company Webcrafters-Frautschi Foundation, Inc. Cress Funeral & Cremation Service Phoenix Resource Group Weimer Bearing Transmission, Inc. CUNA Mutual Group Foundation, Inc. Pleasant Company Windway Foundation Drum Corps. World The Printing Place Wisconsin Physicians Service Hercules Contractors and Engineers Project Solutions, Inc. Isthmus Architecture The QTI Group J. P. Cullen &Sons Racine Federated, Inc. AUTUMN 2003 181855 9/16/03 10:34AM Page If WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY Speaking with an Equal Voice The Reform Efforts of Milwaukee's Mary Blanchard Lynde By EUen D. Langill he lake schooner bearing Mary Blanchard Lynde to Mil waukee's shore rocked gently. The quiet rhythm of Lake Michigan and the darkness of the June night allowed the Ttwenty-one year old her final moments of contemplation as each second she moved closer to her new home. These would also be the fmal moments of her honeymoon, if one could apply that romantic a term to the succession of boat trips she had taken over the last few weeks: from her hometown of Tuxton in upstate New York, where she and William Pitt Lynde had just married, to Buffalo on an Erie Canal packet boat, and then to a vessel that had carried them from Lake Erie, across Lake Huron, and nearly the entire length of Lake Michigan. Apparently, there would be one more change of ship before they reached land. Milwaukee in the year 1841 had no wharves large enough for lake schooners to land. m AUTUMN 2003 181855 9/16/03 10:34 AM Page 19 -^> Milwaukee County Historical Society Although she was married to a prominent politician, Mary Blanchard Lynde was no mere "token representative of the softer sex." She provided leadership and a voice for the disenfranchised in Wisconsin for nearly fifty years. 181855 9/16/03 10:34 AM Page 20 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY Mary Blanchard Lynde had a good deal to contemplate as to attend a church service, which was constantly disrupted by around her preparations for the final leg of the trip were being the sound of cow bells outside the windows. It was a crude set made. Only a few weeks ago she had been Miss Mary Eliza tlement, indeed. Clearly, the field lay open for the combined beth Blanchard, a valedictorian of the class of 1839 at her talents of Mary and William, who had just completed a law female seminary, and daughter of Dr. Azariah Blanchard, a degree at Harvard. physician, and Eliza Blanchard. Her prize-winning valedicto They boarded initially with Charles Lynde and his wife, but ry essay, "On the Advantages of the Study of Mathematics," were soon left alone as the two elder Lynde brothers and was read at her graduation ceremony by New York Senator Charles's wife made a trip back to New York to see their parents William Seward (later Secretary of State under Abraham Lin and discuss their Wisconsin ventures. Their return trip to Wis coln), since young ladies were not supposed to deliver public consin ended tragically when their steamship, the _Ene, explod addresses.^ ed just hours out of Buffalo, killing both of the Lynde brothers Her essay's theme resounded with Mary Blanchard's own and critically in particular sense of mission, to establish the intellectual equal juring William's ity of men and women. Because "scientific reasoning" was so sister-in-law. Wil important to her (at age 20 and throughout her life), she used liam and Mary the essay as a platform to argue "that women [as well as men] Lynde were strand- should taste the purer, higher pleasures of the intellect." Fore ed without family telling her lifelong commitment to reason based on data, in Wisconsin and Mary argued that "woman has the same need for decision debated long and and firmness in her sphere [as man]" and that "the same gen hard about wheth eral principle of intellectual rigor should operate in all er to stay alone or minds." If mathematical reasoning "strengthen[s] and enno to return to New ble [s] the mind of man, [it] will strengthen and ennoble the York. mind of woman. "^ Their decision Engaged to William Pitt Lynde since her schooldays, to remain and to Mary's life had been similar to many young upper middle- work together to class women growing up in the "burnt-over district" of central build lives in Wis and upstate New York in the early nineteenth century. The consin is an indi millennial furor of the Second Great Awakening had infused cation of the a generation of young women with a spiritual passion for soci strength of their etal reform that took different roads: abolition, women's suf partnership, as PH (3)120.8 frage, and temperance were among many others that held the well as their shared William Pitt Lynde in his 1866 portrait for the attention and drew the efforts of so many. sense of mission Wisconsin Assembly. Ten years later he would to create a new introduce legislation for women's suffrage into the U.S. Congress. he idealism of the age was gaining great momentum and better world as predominantly Yankee men and women left the on the midwestern frontier. William Lynde soon found a new TNortheast to settle the Great Lakes region of the Old law partner, Asahel Finch, and established a thriving practice. Northwest Territory. Just five years before Mary Blanchard Mary Lynde, however, was faced with carving a different Lynde sailed to Milwaukee's shores, the region had gone from niche for herself In the years before Wisconsin joined the being part of the Michigan Territory to becoming part of the union, voters in the territory considered—and rejected— Wisconsin Territory. It would be seven years after her arrival women's suffrage. Mary Lynde realized that without the right that Wisconsin would become the nation's thirtieth state. The to vote, the fulfillment of her dreams to make a difference in Milwaukee that welcomed them in June 1841 was a forlorn her new home state depended on her ability to build a bridge and primitive sight to the young couple. Mary Lynde recalled between the public sphere where her power was limited by that after the light tug docked at a small wharf around mid tradition and law, and the private sphere where her influence night, William and she were met by his two older brothers, would be considerable.* who had already established themselves in the village of Mil In her initial work Mary Lynde turned toward the private waukee, set up a law partnership, and started to invest family sphere, on behalf of safer streets, paved roads (instead of dirt money in land. "We have no carriages here," the young cou paths), and an end to the free roaming of cattle, which was ple learned that first night, as the older Lynde brothers escort noisy, filthy, and dangerous for children. She asked her hus ed them on foot to their frame home on the northeast corner band's influential friends to work with her and improve street of Mason and Jackson Streets.^ conditions and sanitation. She also witnessed her husband's The village had only fifteen hundred inhabitants, dirt legal work to halt the liquor trade with the Potowatomi Indi roads and footpaths, pigs and cattle roaming loose, and no ans, and she was one of several women in the village who fed bridges across the Milwaukee River. The Lyndes' first Sunday and clothed the small number of native people who had found them on a scow, being pulled by ropes across the river remained despite the removal acts of the 1830s. She recalled ^ AUTUMN 2003 181855 9/16/03 10:34 AM Page 21 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OE HISTORY these people coming into town "to sell baskets and to beg." its operations kept Mary Lynde at the forefront of institution Their custom of playing dice games and gambling, however, al reform. She also found herself taking the lead in other Mil offended her Protestant sensibilities. waukee causes, for just a decade after founding the orphan Her early work for civic betterment took a back seat by the asylum, William's political aspirations resurfaced with signifi mid-1840s as the first of her seven children, four girls and cant results on Mary's career. three boys, began to arrive. (One of the girls, Fanny, died in In 1860, leading a reform ticket after heavy debt crippled infancy.) William Lynde's rising political star took him to the the newly chartered city, William Lynde was elected mayor of U.S. House of Representatives as a member of Wisconsin's Milwaukee, and he and Mary entered the limelight together. first Congressional delegation in June 1848, just after the Two events of this period shaped Mary's political awareness achievement of statehood in May. Still in mourning over and her social activism very dramatically. First, her husband Fanny's death, Mary Lynde and her other children did not fought off strong special interest groups to solve the city's debt problem, even paying for a new fire engine out of his own pocket. The idea of fiscal conservatism and the steward ship of public funds was a clear lesson of his mayoral term. Second, Lynde was in office during the city's worst dis aster at the time, the wreck of the steamship, the Lady Elgin^ in 1861, with a loss of more than two hundred lives, many of them Irish Democrats who were on the return leg of a trip to Chicago. Going by a specially chartered railcar to the scene of the wreckage near Win- netka, Illinois, the Lyndes worked to provide public relief and to offer the promise of private assistance for the one thousand children who were orphaned WHi(X3)14312 by the accident. Mary Lynde took the forefront in the enlargement of the The city of Milwaukee as it appeared ca. 1850, just a few years after the Lyndes arrived. Free-roaming livestock and poor road conditions were early concerns for Mary Blanchard Lynde. orphan's home to accommodate the many children whose families had been killed in the wreck. She learned concrete lessons in the functioning of institutions, join William in Washington until early in 1849. As the wife of especially the teamwork required for their support, and she a representative, Mary reveled in the excitement in Washing sharpened her own social philosophy of active reform and ton that year, as the Mexican War came to a close and the Christian stewardship. debate over slavery escalated. In her diary she noted that she Although his term as mayor ended in 1861, Lynde had been privileged to meet two grandams of the early remained very active in Wisconsin Democratic politics, serv Republic, Elizabeth Schuyler Hamilton, the widow of ing as a State Assemblyman from 1866-1868 and as a State Alexander Hamilton, and Dolley Madison, who were both Senator from 1869—1870. Mary Lynde occasionally joined still a part of the social scene in the nation's capital. her husband to witness the boiling cauldron of Wisconsin state politics in the late 1860s, commuting by train with him pon returning to Wisconsin after her husband's term to Madison. Her intellect and her experience with social insti ended, Mary Lynde balanced her domestic duties tutions led to her appointment, in April 1871, to the State Uwith an early commitment to the anti-slavery cause. Board of Charities and Reform, the first woman in Wisconsin At their elegant new home on West Chestnut Street, chris to serve on a state board, and one of the first in the country. tened "Lynden," the Lyndes held gatherings for the anti-slav Governor Lucius Fairchild asked her to accept a five-year ery cause and for the Democratic Party. Even before joining term, the longest of any of her counterparts on the newly cre her husband in Washington, Mary had organized, in her par ated board. Her history of charitable work, her record in lor, the first woman's group in the newly chartered city, the administering the Milwaukee Orphan Asylum, and her "Ladies Benevolent Society," and it was this group that staunch commitment to social reform proved essential to the founded the Milwaukee Orphan Asylum after the Lyndes' success of the newly created board. The stated purpose of the return from Washington in 1850.^ Guiding the new institu board, as specified in the 1871 legislation, was to ensure that tion, raising private subscriptions to fund it, and supervising the "administration of public charity and correction may be AUTUMN 2 003 181855 9/16/03 10:35 AM Page 22 conducted upon sound principles of economy, justice and for a key leadership role on the board. At the board's very first humanity, and that the relations existing between the state meeting on 13 April 1871, a resolution was passed stating; and its dependent and criminal classes may become better "That Mrs. Mary E. B. Lynde be appointed a committee to understood.'"^ For the next five years Mary Lynde's work on look after the welfare of the children at the Milwaukee Coun this board and her leadership role in its reforms occupied the ty house [the poor house] and see what can be done for the bulk of her time, while her husband continued his legal prac improvement of their condition." Her determination to make tice and political activities. a difference in the state's commitment to women and children became an "engine that knew no rest." arly on it became clear that Mary had been an able At the very next board meeting, in May, she presented student of parliamentary procedure and committee another top item on her social agenda—the concern over the Ework. She did not intend to take a backseat, or to be a state's "destitute and homeless girls." She reported to the board "token representative of the softer sex." She assumed she that the Milwaukee institution called the National Soldiers' would have an equal voice to her six male counterparts and Home (which she had also helped to create after the Civil War) spoke out often about the particular needs of the state's had twenty extra acres of land that would be an ideal place to women and children in its few jails, poorhouses, and other locate an institution for girls who were left homeless or confined homes. In response her fellow board members selected Lynde to the poorhouse with adults who might prey upon them. V^ AUTUMN 2003 181855 9/16/03 10:35 AM Page 23 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY The purpose of her the maintenance of the offspring as it now does the outraged, campaign for this land was deserted mother.'" By October the indefatigable Lynde sub the creation of an industrial mitted a statement from the Soldiers' Home that they were school for girls which would prepared to accommodate her wishes as to the creation of a take young girls out of home for girls on the grounds of West Spring Street (today's poorhouses or jails and pro Wisconsin Avenue). vide a safe and secure home Thus Lynde pushed forward a strong reform agenda in her where they could receive first six months on the Charities and Reform Board. She also protection and vocational participated fully in the other work of the board, to supervise training (an institution simi the financial operations of the state's institutions, to standard lar to the Industrial School ize expense reports, and to gather data to use for a more com for Boys that existed in plete understanding of those people in state institutions. It is Waukesha). By the State in her use of evidence as well as in her powers of persuasion Board's third month in exis that Mary Lynde stands out as a unique female leader in the tence, the minutes noted 1870s. She chose to follow the dictum on her valedictory that, "Mrs. Lynde having essay, regarding the need for "firmness" and "intellectual given considerable thought rigor" rather than approaching men in power from a tradi to the pressing need of the tional, maternal stance and appealing to their charitable ten establishment by the State of dencies. With this approach Lynde was part of the birth of an an Industrial School for exacting social science (later developed in full form at the Uni Girls, was requested to pre versity of Chicago under the rubric of sociology) for which she pare a paper on the subject had been reaching ever since her valedictory essay three to be embodied in the annu decades earlier. al report of the Board [m October]." he first success for her proposed reforms came in the The first of her tasks (the form of a resolution directing that the State Board of report on the condition of TCharities and Reform become the official legal women and children in state guardian of all children who would reside at the Soldiers' institutions) was ac- Orphans Home (so renamed). It further mandated that the compfished with eificiency Board "exercise a close supervision over the interest of any and presented at the board's and every child during their minority" and that some system August meeting. Having vis of industry, as well as schooling, be provided for all residents. ited many of the state's insti The report to the Governor urged that the new home be tutions, county jails, and funded by the state at $25,000 per year.'* poorhouses, Mary Lynde The Wisconsin legislature, however, refused to approve reported forcefully, "I am the petition, reluctant to establish another institution to fully convinced that a poor "drain the public treasury." As an activist who wouldn't take house is a most unsuitable a public "no" for an answer, she attended the Conference of place in which to rear chil State Boards at Chicago in 1872, and also made trips to dren, and take the liberty to Massachusetts, Connecticut, New York, and nearby Illinois recommend the foundation of a 'Children's Home'... where they (at her own expense) to report on their successes in meeting can be reared under more healthful and elevating influences." the needs of these homeless young girls and women. She further elaborated on the deplorable conditions exist When the legislature still refused to act, Lynde moved for ing for many women in these same institutions, arguing that ward on her own, enlisting the powerful support of Milwau "some provision should be made for the [many] unfortunate kee's respected Circuit Judge, James A. Mallory, whose report women . . . [who] have been the victims of men who promise seconded Lynde's research and recommendations, backed by marriage only to betray and desert when ruined." These his own experience on the bench.** To add renewed force to her woman, Lynde noted, have "no refuge or shelter, and often arguments, Lynde reported on the institutions she had visited in no occupation but the life of sin [they have] resolved to aban the East where the girls were well-cared for and were learning don." She asked her fellow board members, "Does not socie useful trades "and hence have no excuse for a vicious life when ty owe to itself, to humanity, that some refuge be found?" they leave." Her report was forwarded to the governor with a Moreover, she wanted the male perpetrators brought to jus recommendation that it receive full support in the next legisla tice as well, foreseeing a demand for equitable responsibility tive session. However, once again the legislature balked, despite between men and women that did not become law until the the best efforts of her equally reform-minded husband. late twentieth century. She wrote pointedly, "Let us punish At this point Lynde resolved to achieve her ends with a dif the equally guilty seducer, and render him as responsible for ferent approach, that of chartering an Industrial School for AUTUMN 2003 181855 9/16/03 10:35AM Page 24 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OE HISTORY Girls with private support, yet still seeking some form of lim As a result Lynde had a building, but no staff, no program, ited public funding. As she noted in a paper she presented at and no funds to support her cherished institution. Undaunt the Northwestern Conference of the State Boards of Charities ed, she turned to the network of her earlier, private activism, in April 1873, "private institutions in many respects are better the network of women volunteers. Meeting with the Milwau than pubfic ones . . . because they bring the persons relieved kee chapter of the Ladies Bible and Benevolent Association, in closer contact with those who relieve them . . . and Lynde first organized them into groups to visit a variety of [because] the labor of women [in running them] is brought poorhouses and jails in nearby counties to see for themselves into use, as it is not in the public [institutions].'"" the need she herself had witnessed. Once this was accom plished, she worked to get the Benevolent Association to he first of her objectives was achieved when the state "engraft a new department upon their society" which would finally approved $4,000 for the renovation of a portion work with Lynde to raise private subscriptions to establish an Tof the Soldiers' Home to be used for an Industrial Industrial School for Girls. School for Girls. In her report, in December 1873, she admit A notice was sent out for all "working, benevolent and ted she was stiU "gready discouraged" that the state had twice charitable women of Milwaukee" to gather in the parlor of refused to allocate more than "a trifle" to help launch the Plymouth Church on 2 April 1873. The crowd that respond school itself Citing the studies of English reformers, Lynde ed was very large and very willing to hear reports of the visits chastised the members of the legislature for their failure to to county jails and poorhouses. Lynde found it all the more comprehend the vital role that social institutions can play in gratifying to hear these reports because they strongly second society—the role of prevention, a cry still being raised among ed her earlier findings that these places "were not for girls or social workers today." However, the legislature once again young women!" The group then reorganized itself into a com refused to go beyond the stipend to renovate the old building. mittee to raise the necessary money and to move forward with WHi Image ID 6122 The second nautical disaster to play a role in the lives of the Lyndes, the sinking of the Lady Elgin took more than two hundred lives and profoundly affected Milwaukee politics. AUTUMN 2 003 181855 9/16/03 10:35 AM Page 25 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OE HISTORY all speed to the estabfishment of such an industrial school. Aware of the organizational beauty of parliamentary pro cedure, Lynde helped this newly established "Visiting Com mittee for Milwaukee County Public Charities and Corrections" to draft its official by-laws, which specified the role of each specific subcommittee.'^ It was from these newly inspired women that Lynde drew her nucleus of fundraisers and began to launch a volunteer board to charter her Indus trial School, an eflFort that succeeded less than two years later. With its oflficial opening on 11 February 1875, the Indus trial School for Girls was able to house boys too young to be accepted at the school in Waukesha and girls who were taken from jails, poorhouses, and city streets to be clothed, fed, edu WHS Name File cated, and provided with training in vocational skills.'^ The school's Board of Managers consisted of the same group of Maiy Blanchard Lynde's One of Mary's male allies, commitment to social reform so Milwaukee Circuit Judge women who had worked with Lynde to raise the money (more impressed Governor Lucius Fairchild ]ames A. Mallory, lent his influence than $2,000 at first) to open its doors. This was a purely vol that he appointed her to serve on the to the push for an untary board; "only the matron, teachers and two assistants" State Board of Charities and Industrial School for Girls. were paid. Lynde's chartered Committee of Visitors came to Reform, the first woman to serve on the school every day and longer on Sunday to volunteer their a state board in Wisconsin. time and to oversee the care of the children and girls housed there. The State Board of Charities congratulated Lynde on her hard-won success, after seeking the help of the legislature "four successive years in vain." The school operated with revenues in excess of $3,000 its first year and housed forty-seven children under the age of sixteen. Before the conclusion of her five-year term on the State Board, Mary Lynde had clearly become the most prominent woman in the state in the area of charities and reform, on both the pubfic and private level. Moreover, Lynde's abifity to galvanize Milwaukee women behind a cause attested to both her zeal and her leadership capabifities. nce the school was launched she turned her attention to the creation of a new woman's association, one for Othe education of women. With Martha Mitchell, the wife of Marine Bank founder Alexander Mitchell, and several other women, Lynde organized the Milwaukee Women's Club in 1876. The first officially chartered women's club in the country, its constitution and by-laws were, ironically, drawn up by Wilfiam Lynde, and it operated under the strict parfia- mentary procedures of Roberts Rules of Order. Roberts him self was one of the club's first guest speakers, as were many others who lectured on social topics, particularly social reform. Mary Lynde's growing leadership and her evolving philos ophy of social activism went hand in hand. Before she retired from the State Board of Charities, she was elected its delegate to the American Social Science Association meeting in New York in May 1874. Before the convention ended, the Social Science Association appointed Mary Lynde a member of the national Committee on Destitute and Delinquent Children PH 6062 A/AS 314.3 which would collect data from around the country and rec In 1875, after years of debate, twenty acres of the land belonging to the ommend remedies based on this hard research." This work National Soldiers' Home in Milwaukee would become home to the took her activism to a national level and provided her further Industrial School for Girls. opportunities to use her well-developed skills in research and AUTUMN 2003 181855 9/16/03 10:35 AM Page 26 WHi(X3)23909 The ability to sew was essential to women in the late nineteenth century. The Industrial School for Girls provided them with the necessary skills to find available jobs. 181855 9/16/03 10:36 AM Page 27 Waukesha's Industrial School for Bays was a predecessor to Lynde's School for Girls. These beys fish near the Milwaukee water works building. The young age of most of the boys pictured suggests that they may have been too young for the bays'facility and were residents ofthe^rls' school 181855 9/16/03 10:36 AM Page 2S WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY Mary Lynde remained politically active into her seventies. Her final achievement was to help convince Congress to allow a separate building to celebrate the achievements of women at the World's Columbian Exposition held in Chicago in 1893. PH4123 Their youngest son, Blanchard, followed his maternal grand father's footsteps and pursued a career in medicine, but became addicted to the narcotics which doctors often pre scribed in those years. He committed suicide in a hotel room in Duluth in a tragic episode which the family tried to keep quiet. It is a sad irony in the life of this highly successful pub lic woman that her private life held such tragedy. While she was able to rescue hundreds of young girls from sordid lives, she was unable to save her two sons. The three Lynde daughters, married at Lynden, became Mary's staunchest emotional support in her later years, partic ularly Glara, who married the prominent Milwaukee industri alist Harry G. Bradley. Mary's renewed dedication to public service came in this period of the 1880s, when her eldest son, Tilly, was involved in a failed business venture and had to WHi(X3)50917 endure the ignominy of bankruptcy proceedings. In 1886, the Mendota Mental Health Institution staff members pose at one of the hospital's year after her husband's death, she was appointed to serve as doors. It was Lynde's objection to the treatment of the insane in state prisons that the first woman on the Board of Visitors for the University of allowed for the creation of institutions like Mendota. Wisconsin, a post which allowed her to continue her social activism, as well as her strong interest in women's education. in public speaking. She published several reports in the Her own daughters had been educated at the Milwaukee national journal of the Association and, in 1883, was the fea Female Academy, which later became Downer Gollege. Mary tured speaker at the West District Conference of the Social Lynde worked to advance the cause of the few women students Science Association, where she defended the actions of states, who matriculated at the University of Wisconsin in these years like Wisconsin, to remove children from negligent parents, and were treated as segregated and clearly second-class citi who by their negligence, forfeited their parental rights/^ zens. Her firm friendship with Mary Mortimer (a pioneer edu Upon their return to Wisconsin in 1879, William and cator at Downer) stems from these years as she witnessed, Mary Lynde settled into retirement surrounded by their chil firsthand, the benefits of separate educational institutions for dren, some of whom were thriving and some deeply troubled. women, versus the second-class status of women at the univer Their middle son, William Jr., had become mentally ill, and sity. A more positive trend was the creation of the several state after failing at an attempt to practice law with his father's "normal schools" during this period, which fit well into her firm, he became a recluse at the family home until his death. emphasis on "vocational" training for women to allow them to m AUTUMN 2 003 181855 9/16/03 10:36AM Page 2 9 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY enter professions and become economically independent. social sciences, Mary Lynde was several decades ahead of her In 1891 she was appointed Wisconsin's representa time. As she had written in her graduation address of tive on the Board of Lady Managers for the 1839 "woman has the same need [to use mathe World's Columbian Exposition, better known as matics and rational thinking] for decision and the Chicago World's Fair, to be held in 1893. firmness as men," and Mary Blanchard As a member of this board, Lynde partici Lynde's needs led to a life of activism that pated in the struggle to persuade Congress changed the world in which she lived."" to allow women to have their own sepa rate building at the fair in which the ^All of the quoted biographical materials, unless other wise noted, are found in the Lynde papers, Milwaukee achievements of women in industry and County Historical Society, (MCHS). the professions could be displayed. She 2Mary Elizabeth Blanchard, "Essay on the Advantages of the Study of Mathematics" delivered at the Annual attended the special preview sessions at Exhibition of the Albany Female Academy, 10 July the opening of the World's Fair, but her 1839, MCHS. ^Mary E. B. Lynde, "Pioneer Experiences of Milwaukee frailty was evident to those who accom Women . . . Their Pleasures and Hardships," Milwauhee panied her. It was her last foray into Sentinel, 16 October 1895. "Ibid. social activism. ^Lynde papers. Between 1893 and her death in 1897 at ^General Laws of Wisconsin, An Act to Authorize a State Board of Charities and Reform (1871), chapter 136. the age of seventy-seven, Mary Lynde ^irst Annual Report of the State Board of Charities and returned to Milwaukee to enjoy her sur Reform of the State of Wisconsin, (Madison, Wisconsin: December 1871) 9-15. viving children and grandchildren and 8fi'ra« Annual Report, 303-304. to take part in the continuing work of ^Second Annual Report of the Board of Charities and Reform, WHi(X3)45950 the Milwaukee Women's Club. She stiU (Madison, Wisconsin: December 1872) 280-283. A tireless worker for reform, Mary Blanchard Lynde ^'^Second Annual Report, 118-119. attended, but did not lead, the meetings ^^ Third Annual Report of the State Board of Charities and seems to embody the old adage "Man's work lasts of the boards for the Orphan Asylum Reform, (Madison, Wisconsin: December 1873) 238-242. from sun to sun, but woman's work is never done." i^Third Annual Report, 264-270. and the Industrial School, both of which ^^Fifth Annual Report of the State Board of Charities and owed their existence to her eflforts. Preform, (Madison, Wisconsin: December 1875) 201-205. ^'^Fourth Annual Report of the State Board of Charities and In the realm of women's reform leadership, and in her own Reform, (Madison, Wisconsin: December 1874). particular crusade for the use of mathematical precision in the ^^Fifth Annual Report; Fourth Annual Report. ^^"Essay on the Advantages of the Study of Mathematics." About the Author A native of Webster Groves, Missouri, Ellen Langill earned a bachelor's degree in the classics at Grinnell College, a master's in history at UW-IVIilwaul AUTUMN 2003 ^ 181855 9/16/03 10:36 AM Page 30 181855 9/16/03 10:36 AM Page 31 lbert Hansen, born in Menomonie in 1886, had a boyhood much like that of any other boy growing up in a small American town at the turn of the twen Atieth century. He swam in the Red Cedar River and canoed and ice skated on Lake Menomin—once falling through the ice when it was thirty below. At the age often, he lost his Norwegian-born father to illness, and his world, though still filled with the natural beau ty that western Wisconsin offered, became less idyllic. Yet Albert Hansen survived and found, in those early years, a passion that he would sustain for a lifetime. In 1905, the year he graduated from Menomonie High School, he was already an accomplished photographer. Five years earlier, he had taken, developed, and printed his first picture at the age of fourteen. By his senior year he had cre ated a set of remarkable photographs illustrating the class prophecy. Albert photographed each member of the class in the costume and setting appropriate to the vocation for which he or she was supposedly destined. The photographs, though often comical (Hansen himself posed as a hobo), are finely wrought studies in composition, contrast, and character. Albert Hansen studied briefly at Stout Institute, later teaching there and producing its annuals. He and a partner, Fred Haft, operated a studio in the downtown Arcade Build ing. Athough Hansen supported himself with studio work, nearly everything in Menomonie became a subject for the camera. Hundreds of his photographs, dating from 1900 to 1915, provide a valuable record of the town as it emerged from the old lumber-mill economy to one based on agricul ture and education. The images record the fabric of the town and its social life: families gathered around their homes, canoe trips, and picnics along the river with girls in long skirts and big hats. These were scenes repeated in small towns all across America. Few small towns had so able a photographer as Abert Hansen, however, and the preservation of his images of everyday life lend them an importance arguably national in scope. In June 1922 Hansen married Mary Elizabeth Schaus, of Newark, Ohio, and in 1924 he began his association with the 181855 9/16/03 10:36AM Page 32 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY Haloid Company, which was to last for fifty-five years, includ ing those years during which Haloid evolved into the Xerox Corporation. In 1927 he was given the opportunity to trans fer to Columbus, Ohio, and he remained there for the rest of his life. He continued to photograph his world, and although his prints never matched the level of creativity he found in his early years in Menomonie, his curiosity about the entire process of photography remained constant. His expertise and technical experience were tapped by the Xerox Corporation in the company's early years of electrophotography. In 1955 he returned to Menomonie to attend his fiftieth class reunion, and he made several complete sets of the class prophecy, which were publicly displayed, and caught the attention of the human interest editor of the Minneapolis Star. In 1971 he took his last photograph, a casual shot of his wife and daugh ter at home. The year following his death, his wife donated his first, last, and more than four thousand other prints and neg atives to the Wisconsin Historical Society. IM<( Editors' note Although the extensive Hansen collection is not yet processed, the images in this article and many others can be made available to the public. Special thanks go to Andy Kraushaar and David Benjamin of the Wisconsin Historical Society's archival staff for their work on this piece. The edi tors also wish to thank Ann Hansen, a journalist and histori an in Columbus, Ohio, for her great patience during the course of this publication. WHS Image ID 7929 A steam train speeds over the trestle that spans the Red Cedar River ^ AUTUMN 2 003 181855 9/16/03 10:36 AM Page 33 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY WHS Image ID 7937 Stout Institute provided instruction to Albert Hansen and, later on in his life, a teaching position. AUTUMN 2 003 181855 9/16/03 10:37 AM Page 36 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY WHS Image ID 7949 The full power of the Red Cedar River is caught in one moment by Hansen's shot of the dam. AUTUMN 2003 181855 9/16/03 10:37 AM Page 37 Trapeze artists thrill the crowds at the Dunn County Fair, ca 1910. Albert Hansen is at the far left in this group shot of a camping trip, ca. 1910 WHS Image ID 7950 WHS Image ID 7951 Not all of Hansen's shots were of the outdoors. This interior, likely a classroom at Stout, offered a high level of detail in the intricate workings of the machinery. WHS Image ID 7952 AUTUMN 2003 181855 9/16/03 10:37 AM Page 3; WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY An All-American in All Respects The Letters of Dave Schreiner By Ellen D. Goldlust-Gingrich and Kurt Gingrich "The Front at Nago." n 29 August 1945 Colonel Alan Shapley, commander of the Fourth In this Dickey Marine Regiment during the invasion of Okinawa, penned a letter of Chapelle photo, a lone soldier views the mists condolence to Anna Schreiner, the mother of David Nathan Schreiner, of Okinawa, where in Owho had been killed during the U.S. conquest of that Japanese island. May and June 1945, Shapley wrote that Schreiner "was not just one of my Lieutenants, he was one of my the Sixth Marine very good friends. We all used to say, jokingly, in the Fourth that Dave was not just Division, with other an All-American football player, but an All-American boy in all respects." elements of the U.S. The context of this letter demanded kind words and platitudes, but there are military, slogged through some of the ample indications that Shapley's estimation of Schreiner was both heartfelt and toughest fighting of the shared by many others. After Dave Schreiner's death, his family received hundreds Pacific campaign. of condolence letters from people throughout the country, many commenting specifically on the quality of his character and values. Many people believed that Wisconsin Historical Schreiner—a native of Lancaster, Wisconsin; a star on the football field; and a leader Society PH3301G 2696. UW—Madison Archives, negative number 2569-A During Dave Schreiner's senior year, the University of Wisconsin football team had one of its most successful seasons. The team notched an 8—1—1 record, losing only to Iowa, and finished the 1942 season ranked third nationally. The season culminated with a 20—6 victory over Minnesota, ending a string of nine straight losses to the Gophers. Schreiner is number 80, front row, center. 5J AUTUMN 2003 181855 9/16/03 10:37 AM Page 3^ Lives are lived to learn. Dave Schreiner, 1941 181855 9/16/03 10:37 AM Page 40 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY Schreiner was born on 5 March 1921, the second child and only son of Bert and Anna Schreiner. He grew up in Lancaster, Grant County, where he first earned notoriety as a football star. In 1938, during his senior year at Lan caster High School, Schreiner helped the school's football team compile a 6-0 record and win the Southwest Wisconsin Conference championship. The following autumn he enrolled at the University of Wisconsin and began his college football career on the freshman squad. During his sopho more year, he suited up with the varsi ty and, in the words of his sister, Betty, "tore the place apart."^ In the first game of the season on 5 October 1940, Schreiner, an end, scored a touchdown in a 33-19 upset of the Marquette Hilltoppers. The game set the tone for Schreiner's 1940 season, after which the Associated Press (AP) awarded him an honorable mention on its Big Ten all-star list. Wisconsin's team was ^ - ..-_ - ro SCHREINER' mediocre in 1941, winning three and l£/\MWORK COMES JEAS-Y TO THIS CJDMBlNAVOMA FOR THE BOYS HAVE 8EEN PALS FOfl AlONCr losing five, but Schreiner, now a jun TtME. THfY ATT£mED ORAMMAR SCHOOL HANDLES TME PASSING- ior, excelled. He led the Big Ten in ANDHI6fl$aiOOt r06£THER'IM THE/R END OF THE HOSKINS TO SCHREINER COMBINATION HOME roif^N.LANCASTER^ ENTBRBO - receiving with twelve catches for 249 WSCOA/SW TOOETHER, ARE ROOMMATES) yards in only six games. After the sea FRATERNrXY BROTHERS, AND iVORRAHTES ON A ROAD CONSTRUCTION GAfK, I^MU SUMMER.son , accolades rolled in. Schreiner Grant County Herald, 12 November 1941 made the all-Big Ten teams selected by Dave Schreiner and Mark Hoskins became celebrities throughout the state of Wisconsin. the United Press (UP) and the Big Ten On 12 November 1941 Lancaster's Grant County Herald ran this cartoon coaches, and the AP named him an all- glorifying the exploits of the hometown boys. American. Despite his growing success on the on the battlefield—had the character and values to deserve gridiron, Schreiner led an off the-field life that resembled that the sobriquet all-American. of many other University of Wisconsin undergraduates. He To some extent Schreiner's story is typical, and its typical was a business major with average grades, served on the Stu ity is one of the reasons it deserves to be told. Many fine dent Athletic Board and University Athletic Board, and held young men fought in World War II and never returned to tell various jobs to defray living expenses. One example of this about it. More than 400,000 Americans died during the war; ordinary life was a stint on a road crew, an activity that he nearly 8,000 of them were from Wisconsin and 486 of them, hoped would help prepare him for football season. Neither his like Schreiner, were graduates of the University of Wiscon jobs nor extracurricular activities were glamorous, but he was sin-Madison.' Each of these people was mourned by many definitely something of a celebrity. Lillian Otto Fried, man others. ager of the student dining hall where Schreiner worked, Because Schreiner was a widely known football star, how assigned him the unsocial task of mopping floors, hoping to ever, his life and death affected an especially large number of reduce the amount of commotion that the football star's pres people, and their responses to his death—like the feelings ence regularly caused. People back in Schreiner's hometown expressed in Colonel Shapley's letter—illuminate his life. avidly followed Wisconsin football, even "little old ladies who While serving in the Marines, Schreiner penned scores of let didn't know a touchdown from a punt," according to Betty ters to his parents and sister. These personal letters, housed at Schreiner Johnson. the Wisconsin Historical Society, provide an opportunity to During Schreiner's senior year, the university's football become acquainted with Schreiner, to travel with him as he team had one of its most successful seasons. The team approaches and experiences war, and to measure how notched an 8-1-1 record, losing only to Iowa, and finished wartime experiences changed his sense of self the season ranked third nationally. The season culminated m AUTUMN 2003 181855 9/16/03 10:37 AM Page 41 -^> WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY with a 20-6 pasting of Minnesota, ending a string of nine straight losses to the Gophers. In that game Schreiner caught three passes (all of the Badgers' receptions) for 82 yards and one touchdown. For the year he had seventeen catches for 371 yards and five touchdowns. Schreiner's performance earned him a wide array of honors. He was tabbed as a co- captain of the team and was named the Badgers' and the Big Ten's most valuable player. He made a host of all-Big Ten lists, including the AP's and the UP's, and he was selected as an all-American by Look magazine, AP, and UP, among other organizations. Schreiner was also chosen to play in the East-West Shrine game, an all-star game played in San Fran cisco on 1 January 1943. In this contest he scored a touch down and helped lead the East to a 13-12 victory. As one of the country's premier college players, Schreiner was selected to play in a charity game pitting a team of college all-stars against the National Football League (NFL) champion Wash ington Redskins, and the Detroit Lions chose him in the sec ond round of the NFL draft. But Schreiner did not play in the charity game, and he did not suit up for the Lions. Instead he donned a military uniform. Schreiner had joined the U.S. Marine Corps Reserves on 15 December 1942, and he left for basic training on 18 May 1943, missing his college graduation ceremony. Schreiner was not alone in leaving school because of the war, which wrought radical changes at the university. The Wisconsin State Jour nal ssdd of the 1943 graduation ceremony, "The atmosphere in the fieldhouse was completely military, with hundreds of uniformed servicemen and women present." The Capital Times reported that the law school's May 1943 graduating class included only eighteen students and that "when Prof Helen White of the English department announced, 'Those candidates for the degree of bachelor of arts in humanities will rise,' a lone young woman stood." The 1939 freshman class, the largest in the university's history to that point, had num bered 2,600, of whom only 1,050 received degrees in May 1943.3 Instead of a graduation ceremony, Schreiner reported to Parris Island, South Carolina, for basic training. He weighed 198 pounds, with gray eyes shining beneath his close-cut brown hair. He began writing at least once a week to his par ents and sister, revealing much about his personality. The cor respondence demonstrates his powerful love of family and highlights the other important parts of his life: his friends; "good old Lancaster"; Badger football; and especially his fiancee, Odette Hendrickson, who served in the WAVES, the women's branch of the U.S. Navy. Clearly strong and hard working, Schreiner wrote on 30 May that "life down here isn't as tough physically as I had expected although some of the boys are having trouble." He made a simple promise to his parents, "I'll certainly do my best to become a good Marine." Judy Corfield Confident, he assured his parents that he would become "a Schreiner possessed natural confidence and ability, but hard work and dedication 1st class fighting man." As his letters describe such activities as enabled him to excel Today's college football stars may spend summers ensconced athletics, church, and enjoying milk, Schreiner obviously in high-tech weight rooms, but Schreiner did not have this option. Instead he was—typical of his time and place—upright but still human. puddled cement on a road crew, hoping that the demanding physical labor would Basic training did little to change the Lancaster boy. help to prepare him for the football season. AUTUMN 2003 181855 9/16/03 10:38 AM Page 42 Though in one letter he remarked on his improved sense of discipHne, the bulk of his education was yet to take place. His football experiences had pre pared him to handle basic training but had not equipped him to understand World War II, and his time at Parris Island did not enlighten him about the conflict he was joining, the duty he was feeling, or the reasons behind the sacri fices he was making. Although he attended lectures "on the seriousness of what we are doing," he retained his naivete. On 21 May 1943 he casually promised his mother that he would not wear his nice wristwatch "when the going is tough," and he described parts of basic training as "fooHshness" and "heU." As for his sense of duty, the best he could articulate was "right now I'm doing what I want to do because it has to be done." His general, cHched lan guage in these early letters reflected his lack of direct connection to the war, which had not yet touched him person ally. As his training progressed, howev er, his perspective changed. In mid-July 1943, after eight weeks at Parris Island, Schreiner completed basic training and was transferred to Quantico, Virginia, for further training with the Reserve Officers Corps (ROC). The training at Quantico began to give Schreiner more than just added discipline, and his letters became more thoughtful and serious. Staged war exercises simulated the "reaHsm and destructiveness of this war." More importantly, Schreiner encountered veteran marines, many of whom had already seen combat in the Pacific. On 9 October 1943 he observed, "We've got about 10 feUows in our platoon (Marine Gunners and 1st Lts) that saw a lot of action in Guadalcanal. . . . Some of the stories they teU are really fantastic. Practically aU have been AUTUMN 2003 181855 9/16/03 10:38 AM Page 43 HEADQUARTERS U. S. MARINE CORPS WASHINGTON i--bj ^^^^''^f*^'^^^^ "^ £9 August, 1945 Mrs. H. S. Schriner Lancaster Wisconsin Dear Mrs. Schriner: I commandecl the Fourth Marine Regiment until recently, when I was detached, and oriiered home after my three ye&rs of duty in the Pacific. I deeply and sincerely wish to take this means to offer you raysympath y on the loss of your son Dave. He vms not just one of my Lieutenants, he (jUJ! ALAN SEAPL Colonel, U.S. Marine Corps Inspector General's Office Letters were an important part of Dave Schreiner's life. He wrote resolutions to himself when war broke out, determined to be a better person; he wrote letters home from the Pacific in 1944 and 1945, to assure his family that he was fine, despite the harsh realities he faced; and letters poured into the Schreiner home after his death in 1945, to offer condolence to Herb and Anna Schreiner, and comment with kind words on the fine character their son had always shown. WHS Archives M92-233 wounded." A 31 July letter that reflected on caring for the forty men in a platoon showed that he was beginning to real ize the responsibilities that come with leadership. It is also clear that marine indoctrination helped him to conceptualize the war, to believe not just that the war had to be fought but also that it had to be fought specifically to exterminate evil. An 8 September 1943 letter to his parents simply says, "If you haven't read Churchill's Quebec speech please look it up and I think you'll realize why we are fighting and why we have to train as we do."* fter completing his training at Quantico, Schreiner As each step in his was commissioned a second lieutenant and received a military service two-week furlough to visit his family in Lancaster. His A took him to a new sister, Betty, recalled that his visit coincided with Thanksgiv place on the globe, ing. Their mother used the occasion to celebrate all the holi Dave Schreiner's days she knew her son would miss with his family: an Easter introspective journey tgg hunt in the morning, a big Thanksgiving turkey dinner, continued as well and then Christmas in the evening, complete with "a Christ The journey that started in Lancaster mas tree up, all decorated . . . just as though Santa Claus had came to an end in come." Schreiner then headed for San Diego, where he Okinawa. would be shipped out for duty in the Pacific theater. Schreiner spent about six weeks in San Diego awaiting deployment, a lull that caused him frustration and anxiety. AUTUMN 2003 181855 9/16/03 10:38 AM Page 44 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY Many of the finest athletes in college and 'i^^Wk^, professional sports ^^ served in the military during World War II, and some who had met on the field met again in uniform. Dave Schreiner (left) shakes hands with Tony Butkovich, an all-American football player from Purdue before a friendly game of football. Butkovich died on Okinawa on 18 April 1945, ]ust two months before Schreiner fell. Judy Corfield - .• '^,->^.. AUTUMN 2003 181855 9/16/03 10:38 AM Page 4 5 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY but also offered him an opportunity to gain a more acute Raider Battalions, which had seen considerable action on understanding of his values. In a long and poignant letter Guadalcanal, Bougainville, and other Pacific islands. Schrein written to his parents on 16 January 1944, just days before he er joined the regimental weapons company, where his unit left San Diego, he stated: "I'm sure that before too long I'll be operated a pair of half-tracks (lightly armored military vehi back in Wisconsin with you. The more I think about it, the cles), which Schreiner said "pack a lot of whallop." more I realize that I want to come back and settle in the mid- In May the Fourth Marine Regiment moved north again, dlewest." Understanding led to direct expressions of grati into the central Pacific, first to Kwajalein and then to Eniwe- tude: "I've always appreciated you folks but it has grown and tok. On 21 July Schreiner and the rest of the regiment hit the Sti grown these months that I've been away. No son ever had two beaches of Guam. Schreiner was in combat, mired in two more loving, kind, and gracious parents. When I come back I weeks of fierce fighting for control of the small but densely hope I'll be able to repay you for everything although I know forested and well-defended island. On 30 July he suffered a you want no recompense for the things little and big that head wound and was temporarily evacuated to a nearby ship you've done." Clearly echoing Psalm 23, Schreiner advised: for medical treatment before returning to action. He reported "Please don't fear for my welfare. I have a feehng, a very to his parents that the wound was "no worse than a scratch," strong one, that God is with me and and on 8 August he glossed, "Here on will deliver me safely back and I sin Guam everything is fine. War isn't the cerely hope you share this behef If you hell you read about. We are living off keep in mind that goodness and right the land and 10-1 rations. Am thinner, eousness shall live forever and dwell in but not tired or sick of it all." the house of the Lord I know that my absence will be merely a safe trip in chreiner omitted from his letters which a job that is to be done will be many details about his time on done, and done well." Galling on the SiGuam , no doubt to avoid worry Bible as well as Ghurchill rather than ing his family. But the savage fighting employing empty generahties, Schrein DAVID N. DAVE and heavy casualties clearly affected er's appreciation of the seriousness of BORN. MARCH 3,^ him. He lost 10 percent of his body war was clearly growing. Still lacking WISCONSIN. HE a weight as well as some of his certainty. firsthand experience, however, he MARINE LIEUTENAJ VJDNE His confident assertions remained, but 21. 1943. ONE OF could not yet describe his feelings in his tr ENDS they now shared the page with open- OF BIG TEN HIST E PLAYING own words. FOR-""^ ""--"'"•'' .0-1941-1942 ended questions. Whereas previous let In February 1944 Schreiner, as part ir iLE PLAYER ters had forthrightly forecast a rapid of the Fortieth Replacement Regiment, V^riV InlOll* '"' "' "1,42. conclusion to his participation in the arrived on New Galedonia, a substan war, his 29 August letter was tinged tial island east of Australia where the Judy Corfield with doubt and a hint of fear, "Maybe marines had a major presence. Here Both before and after his death, Schreiner received it'll be over real soon I hope." As he Schreiner would spend three months, myriad accolades, and this plaque at Camp Randall had many times previously, on 4 Sep is just one example. Schreiner was first honored as and here the young man from Lancast tember he expressed his desire to an all-American for his success on the football field, remain close to his sister and his hopes er would experience a different world. but his accomplishments on the battlefield made him His letters excitedly described encoun an all-American in all respects. Scheiner was born in for the future, but unlike earlier letters, ters with natives, passages in which the 1921, not 1920, as written on the plaque. the post-Guam passages ended with young American depicted them both as questions, "How about that Sis?" and primitive and as more "civilized" than he had expected. For "It'd be nice, wouldn't it?" When he spoke of Odette Hen the most part, however, Schreiner found his time on New drickson, he explicitly uttered a greater uncertainty, "You Galedonia intensely frustrating. The football hero had prac know. Bets, sometimes I think that its unfair to have her wait ticed for the big game, but on New Galedonia he just stalked for me. After all there's a chance I won't come back and then the sidelines, aching to get into the action and believing that where'U she be?" Schreiner had realized and used his own he alone could make a difference. As he wrote to his sister on language to express his sense that he was involved in a situa 20 March: "As yet we have not done one thing for the good tion too big and complex for even the most capable person to of the old U.S.A. Not one damn thing! We've been out of the control. states approx. 2 months now and they have been entirely While on Guam the young man had clearly glimpsed his wasted as far as the war effort is concerned." own mortality. His subsequent letters showed for the first time In a letter dated 23 April 1944 Schreiner used a personal his capacity to hate, a hatred directed at "these little yellow code to inform his parents that his unit was about to move " who had jolted his psyche. Perhaps sensing his own north to Guadalcanal, a scene of fierce combat in late 1942 limitations, Schreiner became even more concerned about the and early 1943. There he entered the Fourth Marine Regi welfare of his friends and family. During his time on Guam, ment, joining many veterans from the First and Second Schreiner received word that his childhood friend and fellow AUTUMN 2003 m 181855 9/16/03 10:38AM Page 46 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY Badger gridder, Mark Hadley "Had" Hoskins, who was serving I've never liked responsibility but I've had to accept it." as a B-17 pilot in the U. S. Army Air Corps in Europe, had been In February 1945 Schreiner and his rifle platoon began reported missing. An 8 August letter opened with comments on preparations for their next mission, an invasion of Okinawa, Hoskins, whom Schreiner called "my best friend and the great just to the south of Japan's home islands. Still scarred from est guy I ever knew," and later letters were filled with thoughts Guam and anticipating more combat, Schreiner began to turn for his friend in spite of his own harrowing experiences.^ more seriously to religion. In a letter written on 21 February, Schreiner's parents learned in a 16 August letter that the while other marines fought the bloody battle for Iwo Jima, he young man had received command of a rifle platoon in the remarked, "The 23rd Psalm is a good one to remember." Then First Battalion's Company A. By the end of August Schreiner on 31 March Schreiner wrote from on board ship: "I have a lit and his platoon were heading back to Guadalcanal, where the tle copy of the New Testament which I've been looking thru Fourth Marine Regiment became part of the Sixth Marine lately. Last night I read Christ's Sermon on the Mount. The Division and waited for its next mission, a wait that would last Bible certainly gives one faith in everything—knowing that with until February 1945. His letters during this second stay on faith everything is bound to come out alright." The invasion of Guadalcanal revealed more of the effects of combat on the for Okinawa began the next day. For the next two months the mer football star. The small-town boy at Parris Island who had Sixth Marine Division and many other elements of the U.S. gleefully snuck off base for milk was now at home on Guadal military in the Pacific slogged through some of the toughest canal and fmding refuge and solace in alcohol. The naive fighting of the Pacific campaign, struggling against fierce resist young man who had thrilled at Churchill's ideals was now the ance as rain and war turned the once-fair island into an other experienced marine who panned the movie The Story of Dr. worldly morass of mud and blood. On 6 June Bob Bauman, Wassell because it had "too much flag waving in it." In an 8 Schreiner's friend and teammate from Wisconsin and his com December letter Schreiner even belittled his Purple Heart: rade in the First Battalion's Company A, was killed. "Last Saturday the general pinned a purple heart on my tunic. Discussing the effects of combat in a 1 May letter, Schrein He shook hands with me etc. Its a big medal and a lot of er observed: "You do get a hardened outlook on life but not an baloney. You get it for just a scratch nowadays." unpleasant or mean perspective. Things that used to shock you Schreiner had grown better at separating propaganda from are more or less taken for granted. But I am quite sure you reality, at differentiating between the superficial and the won't find me greatly changed." In fact he had changed. Nev important. He also was fighting enervation. A 10 January let ertheless, his self-analysis was sound. He was fundamentally ter to his sister explained: the same: strong, upright, and hardworking. Though less cer tain, he still had his confidence. Ability, along with the horri I'm getting along real well but beat my gums occasionally if ble attrition of battle, had enabled the young marine to rise the chow isn't good or if I must stand guard for 4 hours at quickly in the ranks, but advancement had not destroyed his night. I have about a year out now and it has gone very fast. modesty. A 14 June letter to his parents explained: "I've been My health is amazingly good although the tropics has a defi Co. Commander of A Co now for about a week which is quite nite tendency to pull you down mentally, morally, and physi a step up but I'm not looking for advancement in the service. cally. It's a shame but this life does ruin a lot of good men. You That might sound funny to you but I was as contented with a have to be very careful not to slip. You see its hard as there's platoon as with a company which is a much larger responsi very litde to take real pride in. Your job is there with natural bility. A Co is the best in the Corps as far as I'm concerned and incentive to do well—at least well enough to please your own runs itself We've been doing a darn fine job and I'm plenty self, but there's nothing you can do about advancement as they proud of them, believe me." promote by ROC numbers. . . . But my Marine ambitions are Dave Schreiner's simple statements about the constancy of small, luckily. Then there's personal appearance, talk, lack of character amid the life-altering experiences of war reveal a wholesome recreation, an Omar Khayam viewpoint in many growing sense of maturity. As he became more accepting of etc. But if you're man enough you can probably gain in char the contradictions that exist in life, his own plans for his future acter rather than backslide. became clearer to him. Throughout the war his letters dis played no interest in a career in the marines. He believed his is intense sense of responsibility surely helped him real life would begin after his military service ended. Writing defeat these doubts on Guadalcanal. As he explained in October 1943, the boy fresh out of college thought that this Hto his parents, "A rifle platoon has about 45 men—a real life would start with a chance to play professional football. big responsibility but a lot of fun too." On 13 November 1944 The young lieutenant with a first taste of caring for other peo he wrote: "My job is to organize and train this platoon—to hold ple began to dream of going to medical school in Madison. By school on weapons, tactics and other relevant things. Its a hard May 1944 Schreiner was torn between medical school and job pleasing everyone—I don't try to. All I do is to play fair & farming, "Farming is the best life one can lead and I'm seri square with them all and call 'em as I see em. After all I'm not ously considering it." A letter written a year later from Oki running a popularity contest but want a good hard hitting pla nawa made it clear that the combat veteran's goal now was toon." In a letter written on New Year's Eve 1944, Schreiner definitely farming. As he saw more of the world and as war told his parents: "I believe I have matured a lot thru necessity. affected him, his goals evolved, but he became ever more root- m AUTUMN 2003 181855 9/16/03 10:38AM Page 47 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY .-v'M t V -f V .* V T^- "IPj^^ -"^ •.^ ^d t A.v::^-^ 1^ i-? •^*' -*^ ••xiT y Judy Corfield ryr Schreiner called Hoskins, who served as a B-17 pilot in the European theater, "my best friend and the greatest guy I ever knew." Schreiner rode an emotional roller-coaster as he heard that Hoskins y^ ^ 0| learned that he had been shot down and taken prisoner. Finally, while on Okinawa, Schreiner learned that Hoskins had been freed. n.-' .'l.Vf..< s\''\i *>-:.i- Ai •M-.'iV J \. •;>-:' Judy Corfield Dave Schreiner and Mark "Had" Hoskins were childhood friends from Lancaster (Schreiner, age twelve, is at left, next to Hoskins, age eleven). Their shared childhood was originally fodder for the sports writers and UW publicity department who duhhed them the "Lancaster Twins " When war sent them to face different fates, the strength of their true friendship was clear AUTUMN 2003 181855 9/16/03 10:38 AM Page 4S WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY ed in his native soil, anxiously awaiting a life in southern Wis "Crazylegs" Hirsch, one of the most storied players in Wis consin with his parents, his sister, his friends, his college consin football history, as saying: "I really received a blow sweetheart, and children of his own. when I read about Dave Schreiner. I admired him more than Schreiner determined what life he wanted to live, but he did any other player. Not only was he an All-American on the not get to live it. His dreams were laid to rest on Okinawa. A field but he was one of the best hearted and most honest fel letter to Schreiner's father from Major General Lemuel D. lows I knew. In my room at home he has the top spot among Shepherd Jr. explained: "On June 20, 1945, the day your son my football pictures. I don't think he ever had an enemy. I was wounded, the Sixth Marine Division was engaged in heavy never heard a bad word against him. He was just one of those fighting at the southern end of Okinawa. In his capacity as good kids that only come along once in a great while." Company Commander, Lieutenant Schreiner was on recon Schreiner continued to garner honors long after his death. naissance with his Battalion Commander in preparation for In 1947 his family established the David N. Schreiner Memo closing a gap in the lines, when he was struck by a round fired rial Award (changed in 1990 to the Schreiner-Hoskins by a Japanese sniper. A corpsman rushed to administer first aid Award), which is given to a Wisconsin football player as part and immediately took him to the battalion aid station, where he of a scholarship. In April 1949, when a Marine escort was treated by the battalion surgeon. From there he was evac returned Schreiner's body to Lancaster, the Grant County uated to Third Amphibious Corps field hospital for an emer Independent and the Wisconsin State Journal dedicated gency operation. His wound was so serious that this operation front-page space to the story of the football star and decorat failed to save his life, and he died at the hospital on June 21, ed war veteran being laid to rest in his hometown. The Uni 1945." The same day brought the official announcement that versity of Wisconsin named a dormitory for Schreiner in all organized Japanese resistance on Okinawa had collapsed. 1955, and a building on North Orchard Street still bears his The last large operation of the Pacific campaign had ended, but name today. The university later retired his jersey number, not before Schreiner, along with more than seven thousand 80. He has been inducted into the University of Wisconsin other American servicemen, had died. On 4 July 1945 a ceme Athletic Hall of Fame and the state of Wisconsin Athletic Hall tery on Okinawa was dedicated to serve as a resting place for of Fame. These honors reflect Schreiner's football ability as Schreiner and seventeen hundred of his fellow Marines. well as how the young man lived and died. News of Schreiner's death spread quickly. The death of the Schreiner was first honored as an all-American for his well-known and much-loved football hero made the war accomplishments on the football field. But his accomplish starkly real. In the Wisconsin State Journal on 1 July 1945 ments on the batdefield made him an all-American in all Henry J. McCormick noted "widespread and sincere expres respects. Ultimately, of course, as a sniper proved, Schreiner sions of grief that went far beyond the Madison campus was a person, not a saint or a demigod of the gridiron. His where Schreiner had lived and played, far beyond his home story shows, however, that even in war—what Schreiner's town of Lancaster. On 16 July the Journal quoted Elroy death provoked State Journal sportswriter Roundy Coughlin to call "the world's worst menace"—a person can be good, can be strong, can find what is truly important, and can help lead other people. Perhaps this is the standard that should truly define an all-American. fcX^ Acknowledgments The authors thank the late Betty and Hal Johnson; their daugh ter, Judy Corfield; Odette Hendrickson Davis; and the late Mark Hadley Hoskins, without whose cooperation this article would not have been possible. About the Authors Notes Kurt A. Gingrich holds a bachelor's degree from the Universi ^Michael E. Stevens, Sean P. Adams, and Ellen D. Goldlust, eds.. Letters from the Front (Madi son: Wisconsin Historical Society, 1992), 73, 91; "The University of Wisconsin in World War ty of Virginia and a master's degree and a Ph.D. in British his n" (1951 report), 14, University of Wisconsin (UW) Archives, World War 11 folder 2. tory from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Since 2000 he ^All quotations from Betty Schreiner Johnson are from her interview, 25 June 1992, Wisconsin Women during Worid War II Oral History Project, Wisconsin Historical has held the position of assistant professor of history at Rad Society. ford University in Radford, Virginia. ^Badger Quarterly, December 1942; "The University of Wisconsin in World War 11" (1951 report), 14, UW Archives, World War II folder 2; Capital Times, 29 May 1943; Wisconsin State Journal, 29 May 1943. Ellen D. Goldlust-Gingrich holds a bachelor's degree from the ^On 31 August 1943, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill gave a lengthy speech in Quebec, Canada, in which he praised the military efforts of France, Canada, the Soviet University of Virginia and a master's degree in U.S. history Union, and other countries. He said, "Let us then all go forward together making the from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. She has worked best of ourselves and the best of each other with vows to apply the maximum forces at our command without regard to any other single thought but the attack and destruc as a freelance editor of scholarly books since 1991. The Gin- tion of those monstrous and evil dominations which have so nearly cost each and all of grichs live in Blacksburg, Virginia. us our national lives and mankind its future" {New York Times, 1 September 1943). ^Schreiner later heard that Hoskins had been shot down and was in a POW camp. While on Okinawa, Schreiner learned that his old friend had been freed. m AUTUMN 2 003 181855 9/16/03 10:38 AM Page 49 Dave Schreiner visited Lancaster for the last time in November leave, his mother had the family celebrate Thanksgiving Christmas, and Easter all in one day to make would be eone. Judy Corfield / -^=,^i-^-ii4£/... As a result of the war to realize his dream of seeing his niece, Judy, grow up. More however, is the way that he lived. As Elroy "Crazylegs" Hirsch said, "He was just one of those good kids that only come ^iJ':^'^^::::?::^!^ L4-i^A^'\J £XJ along once in a great t _;/ XT? while." WHS Archives IVI92-233 181855 9/16/03 10:38 AM Page 50 EDITORS' •<^ CHOICE Books Events Multimedia Exhibits Resources Locations The Three-Ring Extravaganza The Circus Age: Culture and Society ed States. She shows, for example, how the under the American Big Top time clock emerged as a controlling force— 1 largely, in the case of the circus, enforced by BY JANET M. DAVIS CULTfR.E (I SOCIETY ^^ , IMDER THE AMERICAN railroad schedules. University of North Carolina Press, Chapel Hill, NC, 2002. Pp. xviii, 329. Index, notes, bibliography, illustrations. ISBN 0- Equally interesting is Davis's discussion of 8078-5399-2, $1995, softcover. the changing roles of women in society, and especially their place in the circus. At a time anet Davis examines the many dimensions of when Victorian values still prevailed, she the circus during the end of the nineteenth argues, the circus was able to feature scantily Jand beginning of the twentieth century, as clad women performers. Yet, when the women the United States moved from a largely agrari left the circus ring, they still donned the long an society to one that was more urban and ^^^^ skirts that indicated respectability. In this way, industrial. Davis, an assistant professor of the circus reflected changing gender prescrip American Studies and History at the University of Texas at tions taking place in United States society more generally. Austin, began The Circus Age as her dissertation while earn As her extensive notes and bibliography reveal, Davis con ing a Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, ducted an enormous amount of research for this project. The Although examining the institution of the circus national Robert L. Parkinson Library and Research Genter at Gircus ly, she also makes many references to Wisconsin's long and World Museum in Baraboo provided a major source of mate colorful circus history, as she should. Her study includes, for rials for the project. She also has effectively incorporated thir example, the substantial circus colony run by Edmund and ty-six black and white illustrations depicting, for example, Jeremiah Mabie in Delavan between 1847 and 1894, She also circus elephants and a sketch of Barnum and Bailey's Show discusses the partnership, begun in 1870, of New York Muse layout in 1903. Finally, eight four-color circus posters present um owner P. T, Barnum with William, G. Coup (from Dela an array of circus advertising approaches. van) and Dan Gastello (a long-time circus man from Racine). At times the book reads more like a dissertation, but on This was the beginning of what became the famous Barnum balance, this work presents excellent research and is a book and Bailey Gircus with headquarters in Bridgeport, Gon- that many readers of Wisconsin history will want to have on necticut. Finally, no discussion of the circus would be com their shelves. The Circus Age paints a picture of the place the plete without mention of the famous Ringling Brothers, who circus held in our culture at a time when "circus day" led folks selected Baraboo as their headquarters from 1884 to 1918. to close schools and shut down all competing activity so every Davis argues quite convincingly that the circus was a one could attend the three-ring extravaganza under the Big reflection of larger societal changes. She illustrates how large Top. railroad circuses—Ringling Brothers and Barnum and Bailey JERRY APPS are but two examples—adopted the system of labor special Professor Emeritus, University of Wisconsin—Madison ization that was emerging in big industrial plants in the Unit- TO OUR READERS Are there books, events, or resources about Wisconsin Most books featured in Editors' Ghoice may be pur that you think we should know about? We'd like to hear chased or ordered from the Wisconsin Historical Museum from you. store; (608) 264-6428 or www.wisconsinhistory.org/shop. Write to Reviews Editor, They may also be acquired from most major bookstores or Wisconsin Magazine of History on-line retailers. Books from smaller presses should be Wisconsin Historical Society ordered directly from the book's publisher, whose address 816 State Street, Madison, Wl 53706-1482 may be found on the Internet or by contacting us. or e-mail [email protected] EIT AUTUMN 2003 181855 9/16/03 10:38 AM Page 51 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY When Discovery and Adventure Were the Order of the Day The Lewis and Clark Journals: french ladies" (p. 2). And later, under way on 15 June, he An American Epic of Discovery noted with some pleasure that "the party drank a dram of BY MERRIWETHER LEWIS AND WILLIAM CLARK whisky and Roe on" (p. 13). EDITED BY GARY E. MOULTON John Ordway, one of three sergeants and a stalwart of the expedition, was a dependable chronicler of the trip, making University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln, NE, 2003. Pp. Iviii, 413. Index, illustrations, maps. ISBN 0-8032-2950-X, $29.95, hardcover. an entry for every day. He was observant and took delight in keeping track of both the natural world and the Native Amer here are any number of narratives chronicling the icans the party met along its route, as well as the more mun remarkable journey of Lewis and Clark up the dane daily happenings. On 6 July 1804, traveling near what TMissouri and across the Rocky Mountains to the is now St. Joseph, Missouri, Ordway took a moment to note Pacific Ocean. But it is a special joy to read their own words that "a whiper will perched on the boat for a short time" (p. about the expedition, and an additional pleasure to read the 18). And on 27 November 1804, with the party settled in for accounts penned by the men, hunters and soldiers and boat the winter at Fort Mandan in North Dakota, Ordway took men, who accompanied them. obvious delight in reporting that "we had a dance this This is the best reason to read The Lewis evening. Rivet danced on his head" (p. 71). and Clarii Journals: An American Epic of Dis What comes across most readily in this covery. Published by the University of Nebras abridged edition of the journals is the sense of ka Press, the book is an abridgement of the The Le^ adventure and discovery that the members of and CL Definitive Nebraska Edition of the journals. It Journa the Corps of Discovery kept alive even through was edited by Lewis and Clark scholar Gary E. the most difficult parts of their journey. There Moulton, and an introduction and afterword are also all of those things that have thrilled ear by him add considerably to an understanding lier readers of the reports—the meticulous list of the expedition, especially for anyone unfa ing of animals and plants previously unknown miliar with the details of the journey. to the European world, hair-raising encounters In this book, Moulton includes not only the with grizzlies, lavish descriptions of a landscape most salient entries from the co-captains but rich with game and prairie and forest, moving also, for the same days, the journal entries accounts of first meetings with the native people from several enlisted men. Thus, we hear the who had called the land home for centuries. voices of and see the landscape through the None of the explorers was better than Meri eyes of men such as Sergeant Charles Floyd, whose notes are wether Lewis at capturing the sense of expectancy and of won particularly poignant because he would become the only der with which each day and each new river vista must have member of the Corps of Discovery to lose his life during the been greeted. Lewis would frequentiy walk on shore as his men expedition, and the youngjoseph Whitehouse, whose account paddled up the river, and he noted in his journal entries how is the only surviving record by any of the privates in the wonderful it was to walk alone with all the new country spread Corps. (The Floyd diary, a part of the Wisconsin Historical before him. On 29 June 1805 he wrote, "I have scarcely expe Society's collection, will be out-of-state on exhibit for much of rienced a day since my first arrival in this quarter without the next year, but available online in its entirety.) experiencing some novel occurrence among the party or wit The observations from each of these men lend rich and nessing the appearance of some uncommon object" (p. 142). colorful detail to the Lewis and Clark story, and they also help Lewis, who suffered from bouts of depression and who make real the day-to-day lives of the adventurers. While read took his own life years after the expedition, would never again ing the book, one becomes familiar with each of the journal capture the happiness and excitement he felt during those keepers and begins to understand their personalities, their days afield. But, reading his journals and the reports of his likes and dislikes, their particular view of the world. men, one joins him for a while at a time in his life and in the Whitehouse, for example, seemed thrilled to be a member history of the nation when all seemed wild and new, and dis of such an expedition and savored the things that any young covery and adventure were the order of the day. soldier would enjoy. On 18 May 1804, while waiting to set out from their camp near St. Louis, Whitehouse noted that the RON SEELY men "passed the evening verry agreeable dancing with the Wsconsin State Journal AUTUMN 2003 181855 9/16/03 10:39 AM Page 52 BOOK ANNOUNCEMENTS The Walleye War: The Struggle for Ojibwe Barker's Barns: Visions of Spearfishing and Treaty Rights an American Icon BY LARRY NESPER PHOTOGRAPHS BY MICHAEL P. University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln, NE, 2002. Pp. xv, 245. Index, notes, HARKER bibliography, illustrations. ISBN 0-8032-8380-6, $19.95, softcover. TEXT BY JIM HEYNEN n the mid-1980s boat landings in northern Wisconsin University of Iowa Press, Iowa City, lA, Ibecame the battlefields in the walleye war, as Ojibwe fish 2003. Pp. 89. 75 b/w photographs. ISBN 0- ermen sought to exercise the spearfishing rights guaranteed 87745-834-0, $24.95, softcover. by nineteenth-century treaties and protesters sought to stop "'hese seventy-five stunning photographs by Michael them. Larry Nesper explores both public and private aspects Harker and pithy vignettes by poet Jim Heynen brilliant of the controversy, analyzing the violence on the boat land ly document Iowa's barns. From square to round, wood to ings as well as the importance of spearfishing in Ojibwe histo brick, Dutch to Swedish, occupied or abandoned, the barns ry and culture. documented in this collection are a testament to a passing way of life that was once the lifeblood of Iowa and the Midwest. Sacred Sites of Wisconsin Crossing to Freedom BY JOHN-BRIAN PAPROCK AND TERESA Crossing BY ELIZABETH WELLS BARDWELL PENEGUY PAPROCK to Freedom Writer's Club Press, Lincoln, NE, 2002. Pp. xi, 214. TraUs Books, Black Earth, Wl, 2001. Pp. xv, 219. Appendix. ISBN 0-595-22598-5, $17.95, softcover. Index, bibliography, appendix, illustrations, maps. ISBN 1-931599-01-7, $18.95, softcover. "ore than a family history. Cross T)rofiling more than four hundred sites M.ing to Freedom assembles stirring around Wisconsin that are noted stories of hundreds of kindred families places of worship and pilgrimage. Sacred related to Elizabeth Wells Bardwell. Sites of Wisconsin includes churches, One of the lines is traced back to 540 temples, synagogues, cemeteries, effigy A.D. but most of this spacious chronicle mounds, retreat centers, and more. In addition to providing is set in the centuries following 1630, when members of these maps and contact information, the authors also include a dis families began ffocking to America's shores to escape religious cussion of each site's history and what makes it sacred. persecution in many parts of the Old World. Duck Hunting on the Fox: Restoration of the Hunting and Decoy- Great Lakes: Promises, Practices, Carving Traditions Performances BY STEPHEN M. MILLER BY MARK SPROULE-JONES Prairie Oak Press/Trails Books, Black Earth, Michigan State University Press, East Lansing, MI, Wl, 2002. Pp. xxi, 114. Appendix, 2002. Pp. 149. Index, notes, bibliography, appendix, illustrations, maps. ISBN 1-931599-13-0, illustrations, maps. ISBN0-7748-0871-3, $29.95, $24.95, softcover. softcover. his is an enchanting collec Ttion of tales of ducks, decoys, and hunting on the Fox he Great Lakes inspire evocative language and hyperbol River of Green Bay, a region that has been an important part Tic metaphors, from the "sweet seas" of Samuel de Cham- of duck hunting heritage. Author and duck hunter Stephen plain to the "bold shores" of Henry R Schoolcraft. Yet, the Miller takes us back as far as the 1930s, to the world of the attitudes, values, and behaviors of settlers, both Native Amer workingman-hunter. Read the fascinating stories of what it ican and European, often reflect the utilitarian values of the was like in the heyday of waterfowling. Lakes and their resources. Sproule-Jones examines the histo ry of the key uses of the Great Lakes, which include trans portation, fisheries, water supply, and waste disposal. He then evaluates the relative successes and failures of the institutions that govern the Lakes' resource management. m AUTUMN 2003 181855 9/16/03 10:39 AM Page 53 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY To Hear Only Thunder Again: "A Job Well Done . . .": America's World War II Veterans Come Home Sturgeon Bay in World War II, BY MARK D. VAN ELLS As Told by the Workers Lexington Books, Lanham, MD, 2001. Pp. xiii, 271. Index, notes, bibliography. Themselves ISBN0-7391-0244-3, $26.95, softcover. The History Company and the Door County Maritime Museum, $18.95, VHS Video an Ells offers a comprehensive study of the experience of V World War II veterans' readjustment to civilian life. In Pouring World War II four Sturgeon addition to examining the personal experience of veterans, he Bay shipyards contracted for, built, examines veterans' benefits as a national legislative and mmmm and launched 258 ships for the war administrative issue. His study offers an analysis of the actual effort—an average of one every five days. implementation of programs at the state and local level, using More than doubling the population of the town, peak Wisconsin as a case study. employment surpassed seven thousand men and women. This is the story of how it was accomplished as told by the people who constructed and served on these well-built ships. Chasing Spies: How the FBI Failed in Counterintelligence but Promoted the Politics of McCarthyism in the Cold War Wisconsin Years BY ATHAN THEOHARIS Book Festival Ivan R. Dee, Chicago, IL, 2002. Pp. 307. Index, notes. ISBN 1-56663-420-2, $27.50, hardcover. wise October 22-26, 2003 rofessor of history at Marquette BOOK IT University, Athan Theoharis rede The Wisconsin Book Festival, an fines politics of the World War II and cold war eras, moving FESTIVAL initiative of the Wisconsin Humanities the debate beyond the narrow perspective triggered by the Council, hosts its second annual, free, release of KGB records and intercepted Soviet Consular public festival to celebrate the written reports (the Verona messages). By gathering evidence through illegal means, he argues, the Federal Bureau of Investigation word, writers, reading, and books. A provided the Justice Department with information it was wide scope of events will again take unable to use in court against suspected spies. Yet, the author place over the five-day gala in down states, the FBI itself, and especially J. Edgar Hoover, used a town Madison, from children's events, great deal of this information for personal political purposes. storytelling, and exhibits to readings, lectures, discussions, book signings, The Sixty Years' War for the and other entertainment for all ages. Great Lakes, 1754-1814 These events will be held in a variety EDITED BY DAVID CURTIS SKAGGS of venues, including the Orpheum AND LARRY L. NELSON Theater, the Madison Public Library, Michigan State University Press, East Lansing, MI, 2001. Pp. xxvii, 414. Index, notes, illustrations, the Wisconsin Historical Society's maps. ISBN 0-87013-569-4, $49.95, hardcover. auditorium and its museum, as well as ' I his collection of essays concerns not other local museums, libraries, and -L only military and naval operations, bookstores. but also the political, economic, social, and cultural interactions of individuals and groups during the struggle to control the great freshwater Speakers include: Grace Paley^ lakes and rivers between the Ohio Valley and the Canadian David Maraniss^ Ellen Kort^ Jacquelyn Shield. Among the topics discussed are the impact of disease Mitchard^ and Luis Rodriguez. upon the Natives' military power and culture, the importance of the French familial and commercial interaction with the British and Indians, and the emergence of intercultural coop For more information visit eration in a region too often characterized as constantly at wv/w.wisconsinbookfestival.org war. ^ AUTUMN 2003 181855 ^l\ WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY The Online Adventures of Lewis^lark lthough Lewis and Clark did not pass through Wis consin on their famous Ajourney that began over two hundred years ago, the Wisconsin Historical Society has maintained (%iM^^ ^^'^'//^^ extensive collections for more than a hundred years that include original ^ diaries and illustrations from the expe dition. First published in 1904, the collections served three generations of scholars as the definitive source of materials on the Lewis and Clark expedition. Now, many of these docu ments are easily accessible online to anyone with an internet connection. Fhe new Web site, www.american- journeys.org, arrives just in time for ¥ the 200th anniversary of the Lewis and Clark expedition, as well as for the 2003-2004 theme for National History Day—Exploration, Encounter and Exchange in History. Middle and high school students in Wisconsin and throughout the country will create and present research projects using historical documents. Beginning in September, more than eighteen thou sand pages from more than 150 docu ments relating to the geographic J,v cCfc^^^"^^' exploration of America will be avail able. Scholars of all ages will have the opportunity to search and view the Society's rarest and most prized mate rials on exploration, from the journals of Christopher Columbus to maps and illustrations by nineteenth-centu ^--"AiPTi^Ml ry adventurers. AJ-097-0057 On the hack inside cover of Charles Floyd's diary, other members of the Corps of Discovery signed their names under Floyd's own stylish signature at the beginning of their transcontinental adventure. The Floyd Diary is part of the Draper Collection at the WHS and is also online in its entirety through American Journeys. AUTUMN 2003 -£> 181855 Sl\elQ-i 10:40 AM Page 55 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY Letters from Our Readers The landscape of the Riley Cooperative is familiar to Public many throughout Dane County and south central Free Evening Scliools Free Wisconsin, whether viewed 1916 - 1917 from FiighwayJ or from the Military Ridge Bike Clashes in English for Foreigners trail, which cuts a swath Also: 5th, 6th, 7th, and 8th Grade Studies for Working Boys and Girls. through the land itself Classes in Citizenship for those desiring to become American Citizens. Joel Heiman Instructions in Sewing, Millinery, and Handwork for Girls and Women. MONDAYS TUESDAYS THURSDAYS years now, I have FROM T:1S — 9:30 BEGINIVINO MONDAY, SEPTEMBER SoTH visited the portion CLARKE STREET SCHOOL . Clarke and Twenty=Eighth Streets DETROIT STREET SCHOOL Detroit and Jackson Streets of the Military DOVER STREET SCHOOL Dover, near Kinnickinnic Avenue EIGHTH STREET SCHOOL Eighth and Sycamore Streets Ridge State Trail FIFTH AVENUE SCHOOL . Fifth and Hayes Avenues FOREST HOME AVENUE SCHOOL Forest Home and Tenth Avenues FOURTEENTH STREET SCHOOL . Fourteenth and Galena Streets that passes through FOURTH STREET SCHOOL Fourth and Galena Streets NORTH PIERCE STREET SCHOOL North Pierce and Center Streets Riley on an al PARK STREET SCHOOL . Park and Hawover Streets most weekly bas ®gentl(cbe Hbeii&fcbulen is. The area is a J'rei Joel Heiman rret Se^ett motttag^ ^Icttftag ttttd S^otmerftag Slbend Hon 7tl5 h'x^ 9:3< ©nalifdr fitr %,yx^ya\xbzx^ tttttctitdit in ^ctl etubim l»e§ Utw, etm, lUn, uni) Stett treasure for those tti read with great enthusiasm the piece "Tracing Aldo Leopold Or mail us your vote by regular mail at through Riley's Farmland" published in the Summer 2003 Hesseltine Award, 816 State Street, Madison, Wl 53706 Ieditio n of the Wisconsin Magazine of History. For several ^ AUTUMN 2003 181855 "^I^^I^Z 10:40 AM Page 56 e Back Matters Heroes and History t's a bit of a joke with units after the attack on in Wisconsin Maga Pearl Harbor, most of the zine of History Badgers on the 1942 team Ieditoria l circles that as were called for active duty soon as we start planning an not long after the season autumn issue, I am apt to was over. Among the many ask if we have a piece per from that team who went taining to football that we on to serve their country in can place therein. Football World War II were is as much a part of autumn Schreiner and his best for me as falling leaves and friend, Mark Hoskins, both the tinge of nostalgia that is from Lancaster in Grant evoked by the Albert County. Hansen photo that graces Schreiner and Hoskins this issue's cover. Though were childhood friends, my colleagues are correct in high-school teammates, reminding me that not roommates at UW, and co- everyone feels as I do about captains of the 1942 Bad football, in the land of Bad gers. After the season, they gers and Packers I'm con went their separate ways, €^ vinced that there are many Schreiner joining the e of like mind. Marines and Hoskins, the The article in this issue U.S. Army Air Corps. that satisfies my football Hoskins was shot down craving, "An All-American over Germany during his in All Respects," however, is thirty-fourth B-17 mission much more than a sports on 27 June 1944. He spent story. While providing an <^ sr .\ jA-Jtfilta the rest of the war as a Ger overview of the football Judy Corfield man prisoner-of-war but career of two-time all- survived to become a American Badger end Dave Schreiner, it primarily tells the lawyer and Grant County district attorney. Schreiner died in story of the rather unsentimental education of a young man combat on Okinawa on 21 June 1945, almost two months whose life was tragically cut short by war. The authors depict after Hoskins was liberated. the rapid transition from innocence to experience by drawing In June Hoskins passed away in San Diego at the age of from a collection of Schreiner's letters and from an oral histo eighty-one. A recent Wisconsin State Journal article by Terry ry project dealing with women's memories of the war, both of Frei told Hoskins's story. Frei, whose father, Jerry, was on the which reside in the archives of the Wisconsin Historical same Badger team and also served in World War II, inter Society. viewed Hoskins in the process of writing a forthcoming book Schreiner was a senior in 1942 and played on what is com about the 1942 Badgers, Third Down and a War to Go. monly acknowledged as one of the best Badger teams ever. According to Frei, "Hoskins still choked up when he talked of Among his teammates were Elroy Hirsch, Pat Harder, Ashley his buddy's death." Anderson, and Jack Wink. As the authors explain, the 1942 The authors of this magazine's article also conferred with Badgers went 8-1-1, losing in an upset to Iowa and ending Hoskins, saying that the piece would not have been possible the season at third in the national rankings but winning the without his cooperation. The editors wish to acknowledge all-important Minnesota game, the first Badger win over the their debt to the two friends from Lancaster for the story in Gophers in nine encounters. this issue and for much else. Sometimes history really is about It wasn't just a good gridiron record, though, that made heroes. this team special; its military service record also set it apart. —J. Kent Calder Having already signed up with one of the military reserve AUTUMN 2 00 3 e 181855 9/16/03 10:40AM Page 57 <^ Coming This Fall New Books from the Wisconsin Historical Society Press At the Creation: Myth, Reality, and the Origin of ublications of the Wisconsin the Harley-Davidson Motorcycle, 1901-1909 BY HERBERT WAGNER Historical Society Press are available to FOREWORD BY JOHN E. HARLEY, JR. Society members at a 10 percent In this definitive account of the creation of Harley-David son, Herbert Wagner brings to life the human side of Harley- Davidson's quest to motorize the bicycle and then promote it discount. For membership in the as a powerful, fast, reliable, and thrilling means of personal transportation. Wisconsin Historical Society, call the Softcover, $24.95 ISBN 0-87020-351-7 Membership Office at 608-264-6587 Native People of Wisconsin (Mon.-Fri., 8-5) or visit the Society's BY PATTY EOEW Web site, www.wisconsinhistory.org Native People of Wisconsin introduces students to the twelve Indian nations that live in Wisconsin, and incorpo (click on "Become a Member"). rates various ways Native people remember the past, empha sizing the value of oral tradition. Young readers learn the unique history of each Nation, the ways that the Nations dif fer from one another, the commonalities among the groups, and those values Native people share with non-Indians. To order books, call the University of A New Badger History Reader Wisconsin Press Distribution Genter Softcover, $13.95 ISBN 0-87020-348-7 toll-free at 800-621-2736 or fax Teacher's Guide and CD-ROM by Bobbie Malone and Kcm Oberle, $34.95 ISBN 0-87020-349-5 800-621-8476. Books can also be Illuminating the Particular: Photographs of ordered from the Wisconsin Milwaukee's Polish South Side BY CHRISTEL T. MAASS Historical Museum Store: INTRODUCTION BY JOHN GURDA PHOTOGRAPHS BY ROMAN B.J. KWASNIEWSKI (608) 264-6428 or Roman B.J. Kwasniewski, son of Polish immigrants, used www.wisconsinhistory.org/shop. his camera to document life in Milwaukee's Polish communi ty during the early decades of the twentieth century. His For a list of books about Wisconsin images offer rare insight into the daily lives of a proud people struggling to maintain their heritage while living in a time of rapid change. and the Upper Midwest, check out Available in November. I the UW Press Online Regional Hardcover, $39.95 ISBN 0-87020-347-9 I Gatalog at I www.wisc.edu/wisconsinpress/ LI books/reffsindex.html . . <^ 181855 "^l^^l^^ 10:41AM Page5£ -£> *» ^ h ftoUBlE.SHqW rNI Circus World Museum Oij .y -I /> WINTERMUTE'S MARVELOUS MARIONETTES he WinteruQute Circus's "Double Show" promised an extravaganza of marionettes, T;eighty-fou r in all. Marionettes were only one THE E^Si-T^^ 1 small part of the daily show that included clowns, IpiED PIPER OF W^^^l^\ 1 "^ild beasts," acrobats and aerialists, and the prom- I HAMEUN , ^ , ,._..,„.-p-- p., , v^J i'l ise of limitless thrills. Milton Bates recreates the : .''rr-H':"™^r ^^^^-^^^^ \ ^QJ^J^ of Jefferson County's Wintermute family as its I A.^tJLirTWO^ HOUR SHO^ I circus traveled throughout the Midwest and made its [^ErK'r: CHILDREN 1 mark on Wisconsin's cultural landscape. IM mtigiid®® (S)fh:mtmj Wisconsin Historical Society Press • 816 State Street • iVIadison, Wl • 53706-1482