WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY j The State Historical Society of Wisconsin • Vol. 58, No. 1 • Autumn, 1974

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«>f- THE STATE HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF WISCONSIN JAMES MORTON SMITH, Director Officers HOWARD W. MEAD, President GEORGE BANTA, JR., Honorary Vice-President JOHN C. GEILFUSS, First Vice-President F. HARWOOD ORBISON, Treasurer ROGER E. AXTELL, Second Vice-President JAMES MORTON SMITH, Secretary

Board of Curators Ex Officio PATRICK J. LUCEY, Governor of the State JOHN C. WEAVER, President of the University ROBERT C. ZIMMERMAN, Secretary of State MRS. DAVID S. FRANK, President of the CHARLES P. SMITH, State Treasurer Women's Auxiliary

Term Expires, 197!

E. DAVID CRONON JOHN C. GEILFUSS LLOYD HORNBOSTEL, JR. FRANCIS PAUL PRUCHA, S.J, Madison Milwaukee Beloit Milwaukee SCOTT M. CUTLIP BEN GUTHRIE ROBERT H. IRRMANN J. WARD RECTOR Madison Lac du Flambeau Beloit Milwaukee ROBERT A. GEHRKE MRS. R. L. HARTZELL JOHN R. PIKE CLIFFORD D. SWANSON Ripon Grantsburg Madison Stevens Point Term Expires, 1976

THOMAS H. BARLAND MRS. EDWARD C. JONES HOWARD W. MEAD DONALD C. SLIGHTER Eau Claire Fort Atkinson Madison Milwaukee NATHAN S. HEFFERNAN MRS. RAYMOND J. KOLTES FREDERICK L OLSON DR. LOUIS C. SMITH Madison Madison Wauwatosa Lancaster E. E. HOMSTAD CHARLES R. MCCALLUM F. HARWOOD ORBISON ROBERT S. ZIGMAN Black River Falls Hubertus Appleton Milwaukee

Term Expires, 1977

ROGER E. AXTELL PAUL E. HASSETT ROBERT B. L. MURPHY MiLO K. SWANTON Janesville Madison Madison Madison HORACE M. BENSTEAD WILLIAM HUFFMAN MRS. WM. H. L. SMYTHE CEDRIC A. VIG Racine Wisconsin Rapids Milwaukee Rhinelander REED COLEMAN WARREN P. KNOWLES WILLIAM F. STARK CLARK WILKINSON Madison Milwaukee Nashotah Baraboo

Fellows VERNON CARSTENSEN MERLE CURTI ALICE E. SMITH

The Women's Auxiliary MRS. DAVID S. FRANK, Madison, President MRS. L. PRENTICE EAGER, JR., Evansville, Treasurer MRS. CHARLES E. PAIN, JR., Milwaukee, Vice-President MRS. GORDON R. WALKER, Racine, Ex Officio MRS. WADE H. MOSBY, Milwaukee, Secretary

ON THE COVER: Senator John Fitzgerald Kennedy strikes a characteristic pose during the October 2}, 1960, rally held at the University of Wisconsin Field House. In this (traniatically lighted picture, a Milwaukee Journal photographer has captured a sense of the tension and enthusiasm that attended the presidential camf)aigning of that year. Volume 58, Number 1 / Autumn, 1974 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY

Published quarterly by the State Historical Society of The Fur Trade in the Upper Mississippi Wisconsin, 816 State Street, Madison, Wisconsin 53706. Valley, 1630-1850 3 Distributed to members as part Rhoda R. Gilman of their dues. (Annual member­ ship, $7.50, or $5 for those over 65 or members of affiliated The Political Education of an American Radical: societies; family membership, $10, or $7 for those over 65 or Thomas R. Amlie in the 1930's 19 members of affiliated societies; Theodore Rosenof contributing, $25; business and professional, $50; sustaining, $100 or more annually; patron, The Ku Klux Klan in Madison, 1922-1927 31 $500 or more annually.) Single numbers $1.75. Microfilmed Robert A. Goldberg copies available through University Microfilms, 313 North First Street, Ann Arbor, The Kennedy Image: Michigan; reprint volumes available from Kraus Reprint Politics, Camelot, and Vietnam 45 Corporation, 16 East 46th Street, Kent M. Beck New York, New York 10017. Communications should be addressed to the editor. The Society does not assume Book Reviews 56 responsibility for statements made by contributors. Second- Book Review Index 64 class postage paid at Madison and Stevens Point, Wis. Copyright © 1974 by the State Wisconsin History Checklist 65 Historical Society of Wisconsin. Paid tor in part by the Maria Proceedings of the One Hundred and Twenty-eighth L. and Simeon Mills Editorial Annual Meeting of the State Historical Society 68 Fund and by the George B. Burrows Fund. Contributors 88

WILLIAM CONVERSE HAYGOOD EDITOR

WILLIAM C. MARTEN ASSOCIATE EDITOR

JOHN O. HOLZHUETER EDITORIAL ASSISTANT Wi"i"lJI«imi|ii " ^^yT--m^''

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Society's Iconographic Collectio A rare and hitherto unpublished daguerreotype of an unidentified Woodland Indian, wearing an otter fur turban. Details such as his peace medal and pipe were retouched at some time with gilt paint. The Fur Trade in the Upper Mississippi Valley, 1630—1850

By Rhoda R. Gilman

'HE North American fur trade Although the sequence of events is shadowy meant many different things in and partly based on guesswork, there is reason different times and places. It was the first to believe that in the 1630's the Winnebago, economic Hnk by which Europeans reached a tribe of the Siouan language group, who out to grasp the weaUh of a new continent. were then the most powerful and numerous It was the first avenue through wliich native people in Wisconsin, refused to co-operate Americans adapted their traditional cuUures in the trading operations of the Ottawa and to deal with the technology and commerce possibly made overtures to the Iroquois.^ of Europe. And for more than two centuries A war resulted in which the Winnebago were it was the main channel through which these crushingly defeated by a coalition of tribes two widely different worlds came into contact. led by the Ottawa and Huron. At this time The vibrations set up by that contact travel­ or somewhat later a number of Algonquian- ed swiftly from the eastern seacoast to the very speaking groups from Michigan moved west­ heart of the continent. In the upper Mis­ ward into the central Wisconsin area formerly sissippi Valley the fur trade had begun to occupied by the Winnebago. They may have affect the lives of people long before any been drawn by the quest for fur or pushed Europeans reached the area. By the mid- by pressure from the Iroquois. Among them 1630's shiploads of beaver and other pelts were probably the Fox, Sauk, and Potawa- were regularly leaving the French ports of tomi.^ eastern Canada. These were supplied not In 1648-1650 the Iroquois attacked and by local trapping, but by Indian middlemen virtually destroyed the Huron and Ottawa who traded European goods for furs far into south and east of Lake Huron. The survivors the interior of the continent. The leading of these tribes scattered. Some joined forces dealers in French goods were the Ottawa and fled westward. At first they took shelter and Huron tribes. Their competitors, the with the Algonquian tribes near Green Bay Iroquois, were supplied largely by Dutch traders.^

" Emma Helen Blair (ed. and trans.). The Indian Tribes of the Upper Mississippi Valley and Region ' For general discussions of the beginnings of the of the Great Lakes (Cleveland, 1911), 1:293. fur trade and the role of Indian middlemen, see " George E. Hyde, Indians of the Woodlands from Harold A. Innis, The Fur Trade in Canada (Toronto, Prehistoric Times to 1725 (Norman, 1962), 95-102, 1956), 23-45; E. Palmer Patterson II, The Canadian 116-118, 127; Louise Phelps Kellogg, The French Indian: A History Since 1500 (Don Mills, Ontario, Regime in Wisconsin and the Northwest (Madison, 1972), 66-69; W. J. Eccles, The .Canadian Frontier, 1925), 82, 93-95; Emerson F. Greenman, The Indians 1534^1760 (Toronto and New York, 1969), 12-34. of Michigan (Lansing, 1961), 25. WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY AUTUMN, 1974 in central Wisconsin. A few stayed there, and woolen cloth; and a variety of decorative others pushed on, one group reportedly going materials—from venuilion ceremonial paint as far as Iowa. During the 1650's some of to glass beads.8 these bands gradually drew together and re­ Only , in a narrowly material sense did established their trading operations.** In 1654 their way of life become more European; and again in 1656 they sent expeditions to nevertheless there were other adjustments. Montreal that returned safely with supplies of The need for furs to exchange increased the European goods.^ By 1660 the Ottawa were importance of hunting. By its very nature located in a permanent village at Chequame- hunting involved a more roving life than gon Bay on the south shore of Lake Superior, agriculture. For farming tribes like the where the Huron soon joined them.^ Huron, who lived in permanent towns and Throughout the next decade this was the depended almost wholly on crops for a liveli­ fur trade center for the entire upper Missis­ hood, this required a major adaptation. sippi Valley and western Great Lakes region. Either they had to de-emphasize farming or Tribes from as far south as Iowa, as far north find sources of fur through trade with other as Lake Nipigon, and west to the edge of the groups. The Huron chose the latter course, plains obtained European goods through the and building upon a trade in furs and skins Ottawa. In 1659, 1660, 1663, 1665, 1667, and which no doubt existed long before the com- 1668 fleets of canoes loaded with furs jour­ ing of white men, they created a short-lived neyed to the St. Lawrence and returned with commercial empire.*" the firearms, fabrics, and metal tools that were Tribes whose subsistence was more evenly beginning to change the lives of Indian divided between agriculture and hunting people.'' might lengthen the hunting season and aban­ The new technology and the far-flung com­ don permanent village sites or move them mercial relationships that accompanied it had to take advantage of favorable trading loca­ a tremendous impact upon Indian society. tions. Northern tribes like the Chippewa The changes that resulted, however, repre­ and Sioux, whose economies were already sented adaptations by Native Americans, based largely on hunting, found the adjust­ rather than destruction or abandonment of ment easier than the rest, and as the impor­ their own cultures.* Indians were extremely tance of the fur trade grew, their influence selective in their demand for European goods. expanded. The improved technology in­ They traded mainly for articles that were creased their leisure time, and the desire for improvements on ones they already had or trade decreased the isolation of small bands that offered more efficient ways of doing or family clans. Religious and ceremonial things they always had done. Such articles life flowered, and tribal ties grew stronger. included fire steels; metal tools, weapons, For them the early fur trade period was a and cooking implements; firearms; cotton or golden age. Although no tribe totally aban­ doned agriculture, the over-all effect of the

' Kellogg, French Regime, 92-100; Hyde, Indians of the Woodlands, 127, 128n; Blair (ed. and trans.), ° George Irving Quimby, Indian Life in the Upper Indian Tribes of the Upper Mississippi, 1: 148-152. Great Lakes (Chicago, 1960), 111-112; Quimby, Indian •' Hyde, Indians of the Woodlands, 128-134. Culture and European Trade Goods: The Archaeol­ "Kellogg, French Regime, 110; Blair (ed. and trans.), ogy of the Historic Period in the Western Great Lakes Indian Tribes of the Upper Mississippi, 1: 165n. Region (Madison, 1966), 179; W. L. Morton, "The " Kellogg, French Regime, 123-126; Blair (ed. and North West Company: Pedlars Extraordinary," in trans.), Indian Tribes of the Upper Mississippi, 1:171- Aspects of the Fur Trade: Selected Papers of the 176. 1965 North American Fur Trade Conference (St. " There has been at times a tendency for historians Paul, 1967), 12. and anthropologists to define any change in "pure" '" Quimby, Indian Life in the Upper Great Lakes, Indian cultures as decay and destruction, thus assum­ 114-116. The destructive effects of the fur trade upon ing that such cultures are by nature static. For com­ Indian agricultural settlements in the St. Lawrence ment on this, see Elizabeth Clark Rosenthal, \'alley was noted at an early date by the French. See, " 'Culture' and the American Indian Community," for example, Alice E. Smith, The History of Wiscon­ in Stuart Levine and Nancy Oeslreich Lurie (eds.), sin, Volume 1: From Exploration to Statehood (Madi­ The American Indian Today (Baltimore, 1970), 82-89. son, 1973), 12. OILMAN: UPPER MISSISSIPPI FUR TRADE fur trade was to make most Indian peoples of the Great Lakes-Upper Mississippi area adopt a life style more like that of the hunt­ ing tribes than of the sedentary agricultural tribes farther south.** There were still other effects. Greater tnobility for purposes of hunting and trade brought more intertribal contacts and inter­ marriage; the wide-ranging search for fur also produced competition and warfare. Among most woodland tribes agriculture %vas con­ \. trolled by women. Hunting, trade, and war were men's occupations. The increased em­ phasis upon these may have affected the posi­ \ tion and influence of the sexes. The economic ,jt»^^^ ^^w contribution of women was further under­ mined by gradual substitution of brass and Society's Iconographic Collections iron utensils for the pottery and basketware Canadian Indians spearing fish, an original watercolor that usually had been shaped by skilled fe­ by Swiss-born artist Peter Rindisbacher, who worked male hands.*2 For Indian society as a whole in the Wisconsin lead mines in 1826. The picture, one it was a time of transition, conflict, and rapid of four acquired by the Society in 1951, was executed adjustment. By the 1660's most of these between 1830 and 1851 and is brilliantly colored and changes were already under way in the upper remarkably well preserved. Mississippi Valley. During these years a few hopeful French In 1667 a temporary peace was made be­ traders and missionaries accompanied the tween the French and Iroquois, and in 1671 Ottawa brigades in their comings and goings the Sioux drove the Ottawa and Huron from between Canada and the western tribes, their position as middlemen in the Mississippi while as early as 1662 anonymous coureurs de Valley trade. The decade that followed saw bois liad taken up residence with Chippewa Frenchmen push rapidly westward. In 1673 bands along the south shore of Lake Superior. Marquette and Joliet crossed the Fox-Wiscon­ But control of the fur trade remained firmly sin portage and reached the Mississippi near in the hands of the Indians, and the economic Prairie du Chien, and in 1680 Dulhut reached fate of Canada from year to year hung on it by way of the St. Croix River. Coureurs de their arrival at Montreal with furs from the bois were close on their heels, if not ahead of west.*^ them. In 1685 Nicolas Perrot went down the Wisconsin, wintered at Trempealeau near " Tribes which depended upon both hunting and present-day La Crosse, Wisconsin, and built agricuhure included the Sauk, Fox, Winnebago, a post the next spring on the east shore of Potawatomi, and Menominee. The effect of the fur Lake Pepin, where he commenced a brief but trade upon the sedentary village life of the Menominee highly profitable trade with the Sioux.*"* is described by Quimby, Indian Life in the Upper Great Lakes, 145-148. For the adaptation of the Chip­ This direct access to European goods was pewa, see Quimby, Indian Culture and European advantageous to the Sioux, but the French Trade Goods, 153-159, 179-180; Harold Hickerson, met strong opposition from other tribes in try­ The Southwestern Chippewa: An Ethnohislorical Study (American Anthropological Association Memoirs, ing to close their grip on the upper Mississip­ No. 92, June, 1962), 66-69, 87-89. pi. The Sauk, the Potawatomi, and especially ^'^ On the ba.sis of evidence now available, any the Fox tried repeatedly to prevent them conclusion about the changing position of women from crossing Wisconsin in the 1680's.*^ To must, of course, be somewhat speculative. For the comments of one observer, see Patterson, The Cana­ dian Indian, 87. " Except where otherwise noted, I have followed "Kellogg, French Regime, 103-118; Blair (ed. and Kellogg's French Regime for the major events of trans.), Indian Tribes of the Upper Mississippi, 1: 173; this period. Crrace Lee Nute, Caesars of the Wilderness (New '° See especially Kellogg, French Regime, 233, 237, York, 1943), 58-64, 75. 261. WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY AUTUMN, 1974

the north the Chippewa negotiated peace with trade came later and covered a briefer period the Siottx and moved rapidly westward to Che- than elsewhere, but the methods of operation quamegon Bay, where they took the place of were the same as those already developed in the Ottawa as go-betweens in the trans-Mis­ other areas. The canoe brigades that carried sissippi trade. Unlike the Ottawa, however, trade goods westward and furs east were now the CJiippewa apparently were content with directed by a French bourgeois and manned an agreement that gave them permission to largely by French voyageurs. The exchange use the rich Sioux hunting grounds of north­ of goods for furs took place at interior posts ern Minnesota and Wisconsin in return for rather than on the St. Lawrence. allowing the Sioux to obtain French goods.*^ The French fur trade was never free in the Accordingly, the French opened short-lived sense of being open to any businessman who posts at Chequamegon (La Pointe) and near wished to enter it. A royal license was neces­ the mouth of the St. Croix. sary, obtained through the governor, and the Immediate pressure on the Wisconsin tribes number of these was limited. In Montreal or was relieved by the outbreak of war between Quebec the trader could sell his beaver only France and England in 1689 and renewed hos­ to a single buyer at a price fixed by the gov­ tilities between the French and Iroquois. ernment, though trade in other pelts was less This was followed by the royal edict of 1696 restricted. During the last twenty years of which forced the closing of all western posts French control, exclusive licenses for certain and the abandonment for twenty years of open areas were auctioned off, or—as more often French efforts to take over the fur trade at happened—were granted by the governor to its source. It took more than an edict to stop his friends with the understanding that he the coureurs de bois, however, and many of would share in the profits. One such vastly them kept on trading directly with the west­ profitable monopoly existed on the upper ern tribes. In 1700, for example, Pierre Le Mississippi in the 1750's.** Sueur built a post on the Blue Earth River in In penetrating to the heart of the continent the heart of the Sioux country. His official the French found it necessary to adopt many purpose was mining, but the venture, like all features of Indian culture and technology. such, was supported through trade. Event­ Hunting; the use of wild rice, maple sugar, ually the Fox burned his post. Tension con­ pemmican, and other native foods; the moc­ tinued to build until 1712, when the spark casin; the snowshoe; the toboggan; and above was lighted. all, the birchbark canoe were obvious. More Although the first incidents of the Fox war subtle were the exchange of gifts, the use of occurred near Detroit, the main theater of ceremonial items such as medals, and the care­ battle quickly moved to Wisconsin. During fully programmed diplomacy with which com­ the generation of struggle that followed, the mercial operations were conducted. Many Fox Indians under their far-seeing chief Kiala French colonists, especially those less privi­ tried repeatedly to unite the tribes in an ef­ leged, found that life among Indian people of­ fort to keep Indian control over the fur trade fered a welcome escape from the oppression of the upper Mississippi Valley. The turning of semifeudal French society. At times the point came in 1730, when the Fox were iso­ number of agricultural laborers who literally lated and nearly exterminated. Belatedly, took to the woods posed a major problem for other tribes recognized the French threat, but French colonial administrators in Canada. already the white men had rebuilt their forts These coureurs de bois were an important ele­ and re-opened trade on the Mississippi.*'' ment in the fur trade and formed the core of Because of the long resistance of the Fox, tiny French-Indian communities which began French control over the upper Mississippi fur to grow around trading points throughout the Mississippi Valley. Many Frenchmen married into the tribes that had given them shelter, " Hickerson, The Southwestern Chippewa, 65. '' For a full account of the Fox "conspiracy," see Louise Phelps Kellogg, "The Fox Indians During the French Regime," in State Historical Society of Wis­ "Innis, The Fur Trade in Canada, 63-83, 102-113; consin, Proceedings, 1907, pp. 142-188. Kellogg, French Regime, 379-382. GILMAN: UPPER MISSISSIPPI FUR TRADE and their children became the focus of a unique culture which represented the blend­ ing of Native American and European ele­ ments.*^ Hostilities with the Sauk and Fox did not close finally until 1738. During the scant two decades of French activity that followed, pat­ terns were set in the upper Mississippi Valley that were to persist throughout the rest of the fur trade era. The administrative headquar­ ters of the area was at Green Bay, but the main scene of operations was along the Mis­ sissippi. Except for the Menominee, eastern Wisconsin's population had been greatly re­ duced as a result of the Fox wars. The Win­ nebago remained in towns along the Fox and upper Wisconsin rivers, but the Potawatomi had moved south toward Illinois and Indiana and the Sauk with the surviving Fox—now virtually a single tribe—had settled along the Mississippi in southwestern Wisconsin and Society's Iconographic Collections northwestern Illinois.^^ The sources of fur This delicately rendered miniature of Winneshiek, a which made this one of the most profitable Winnebago chief, was donated to the Society by Caleb trading areas in New France were the Sioux Atwater in 1854. of the upper Mississippi and Minnesota val­ which by the 1750's extended as far north as leys, the Iowa and Oto tribes of the Des the Crow Wing River, near present-day Brain- Moines and Iowa river valleys, and to a lesser erd, Minnesota. The co-operation of the extent the Omaha and other peoples of the Chippewa was no longer necessary to them, upper Missouri, who were reached either di­ and they sought to end the agreement by rectly or through intertribal trade.2* which the two tribes had shared the rich fur To the north was the trading area admin­ regions of the Mississippi headwaters. The istered from La Pointe among the Chippewa. bypassed Chippewa had no intention of re­ The boundary between this and the upper treating to the rocky shores of Lake Superior, Mississippi district followed lines of tribal in­ and over a period of fifty-odd years they suc­ fluence rather than geography, and for the ceeded in pushing the Sioux out of northern next hundred years it remained a subject of Minnesota and Wisconsin.^^ dispute between both traders and Indians.^^ The southern limit of the upper Mississip­ In the late 1730's the fifty-year peace that had pi district was even more indefinite. In 1699 existed between the powerful Sioux and Chip­ the colony of Louisiana had been founded, pewa tribes was shattered. The Sioux by then and in 1731 the vast and vaguely defined ter- had an ample supply of trade goods through the French posts on the upper Mississippi, this boundary, see Grace Lee Nute, "Marin versus La Verendrye," in Minnesota History, 32: 226-238 (De­ cember, 1951). At a later date the Chippewa were " For general discussions of French-Indian inter- wiLhin the trading sphere of the North West Company, cultural influences, see Eccles, Canadian Frontier, wh'ch jealously guarded its territory against inter­ 88-92; Marcel Giraud, Le Metis Canadien, son role lopers from the south. Still later, when the American dans I'histoire des provinces de I'Ouest (Paris, 1945). Fur Company controlled the entire region, the Chip­ " Kellogg, French Regime, 339-340; Quimby, In­ pewa ivere assigned to the Fond du Lac Department, dian Culture and European Trade Goods, 141-142. while the Sioux were supplied by the various outfits ''^ For the extent of western penetration in the early operating out of Prairie du Chien. Friction between 1700's, see Donald J. Lehmer, Introduction to Middle traders of these different divisions continued as Missouri Archaeology (National Park Service Anthro­ long as the fur trade lasted. See Rhoda R. Gilman, pological Papers, No. 1, Washington, D.C., 1971), "Last Days of the Upper Mississippi Fur Trade," in 167-169. Minnesota History, 42: 125-140 (Winter, 1970). - For the earliest example of traders' rivalries along ^"Hickerson, The Southwestern Chippewa, 69-71. WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY AUTUMN, 1974 ritory known as Illinois was annexed to it. side- of the French, while the Iroquois, as be­ During the French period the boundary be­ fore, stood with the English. In the closing tween Louisiana and Canada was never de­ years of the war the Ottawa, led by Pontiac, termined, and competition between the two tried, as the Fox had a generation earlier, to colonies for the fur trade remained relatively unite the Algonquian tribes and restore to In­ unimportant. Then and later, the broad high­ dians control of their own destiny. But the way of the lower Mississippi was second choice power and numbers of Europeans were too as an outlet for the furs of the upper country; great, and the Indians' need for manufactured worms and rapid spoilage due to the warm goods was too keen. climate made losses too heavy.^* However, The force of Indian resistance, however, did furs and hides from Missouri and Illinois reg­ persuade the British to re-examine their fur ularly were taken eastward by way of the Il­ trade policy. In the years of rivalry with the linois-Chicago river route rather than north French, the separate colonies had regulated through Green Bay. Though longer, the as­ the traders. Between 1763 and 1768, however, cent up the Illinois was easier than climbing the British Crown tried tentatively to impose the rapids of the Mississippi. This fixed a a policy of imperial control that was a little sort of de facto southern boundary for the up­ reminiscent of French policy in the years be­ per Mississippi district at the long series of tween 1696 and 1715. Trade was restricted rapids below the mouth of the Des Moines to five posts on the edge of the Indian coun­ River.2^ try, where it was to be carefully supervised by government officials. The plan collapsed owing to the same forces that had frustrated the French.2^^ TURING the French and Indian The era had long since passed when great wars the fur trade on the Missis­ D' seasonal expeditions to the east met the needs sippi was disrupted, but it never ceased alto­ of Indian people living west of the Great gether. The French kept effective control of Lakes. Not only were they economically de­ Louisiana until 1769, even though the colony pendent upon manufactured goods; they were became legally Spanish in 1762. And during also dependent upon a steady and relatively the thirty-odd years of Spanish rule that fol­ accessible supply. No longer could vast quan­ lowed, the fur trade remained largely in the tities of furs be obtained quickly through hands of French citizens. In 1764 Frenchmen trade with tribes farther west; hunting took founded St. Lottis, and it quickly became a time and steady effort, and the need to make magnet for traders and settlers in the Ohio a thousand-mile expedition to trade for goods and upper Mississippi valleys who objected to was a real hardship. They were also increas­ living under the British.^^ ingly dependent upon the credit extended by The position of Indian people in the strug­ resident traders during the hunting season. gle varied. In general, the tribes of the upper Moreover, the entire Great Lakes and Missis­ Great Lakes, particularly the Chippewa, who sippi region already was infiltrated by hun­ had prospered through the fur trade, took the dreds of small independent traders—"vaga­ bonds" in the words of General Thomas ^'Kellogg, French Regime, 371-373. Between 1760 Gage—who could either obtain goods illegally and 1803 political lines forced Louisiana-based traders or buy them in Louisiana. The merchants to ship their furs to New Orleans, and later in the and traders based in the St. Lawrence Valley nineteenth century the speed and economy of steam­ boats made the river the major outlet for the peltry of St. Louis. But even then there were spoilage prob­ lems, and furs which were subject to easy damage were still often shipped by way of Pittsburgh. See ^ For an account of the role played by Spanish correspondence between the American Fur Company Louisiana in the fur trade of the upper Mississippi and the Chouteau Company of St. Louis in the Ameri­ and Missouri rivers, see Abraham P. Nasatir, "The can Fur Company Papers for 1834 and 1835 (micro­ Anglo-Spanish Frontier on the Upper Mississippi, film copies in the Minnesota Historical Society from 1786-1796," in Iowa Journal of History and Politics, originals in the New-York Historical Society). 29: 155-232 (April, 1931). ^° David Lavender, The Fist in the Wilderness (New -' Paul Chrisler Phillips, The Fur Trade (Norman, York, 1964), 8 1961), 1: 566-585. 8 OILMAN: UPPER MISSISSIPPI FUR TRADE insisted that they were being ruined by com­ but for those from St. Louis and even distant petition, and in 1768 all control of the fur New Orleans. Its position at the meeting trade was returned to the colonies.^^ point of routes down the Mississippi and up Five years of unregulated competition, of the Wisconsin was undoubtedly tlie main rea­ liquor pushing and lawlessness, persuaded the son for its importance. Jonathan Carver in British government that this system, too, was 1766 and Peter Pond nearly ten years later unworkable, and in 1774 the entire region, left vivid accounts of the great gatherings held from the Oliio River north, was made a part here, and their descriptions bring to mind the of the province of Quebec, subject to its laws famous Rocky Mountain rendezvous of later and regulations. The Atlantic colonies re­ years. The only element missing is the acted with fury, and the hated "Quebec Act" "mountain men"—for on the upper Mississip­ was one of the precipitating causes of the pi all hunting and trapping were done by In­ American Revolution. dian people.^" In the upper Mississippi Valley none of Although tlie Prairie of the Dog was the these developments had any great impact. site of a large Fox village, it was neutral After the French forts were closed, a number ground among the tribes—a status apparently of coureurs de bois, later joined by independ­ encouraged by the old chief from whom it ent British traders, continued to winter in the took its name. According to Carver, he was in­ country, returning east or south each summer tent upon restoring his decimated people to exchange their furs for new supplies. Green through maintaining peace and productive Bay developed into a permanent and influen­ trade with his neighbors. For a month or tial French settlement, but under the British more between May and July and again for the depot for trade and the center for admini­ a shorter period in October this was the meet­ stration were at Mackinac. ing place for Indians and traders from the Robert Rogers, the British commander upper Mississippi and all its tributaries. Con­ there in 1767, estimated that 110 canoes, each tests were held, games were played, debts were carrying goods worth about 150 British settled, furs were sold, tall tales were told, pounds (Quebec value) would be necessary to and carousing ran high. (Pond reports sev­ supply the potential Indian trade of the areas eral boats from New Orleans, each of which tributary to the fort. Among these he counted carried sixty hogsheads of wine.) There may all districts reached by way of Lakes Superior also have been horse races, for both Carver and Michigan, including posts as far west as and Pond saw numbers of fine Spanish horses, present-day Manitoba. Nearly a third of this "liberated" by the Sauk in raiding expeditions total, however, would be needed by Green that took them as far as Santa Fe.^* Bay and "its dependencies." He listed the According to Carver the leading men of the principal pelts sent east from Mackinac that various tribes and bands held a general coun­ summer as beaver, otter, marten, fox, raccoon, cil in which they bargained as a group and wolf, and bear.^^ decided whether to sell their furs to the trad­ Rogers also noted that the French and Span­ ers at Prairie du Chien or to take them on to ish had begun a settlement at Prairie du Mackinac or St. Louis. Credit, apparently, Chien. This was the great rendezvous point- was still not a major factor in the business. not only for traders supplied from Mackinac, By tlte time Pond arrived, however, this unit­ ed Indian action seems to have broken down, and many traders—like Pond himself—sent =8 Phillips, The Fur Trade, 1: 583, 609. '"' "An Estimate of the Fur and Peltry Trade in clerks to winter with the various bands and the District of Michilimackinac, according to the secure a firm hold on furs at the source. The Bounds and Limits, Assigned to it by the French, when under their Government: Together with an Account of the Situation and Names of the Several Outposts." Photocopy in the Robert Rogers Papers, •"'Jonathan Carver, Travels Through the Interior Minnesota Historical Society, from an original in Paris of North America (Reprint of ,^rd ed., Minne­ the .\merican Philosophical Society, Philadelphia. apolis, 1956), 50-51, 98-99; "The Narrative of Peter Much of the same information is included in Rogers' Pond," in Charles M. Gates (ed.), Five Fur Traders of journal, published in American Antiquarian Society, the Northwest (St. Paul, 1965), 44-47. Proceedings, New Series, 28: 224-273 (October, 1918). •" Ciates (ed.), Fix/e Fur Traders, 41. WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY AUTUMN, 1974

trade was still profitable, for Pond noted that in the summer of 1774 some 1,500 pounds of furs were sent from Prairie du Chien to Mack­ inac, and he himself was able to pay off all his debts and buy out his partner. But a new bonanza was on the horizon, and Peter Pond was one of many Scottisli and Yankee traders who left the Great Lakes-Mis­ sissippi region in the years between 1768 and 1777 to follow the lure. Men who had the boldness, plus the capital resources to back it up, were making a killing in three-year vent­ ures beyond Lake Superior to the Red River, the Saskatchewan, and eventually the Atha- baska country. Few Frenchmen could com­ mand that kind of credit from Montreal or # London merchants, and they were thus re­ stricted to the southern trade. So the troubled years of the American Revolution found the upper Mississippi peopled mainly by traders with names such as Grignon, Gautier, Bris- bois, Reaume, Ducharme, La Roque, Ange, Giard, Dorion, Dubuque, and a host of oth­ ers. Some had connections in Mackinac and some in St. Louis, but like the Indian tribes they dealt with, they were caught in a con­ flict which did not basically concern them,

•^-i and the allegiance of many wavered back and forth with the fortunes of war. Hostilities along the Mississippi sharpened when Kentucky volunteers under George Rog­ ers Clark successfully invaded Illinois in 1778 and when Spain declared war on England in 1779. Under British orders, an expedition was organized at Prairie du Chien for an at­ tack upon St. Louis. It was led by the Sioux chief Wabasha and the Chippewa chief Mat- chekewis and was accompanied by an assort­ ment of traders and voyageurs. The Sauk and Fox, who had been coerced and threat­ ened into coming along, defected at the cru­ cial moment, the attack failed, and the expe­ dition dissolved. By way of reprisal Spanish troops visited Prairie du Chien.^^

-•v *»! This turmoil turned even more merchants toward the far northwest and away from the Mississippi. Trade there received another Hough, Way to the West blow when news arrived that the Treaty of Frederic Remington made this drawing from a sketch Paris in 1783 had drawn the boundary of Bri- done by A. B. Mayer in 1851, depicting a voyageur in the fringed, red-sashed costume which so captured the Indian imagination. ''' Louise Phelps Kellogg, The British Regime in Wisconsin and the Northwest (Madison, 1935), 165— 170.

10 GILMAN: UPPER MISSISSIPPI FUR TRADE tish territory through the Great Lakes. The dians on both sides of the border. The fur upper Mississippi region was thus divided business remained undisturbed, and in 1797 down the middle—American on the east of the the upper Mississippi Valley trade, centering river and Spanish on the west. For another at Prairie du Chien, accounted for more than thirty years, however, it was effectively con­ 3,000 packs of fur with an estimated total trolled by the British. value of over 45,000 pounds Canadian.^^ At The year 1783 had seen yet another import­ this time—the height of the Canadian fur ant development. This was the formation of trade in North America—business was tun­ the North West Company. By the late 1780's neled through three major centers or entre­ the country beyond Lake Superior was under pots: most of southern Michigan and the Ohio the control of the great monopoly, and inde­ Valley were subsidiary to Detroit; trade from pendent traders found themselves shut out. the Mississippi Valley and beyond went The more enterprising and determined ones through Mackinac; and Grand Portage was turned toward the unexploited reaches of the depot for all trade in the country to the Louisiana between the Mississippi and the up­ north and west of Lake Superior (except, of per Missouri. Prairie du Chien was the logi­ course, that controlled by the English Hud­ cal jumping-off point, and by the early 1790's son's Bay Company). Also subsidiary to Grand its business had revived and its citizens in­ Portage at this time was trade with the Chip­ cluded men like Murdoch Cameron, James pewa tribe along the south shore of Lake Su­ Aird, John Campbell, and Robert Dickson, all perior and westward as far as the Red River, of whom were trading in Spanish territory, including a chain of posts about the head­ some as far to the west as the headwaters of waters of the Mississippi.^" the Minnesota, the Des Moines, and the Big A fourth great fur-trading center was fore­ Sioux rivers. The few Spanish-French trad­ shadowed in 1803 when the United States pur­ ers remaining on the upper Mississippi found chased the Territory of Louisiana, and St. themselves at a disadvantage in competing Louis—the natural key to the Missouri—be­ with the steady supply of cheap, duty-free Eng­ came American. Until this time the traders lish goods.^^ working out of Prairie du Chien and a smaller Spanish authorities were well aware of all group based at Green Bay had remained un­ this and talked fitfully of patroling the upper organized and independent. But a number Mississippi and establishing forts at the of them, including particularly Dickson, who mouths of the Minnesota and Des Moines had a major post at Lake Traverse, were do­ rivers, but nothing was actually done. The ing a substantial business with the Yankton most effective measure they took was the or­ and Teton Sioux along the James River. ganization of their own companies to exploit These groups in turn served as middlemen the fur resources of the Missouri. By 1795, for the Arikara and Mandan of the upper Mis­ however, as traders licensed out of St. Louis souri. Foreseeing that these profits would be climbed the Missouri, they met competition threatened by Americans pushing up the Mis­ from Prairie du Chien traders who had souri, several of the Canadian traders agreed pushed as far west as northern Nebraska and to combine in 1805.^'' southern South Dakota and were trading The organization included Dickson, Aird, there with the Maha, the Oto, the Pawnee, Cameron, and Allen Wilmot, all of Prairie du and the Ponca.^* Chien, and Jacob Franks and John Lawe of In 1796 Jay's Treaty reasserted American Green Bay. Led by Dickson, who gave his possession of the Great Lakes-upper Mississip­ name to the firm, they took aggressive action pi region, at the same time giving reciprocal to expand their trading area. Aird took a trading privileges to Americans and Cana-

'= Robert Hamilton, "Observations on the Trade of Upper Canada, 24 Sept. 1798," in Michigan Pioneer =^ Kellogg, British Regime, 228-231; Lavender, Fist and Historical Collections (Lansing, 1896), 25: 202-206. in the Wilderness, 30-35, 102; Nasatir, "The Anglo- •'" Wayne E. Stevens, "Fur Trading Companies in the Spanish Frontier," 214-220. Northwest, 1760-1816," in Mississippi Valley Histori­ •" Nasatir, "The Anglo-Spanish Frontier," 170, 203, cal Association, Proceedings, 9: 284, 287 (1916-1917). 204-206. '•" Lavender, Fist in the Wilderness, 44-51.

11 ^^-

J^ ! .1-

^ -^ *•

The mouth of the St. Croix River, about 1830, a drawing by Henry Lewis for his book. Das lUustrite Mississippithal, first published in Dusseldorf in 1855-1857 and republished in Leipzig in 1923.

wintering expedition up the Missouri from pany specified the areas of each and forestall­ St. Louis, and Dickson pushed north up the ed competition. It gave to the Michilimacki­ Mississippi to open trade with the Chippewa nac Company the trade south of Lake Supe­ in competition with the North West Compa­ rior as far west as Chequamegon Bay but re­ ny. The enterprise failed for lack of capital,' tained for the Nortli West Company that be­ and in 1807, after two years of operation, it tween La Pointe and Fond du Lac—probably was absorbed by the Michilimackinac Com- including several small posts in the upper St. pany.^8 Croix Valley. From Fond du Lac (present- This new effort at Canadian monopoly in day Duluth-Superior) the line ran westward the Mississippi area had much greater re­ to the mouth of the Sheyenne River, some sources than Dickson and his associates could fifteen miles north of what is now Fargo, command. It was intended to be a south-of- North Dakota.30 the-border twin to the North West Company The future of the Michiliiuackinac Com­ and was organized by a group of the same pany, however, was decided by forces beyond Montreal merchants who controlled the lat­ the control of even Montreal merchants and ter. An agreement with the North West Com- bankers. Relations between the United States and Britain were growing steadily worse, and despite the provisions of Jay's Treaty, the "" Lavender, Fist in the Wilderness, 58, 92, 435; Louis A. Tohill, Robert Dickson, British Fur Trader on the Upper Mississippi: A Story of Trade, War, and Diplomacy (Ann Arbor, 1927), 18-24. "" Stevens, "Fur Trading Companies," 287-288. 12 OILMAN: UPPER MISSISSIPPI FUR TRADE governor of Louisiana proclaimed the terri­ the fur trade as a way of life for Indian peo­ tory west of the Mississippi closed to foreign ple could not have continued, with some mod­ traders. United States government trading es­ ifications, if it had been possible to guaran­ tablishments (factories), which were author­ tee them possession of the land and its re­ ized by law in 1796, were operating by 1808 at sources. Although some fur-bearing species Chicago, Fort Madison, Fort Osage, and Mac­ were permanently depleted by intensive hunt­ kinac itself and were cutting severely into the ing, the over-all figures on fur production in trade. The same year saw the beginning of the Great Lakes-upper Mississippi region dur­ another great rival with the founding of the ing the last half of the nineteenth century American Fur Company by John Jacob Astor. clearly show that animal resources on the In 1810 the Nonintercourse Act forced the whole held their own and even increased.''^ Michilimackinac Company to make an ar­ There is even less reason to assume that rangement with American Fur for circum­ Indian societies were doomed to internal col­ venting the United States embargo on Cana­ lapse from contact with Western civilization. dian goods, and in 1811 the two firms merged By the end of the eighteenth century native under the name South West Company.*" Americans in the upper Mississippi Valley and During the war which began in June, 1812, Great Lakes region had reached in material Prairie du Chien as the center for trade and terms what has been called a "pan-Indian cul­ thus for Indian relations in the upper Missis­ ture."*'' Nearly all the tools and implements sippi Valley was fortified by the Americans used in their daily lives were manufactured and taken by the British. Using economic in Europe, and the goods from which they pressure and extravagant promises, Canadian made their clothes were also largely European. officials, among whom Dickson was promi­ The limited range of things for which they nent, marshaled the Indian tribes to their had traded a century before had expanded. side.** The Canadian efforts were aided by More sophisticated tools had been added to the decision of the Shawnee leader Tecumseh the list—such items as spring-operated animal to join forces with the British. His example traps, augers, nails, handsaws, corn mills, and exerted a powerful influence, especially among burning glasses; clay pipes had replaced stone the other Algonquian tribes. Indian forces ones for nonceremonial occasions and import­ successfully prevented American occupation ed tobacco had replaced that grown locally of the region, but the Treaty of Ghent, signed or the substitutes which had been smoked; in the closing weeks of 1814, betrayed the In­ horses had been introduced, and bits, bridles, dians and left the boundaries as they had and a variety of harness gear were in demand; been. Americans were henceforth in complete silver ornaments had become popular—arm­ control of the fur trade south and west of the bands, brooches, gorgets, earrings, and even Great Lakes. cradleboard decorations. This so-called "trade silver" was part of a whole class of goods de­ signed and manufactured by Europeans sole­ HAT the Americans had won ly for the Indian market. Other examples w was the privilege of presiding were tomahawk pipes, wampum, and trade over the closing years and final destruction of guns with enlarged trigger guards and ser­ the Indian fur trade in this region. The seeds pent-shaped sideplates of brass. of that destruction were in the American hun­ But in spite of this "pan-Indian" material ger for land and the engulfing wave of white sameness, other aspects of Native American settlement. There is little solid evidence that culture remained little changed. A Winneba-

'" Stevens, "Fur Trading Companies," 288-291. For "'See James L. Clayton, "The Growth and Econom­ a more detailed and soph'sticated account of the re­ ic Significance of the American Fur Trade, 1790-1890," lations between Astor's American Fur Company and the ill Aspects of the Fur Trade, 62-72; Gilman, "Upper Michilimackinac Company, see Lavender, Fist in the Mississippi Fur Trade," 123-124, 140. Wilderness, 108-113, 114, 120-127, 147-150. '•' For the term it.self and discussion of the material " For a detailed accoinit of Dickson's war activities culture of this period, see Quimby, Indian Culture and of hostilities on the northwestern frontier, see To­ and European Trade Goods, 140-159; Quimby, Indian hill, Robert Dickson, 42-78. Life in the Upper Great Lakes, 147-151.

13 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY AUTUMN, 1974

the fur trade, and addiction to it was wide­ spread among both whites and Indians. There are innumerable lurid accounts of its effects but little evidence to support the claim that Indians could not resist it or that its ravages alone ever destroyed Indian society.** The traditional life of Indian peoples moved with the measured cycle of the seasons, and their adaptation to the fur trade did not change this greatly. Winter was still by neces­ sity the time for hunting. Northern tribes like Image suppressed the Chippewa dispersed in small family pending copyright groups through the frozen forests. If a trad­ clearance er's wintering post were nearby, supplies might be purchased occasionally and furs de­ livered to pay for credit extended in the fall, but if the trip were too long, this would wait until spring—perhaps to be accomplished on the way to the sugar bush. Summer was a time for gathering into larger bands or vil­ lages, for social and religious celebrations, for travel and trade, and sometiines for war­ fare. In early fall came the ricing season, then gardens were harvested, food was laid away, and winter supplies of ammunition, clothing, and other necessities were secured Entitled "The Bane," this drawing by George Catlin from the trader, possibly on credit. Among shows traders selling whiskey to Indians. tribes in milder climates the pattern varied. There a whole band often united for an go was still different from a Chippewa—just early winter hunt, traveling in search of game as the use of mass-produced goods failed to like deer or buffalo, returning to the village make a Norwegian and an Italian into iden­ for the bitterest months, then leaving again tical Europeans. Probably the best evidence in early spring to hunt muskrat or other for the inherent vitality of Indian societies is furred game. Maple sugar or wild rice might the extent to which some still retain their be gathered, but the greatest reliance for identities even under the pressures of the mid- food would be upon fields of corn, squash, twentieth century. melons, potatoes, and other crops.*^ One widespread characteristic of Indian As fur posts were opened throughout the culture which persisted despite the new varie­ region, these crops also gained importance ty of goods available was indifference to ac­ in trade. Because transportation was difficult quiring wealth beyond the immediate need. and every pound precious, fur traders relied This presented a problem for the aggressive upon buying as much of their food supply as white trader, who generally interpreted the possible from Indian people. Jonathan Car­ lack of concern for material possessions as lazi­ ver reported that a Sauk village on the Wis- ness. It was a major factor leading him to in­ troduce liquor. Time and again traders testi­ fied that Indian people addicted to alcohol " Phillips, The Fur Trade, 1: 109, 210-216, 401, 440; Lewis O. Saum, The Fur Trader and the Indian (Seat­ produced more furs than those who had not tle and London, 1965), 150, 168; W. L. Morton, in As­ acquired the bitter craving and hunted only pects of the Fur Trade, 12; Patterson, The Canadian to make a living. Also recorded are frequent Indian, 79. The argument that liquor ruined the trade protests by Indian leaders against the delib­ was often put forth, but seldom by the traders them­ selves. erate pushing of liquor among their people. '•'Quimby, Indian Life in the Upper Great Lakes, Alcohol was unquestionably a major factor in 108-146.

14 GILMAN: UPPER MISSISSIPPI FUR TRADE consin River raised "great quantities of In­ period this began to change. St. Louis de­ dian corn, beans, melons, &;c, so that this veloped rapidly as a supply point, and with place is esteemed the best market for traders the beginnings of steamboat traffic on the up­ to furnish themselves with provisions of any per Mississippi in the 1820's more and more within eight hundred miles of it." Peter Pond goods came up the river. Prairie du Chien noted that the Ottawa of L'Arbre Croche, itself then became the major distribution Michigan, "rase Corn Beens and meney point for the area, and Mendota, opposite artickels which they youse in Part them salves Fort Snelling at the mouth of the Minnesota and Bring the Remander to Market"—also River, became the local rendezvous for that maple sugar, dried venison, and bear's traders from the Minnesota Valley and be­ grease formed a considerable part of the local yond. Until 1842, however, furs from Prairie trade at Mackinac. Wild rice was a major du Chien continued going to Mackinac and item of trade at the North West Company on to New York. The coolness of the climate post on the Snake River of east-central Min­ was apparently still enough of an advantage nesota in the winter of 1804-1805.*" Pem­ to overcome the difficulties of transportation mican is still another example of an Indian up the Wisconsin. With the failure of the food source which became vital to the opera­ American Fur Company in 1842 this also tion of the fur trade, although its use in the changed. Thenceforward furs went to the Mississippi Valley was limited. Chouteau Company warehouse in St. Louis.*'' The fur trade itself also moved with the After the War of 1812 Americans moved cycle of the seasons. Fall was the time to rapidly to consolidate control of the fur trade stock up and disperse to small wintering posts. on their side of the border. In 1816 a law Winter was a time of isolation and boredom, was passed excluding foreigners from trading broken sometimes by visits to groups of cus­ with Indians in United States territory (ex­ tomers living at a distance. Spring brought ceptions were later allowed), and government- the gathering in and packing of furs and at­ operated factories in conjunction with mili­ tention to canoes or other means of travel. tary forts were atithorized for Green Bay and With early summer came the trip to the ren­ Prairie du Chien in Wisconsin and for Rock dezvous or nearest supply point, the settling Island in Illinois. More important, Astor re­ of accounts, the paying of debts, the renew­ vived the American Fur Company, bought ing of contracts, and the discussing of new out his Canadian partners in the South West plans and arrangements. Then there was the Company, and embarked on a twenty-year assembling of the next year's "outfit"—the pur­ struggle to monopolize the business of the chase of goods, the hiring of men, and at last upper Great Lakes and Mississippi.*' the departure once more for the hinterland. Many of the Canadian traders who had This pattern varied immensely with the made their homes and livelihoods in the particular period and location. During the area eventually accepted United States citizen­ British years in the Mississippi Valley there ship and, quite often, employment under were two stages: clerks, wintering partners, Astor. A few, led by Dickson, left for the and small traders, along with many Indians, Earl of Selkirk's new colony in the Red River assembled at Prairie du Chien for the spring Valley.*^ One who stayed was Joseph Rolette, rendezvous. There the major traders formed an ex-seminary student from Quebec, who a canoe brigade to carry the furs to Mackinac had come to Prairie du Chien in 1804 and in late summer, returning to the Prairie with had been associated with Dickson in the their supplies in early fall. Then they dis­ Michilimackinac and South West companies. patched clerks to wintering locations and made arrangements with the smaller traders, to whom they might either sell at a markup '" These generalizations about the flow of trade are or advance goods for a share of the profits. based upon correspondence and invoices of the West­ During the early years of the American ern and Sioux outfits in the Henry H. Sibley Papers, Minnesota Historical Society, and in the American Fur Company Papers. ** Carver, Travels, 46; Gates (ed.). Five Fur Traders, •^ Lavender, Fist in the Wilderness, 228-237. 32, 246. "'Tohill, Robert Dickson, 93.

15 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY AUTUMN, 1974

He had played a prominent part on the headwaters of the Red River and was greatly British side during the war and afterward respected among the western Sioux bands. continued as an independent trader. Re­ Taking goods up the Mississippi and Min­ nowned for ruthless tactics, he soon gained nesota rivers from St. Louis, the new company control of much of the eastern Sioux trade on commenced operations on the great divide be­ the Mississippi and Minnesota rivers above tween the Mississippi and Missouri—the Prairie du Chien. He divided the territory Coteau des Prairies of eastern South Dakota. with James Lockwood, an American new­ From there they reached northward toward comer in the area.^'' the Canadian border and west to the Teton By 1820 competition from the American trade that Dickson had found profitable in Fur Company was pressing Rolette hard. earlier years. In the Minnesota Valley they Lockwood had become its agent in Wisconsin, gave stiff competition to Rolette.=^ and it controlled the Iowa trade through Six years later, in 1827, a consolidation oc­ Russell Farnham, who operated posts at Rock curred by which Bernard Pratte & Company Island and on the Des Moines River. In 1821 of St. Louis became the Western Department an agreement was reached by which Rolette, of the American Fur Company. At the same though remaining independent, would buy time the owners of the Columbia Fur Com­ and sell only through American Fur. In line pany agreed to merge and become the Upper with its developing policy, the company Missouri Outfit of the Western Department, promised to let none of its own traders com­ working up the river from St. Louis. Renville pete within his specified area and agreed to split off and became a semi-independent op­ dump Lockwood without ceremony. Another erator supplied through Rolette's Upper Mis­ step toward monopoly on the upper Missis­ sissippi Outfit. This left the American Fur sippi came with the closing of the govern­ Company without major competition on the ment factory at Prairie du Chien after six upper Mississippi except in the far north.^^ years of highly successful operation. This re­ Along the international border from Lake sulted from a long and bitter lobbying effort Superior at Grand Portage to the Red River by the American Fur Company, which finally at Pembina, the early 1820's had seen a trade triumphed in 1822 when Congress terminated war so fierce that it occasionally led to vio­ the entire factory system.^* lence. There old partners from the North Competition from outside soon developed, West Company often found themselves on however. The year 1821 had seen the merger opposite sides, for many had remained with of the Canadian North West and English the Hudson's Bay Company after the merger Hudson's Bay companies. One result was un­ of the two organizations, while the Northern employment for a number of experienced Department of American Fur was also staffed Canadian traders. A group of these, headed largely by former Canadians. Among these by Kenneth McKenzie, Daniel Lamont, and were William Morrison and his younger William Laidlaw, with several Americans to brother Allan, Eustache Roussain, Pierre Cot- front for them, formed a firm known as the te, John Holiday, and William A. Aitken. Columbia Fur Company. The actual organ­ Between 1820 and 1826 the elder Morrison izer of the enterprise was Joseph Renville, established a line of posts along the border a half-Sioux interpreter who had worked from Grand Portage to Lake of the Woods. for Dickson and for the Hudson's Bay Com­ Although furs from both sides of the line were pany. Renville knew the country around the sought, the border area itself did not by that time yield great amounts, and the real pur-

"' Lavender, Fist in the Wilderness, 308; James Lockwood, "Early Times and Events in Wisconsin," in ^2 Lavender, Fist in the Wilderness, 335-336, 367- Wisconsin Historical Collections, 2: 173-175. 369. » Lavender, Fist in the Wilderness, 309, 319-325. •^ Lavender, Fist in the Wilderness, 377-380. Lav­ The final inventories of property indicate that among ender states that Renville was supplied through the the eight government factories closed in 1822, Prairie Northern Department. If so, the arrangement was du Chien had the second largest. See Ora Brooks soon changed. A contract in the Sibley Papers, dated Peake, A History of the United States Indian Factory June 6, 1835, shows Renville doing business exclusive­ System, 1795^1822 (Denver, 1954), 295. ly through Rolette.

16 GILMAN: UPPER MISSISSIPPI FUR TRADE pose of Morrison's posts was to prevent British penetration of the rich Mississippi headwaters, a region known as the Fond du Lac Department.5* In 1826 Morrison retired, leaving the Fond du Lac trade to Aitken and Roussain. In 1829 Aitken bought out Roussain and at the same time he opened direct negotiations with the Hudson's Bay Company. This led to a Image suppressed moderating of competition, and in 1833 an agreement was reached between Aitken and pending copyright Hudson's Bay Governor George Simpson un­ clearance der which the American Fur Company closed all of its border posts in return for a payment of three hundred pounds a year. Thus at last American Fur achieved a virtual monop­ oly of what was left of the fur trade in the upper Mississippi Valley.^'' During the half-dozen years of ruthless com­ petition with the Columbia Fur Company, ..^.v^-.. and Notes Rolette and his employees had become em­ George Catlin's rendition of beavers building a dam. broiled in battles with Indian agent Lawrence Taliaferro at Fort Snelling and had won the in the Western Outfit, but until 1840 Rolette ill will of numerous other people. To held an interest equal to both of theirs. In straighten out the trader's chaotic affairs and 1842 American Fur failed and the Western strengthen company control over his outfit, Outfit, thereafter controlled by the two American Fur in 1826 sent Hercules Dousman younger partners, became subsidiary to Pierre to Prairie du Chien. Dousman, the son of a Chouteau, Jr., & Company of St. Louis.^^ Mackinac trader, had been educated in New Dousman and Sibley worked well together York, and his vision and business capabilities and exercised a great degree of independence reached far beyond the declining fur trade.^" from the parent companies under which they In 1834 Astor retired and the American operated. Both were men of intelligence and Fur Company underwent reorganization. The probably greater than average integrity, but Upper Mississippi Outfit became the Western even so, the Western Outfit seldom prospered. Outfit, and a subsidiary department was Although Dousman was to become one of the formed under the name Sioux Outfit, with wealthiest men in Wisconsin, he made rela­ headquarters at Mendota. Management of tively little of his fortune by actual dealing this was given to another young newcomer in fur. It came instead from steamboats, named Henry H. Sibley, son of a Michigan railroads, and land, and was built upon an judge. Sibley and Dousman owned shares initial "stake" acquired from Indian treaty money.s* By 1830 white settlement was pushing in­ "John S. Galbraith, "British-American Competition to the valley from the south and blossoming in the Border Fur Trade of the 1820s," in Minnesota legally and otherwise among the lead mines History, 36: 242-247 (September, 1959); Letter from and around fur trade and military establish­ Allan Morrison, in Minnesota Historical Collections, 1 417; Affidavit of William A. Aitken, in Wisconsin ments at Fort Madison, Rock Island, Prairie Historical Collections, 20: 340; Lavender, Fist in the du Chien, Milwaukee, Green Bay, La Pointe, Wilderness, 246, 268, 283-284. and Mendota. Already the Potawatomi Na- °'' Galbraith, "British-American Competition," 248- 249; Gilman, "Upper Mississippi Fur Trade," 126. '^'' Henry H. Sibley, "Memoir of Hercules L. Dous­ man," in Minnesota Historical Collections, 3: 192-200 ''Gilman, "Upper Mississippi Fur Trade," 125, 126, (St. Paul, 1880); Lavender, Fist in the Wilderness, 321- 129. 324. 'Olbid., 129, 132.

17 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY AUTUMN, 1974 tion had signed away most of its land in Il­ American Fur Company paid liberal divi­ linois, and within another year or two the dends while many of its small traders failed Fox and Sauk under Black Hawk would be and were replaced by new men. What losses engaged in their final, despairing struggle were passed on to the company were never against white aggression. The rest of the written off—merely added to the mountain of Indian population, long decimated by epi­ Indian debts on the books.^^ demic diseases, was still shrinking. Some It was these accumulated losses masquerad­ kinds of game, like elk and buffalo, had been ing as bad debts for which the larger opera­ permanently depleted, and beaver was prac­ tors claimed reimbursement when the tribes tically extinct in the area. The highly valued of the upper Mississippi Valley were at last "fine" furs like marten, fisher, and otter were forced to give up their land to the United no longer shipped in large quantities, though States Government. The politics of treaty- their smaller cousin, the mink, remained plen­ making were delicate and involved, but Dous­ tiful. So did the lowly muskrat. In the 1830's man and Sibley were equal to them, and it accounted for 95 per cent of the furs ship­ both men collected handsomely. As Dousman ped from the upper Mississippi Valley, with told Sibley after traders had pocketed a sub­ deer skins second.^^ sidy of $310,000 under the 1837 Sioux, Chip­ Those Indian people who depended for pewa, and Winnebago treaties: "Otherwise their whole living on selling furs faced pover­ we were gone coons."^••' ty and even actual starvation. They were Fur was only a marginal part of the busi­ caught in a vicious circle of vanishing re­ ness in the few years that remained before sources and therefore even greater dependence all Indian people of the upper Mississippi on expensive trade goods—often including Valley were confined to reservations. Instead food to get them through the winter. One of the rendezvous there was the annuity pay­ trader observed during an especially bad sea­ ment, and there the treaty story was con­ son that there were plenty of fur-bearing ani­ tinued: traders profited immensely and even­ mals but that his Indians were too weak to tually collected most of the government hunt them.^" Without food, guns, ammuni­ money, either for payment of debts or new tion, and traps they could not hunt, and with­ purchases. out hunting there would be no furs at all, so After two hundred years the forms of adap­ traders gave credit, hoping always for a bet­ tation by which Indian people had coped ter season that seldom came. There were few with the white man's commercial world had bands by this time that did not have their been thrust aside. The fur trade was compa­ resident trader, and as debts mounted, the re­ tible with traditional Indian life styles and lationship became far more like employment skills, and its economics were viable as long at piece work than independent barter. It as parity of power existed and Indian people was a losing business, but one that neither had total access to the resources of their land. the trader nor his customers could afford to On his side, the white man argued that the quit.''* land could be put to far more efficient use, Most of the losses appeared on the trader's and when he had the power to take it, he did books as unpaid Indian debts, which mounted from year to year. To some extent these losses were passed on when small traders received credit from their suppliers in the larger out­ '"Ibid., 136-137; James L. Clayton, "The Impact fits. But the organization of the business of Traders' Claims on the American Fur Trade," in generally placed the major risk on the sub­ David M. Ellis (ed.). The Frontier in American De­ sidiary trader, just as he sought to place it velopment (Ithaca and London, 1969), 299-322. on the Indian. As the years went by the ""Dousman to Sibley, July 12, 1838, in the Sibley Papers. For the treaties, see Charles J. Kappler, (comp. and ed.), Indian Affairs: Laws and Treaties (Washington, D.C., 1904), 2: 491-500. The amount '''Ibid., 124. quoted does not include an 1837 treaty with the Mi- "" Norman W. Kittson to Henry H. Sibley, February ch'gan Chippewa which gave .1540,000 to traders in 28, 1851, in the Sibley Papers. that area, nor $50,000 which the Winnebago allotted "Gilman, "Upper Mississippi Fur Trade," 137-139. in specific grants to individuals.

18 The Political Education of an American Radical: Thomas R. Amlie in the 1930's

By Theodore Rosenof

'HE problem of political change attempt to change America, of his strategy, has been a perennial one for his failure, withal of his political education. American radicals. Their confines have gen­ Thomas R. Amlie served in the United erally been those of constitutionalism, demo­ States Congress as a Representative from Wis­ cracy, and civil liberties—the essence of the consin in 1931-1933 and 1935-1939. He was American political tradition. America has elected first (in a special election caused by also been a remarkably consistent country in a vacancy) as a La Follette Republican, and the realm of social and economic ideology: in 1934 and 1936 as a Progressive, a leader equality of opportunity, the Horatio Alger of the breakaway party established in Wiscon­ ethos, and free enterprise have been occasion­ sin in 1934. Amlie's own background was ally questioned but deeply ingrained beliefs. agrarian (born in North Dakota in 1897), but The problem for American radicals, operating his district in southeastern Wisconsin con­ in a country in which liberty, prosperity, and tained the cities of Kenosha and Racine. He at least a degree of social mobility have been attended the Farmer-Labor Convention of the norms, has been that of gaining majority 1920 and worked in the presidential campaign support for basic change. How can such of Senator Robert M. La Follette in 1924. change be made in a land of self-professed self- His radicalism (and progressivism) was basic­ made men—and those on the make? How can ally American in origin, rising from midwest- the problem of social injustice be resolved ern insurgency. Influenced by Marxian eco­ when the injustice is most acutely felt by a nomics and John Strachey's vision of a "com­ minority of the people? But what if general ing struggle for power" in the early 1930's, prosperity becomes a general—and lasting- he also followed Thorstein Veblen and re­ depression, if millions are chronically out of jected the Marxian version of the class struggle work, if reform proves inadequate to the chal­ in the American context. Most important, lenge? Would radicalism then become viable? for understanding Amlie's career, he was as What would be its rationale and strategy? much an intellectual as a politician; while How would it proceed? The career of Thomas trained in the law, he had early thought of R. Amlie provides a case study of one radical's becoming a social scientist (he was discour-

19 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY AUTUMN, 1974

what it suggested about America, the kind of country it was,' its political processes, its social characteristics, its ideological traditions. As a new legislator Amlie initially spoke like a reasonably orthodox progressive. He accepted capitalism as a superior economic system, but called for regulation and wealth redistribution.* His radicalism, however, deepened with the Depression; his question­ ing of the system grew more and more acute; and he followed the questioning to its logical conclusion. Capitalism, he declared in 1933, has run its course, and a new system was now in order. He viewed capitalism in this con­ text through the decade of the thirties; it was the basic economic assumption on which his political education proceeded. Despite shifts in terms of strategy, tactics, and programs, he did not change his conviction that capitalism Society's Iconographic Collections (though it could be kept going through gov­ ernment spending, or various expedients, or Amlie and his wife Gehrta, photographed with their four sons in the 1930's. The sons are William and war) was no longer a dynamic system, that its Frederick (seated), and Thomas and Robert (on floor). dynamism lasted only as long as there was a frontier into which to expand, that with the closing of the geographic (and subsequent) aged by the lack of academic freedom he wit­ frontiers capitalism's dynamic had given out; nessed during and after World War I); his and that this was true of the western world speaking style was that of the systematic lec­ as a whole—that the breakdown of capitalism turer rather than the rousing orator. marked an epochal period of transition in Amlie lost his race for Congress in 1932 and history comparable to the end of the feudal for the Progressive nomination for United era.2 States Senator in 1938. He was nominated by But while he considered America to be President Franklin D. Roosevelt to serve on part of the western world economically, Amlie the Interstate Commerce Commission in 1939, also believed strongly, and believed through­ but withdrew his name in the face of heated out the decade, that psychologically and ideo­ opposition. He ran again for Congress in logically America was different, that orthodox 1941 in a special election, this time as a Demo­ socialists had merely served to alienate their crat, but again lost. While he remained active in politics for two decades to come, the most lAmUe to Kenneth Grubb, October 22, 1931; to important years of his career were those of the S. O. Kolstoe, October 22, 1931; to Frederick C. John, Depression and New Deal. While he be­ October 30, 1931; to William E. Runge, February 19, 1932; to H. A. Studebaker, February 19, 1932, all in longed to several political parties, he remained the Thomas R. Amlie Papers, Archives-Manuscripts ideologically consistent—always on the left, Division, State Historical Society of Wisconsin. always trying to push liberalism farther left­ ^Thomas R. Amlie, "The End of Capitalism," in ward. Amlie's main significance was not as Common Sense, II: 6 (October, 1933); Thomas R. a Congressman per se; in a sense that was the Amlie, "The Independent Farmer," in Common Sense, IV: 18 (September, 1935); The Progressive, December least of it. His main significance was as a 25, 1937, p. 7, and May 14, 1938, p. 7; Thomas R. leader of American radicalism in the 1930's, Amlie, The Forgotten Man's Handbook (Elkhorn, as the man who was elected chairman of the Wisconsin, 1936), 64-65, 67-68, 78; Congressional Rec­ Farmer-Labor Political Federation in 1933 ord, 74 Congress, 1 session (August 26, 1935), 14806- and of its successor, the American Common­ 14807; Nomination of Thomas R. Amlie, Hearings Be­ fore a Subcommittee of the Committee on Interstate wealth Federation, in 1935. And his career Commerce, U.S. Senate, 76 Congress, I session (Febru­ as a radical leader was most significant for ary, 1939), 174, 210, 215, 223, 229.

20 ROSENOF: THOMAS R. AMLIE countrymen and to destroy themselves polit­ cy seemed to many to be doomed—a year of ically by couching their appeals in European ferment, strife, fear, and hope. Amlie's views rhetoric, that to succeed in America radical­ were shaped by this extraordinary year; he ism would have to speak in the American reached during it his radical extremity; he idiom, proceed in a way compatible with the was imbued with the apocalyptic mood of American psychology and experience. Amer­ the time; he looked at the ferment both at ica was psychologically classless, he argued; home and abroad, particularly at the Nazis' a "middle class" psychology pervaded the so­ triumph, and saw the political center collaps­ cial order; "the conditioning effect of 150 ing; he had hopes of a co-operative common­ years of an American frontier on American wealth and fears of a fascist upheaval. He habits of thought" had left a lasting impact. would stand against both fascism and com­ America had been the land of opportunity; it munism—the collapsing liberal center seemed had been the land for the able and ambitious hardly any more to matter except for the very man on the make; it had been the land of an short run—with an indigenous American rad­ expanding frontier and a dynamic economy. icalism: its prophet would be Thorstein The problem now, objectively as well as sub­ Veblen (Amlie's own intellectual hero); its jectively, economically as well as psychological­ appeal would be couched in the American ly, was that the frontier had closed, that cap­ idiom; its objective would be the co-operative italism had ceased to expand, but that people commonwealth; its means would be those still behaved as if the old realities, the old necessary. opportunities, still existed. This was the phe­ The New Deal, Amlie believed, both in nomenon of "psychological lag," the phe­ 1933 and later, could only temporarily stave nomenon that remained at the core of Amlie's off the collapse of capitalism; it was the final thought and action through the decade. This reformist effort to save a dying system. Agree­ was the dilemma as Amlie saw it: the old ing that popular sentiment as well as ideo­ order was breaking down, objectively and logical inclinations limited Roosevelt to a pro­ economically it was imperative that action be gram of regulation rather than socialization, taken, but the people were not yet ready to Amlie believed that such a program would take the necessary action.^ inevitably fail, that it could not (given the What was to be done? Was the answer objective economic realities) succeed, that the gradual education and eventual political ac­ New Deal would inevitably either turn left tion? Would complete collapse come before (with Roosevelt perhaps becoming the leader such education and action were possible? of a radicalized progressivism), or would sur­ Would they merely open the door to fascism render to the big business right. He further before radicals could take power themselves? felt that given the psychology of the Ameri­ These were some of the questions Amlie can people New Deal reforms would have to pondered and tried to answer as his political be tried before more thoroughgoing radical education proceeded through the decade. measures would be accepted. Thus, while Amlie was convinced that the New Deal's re­ covery program would fail, he was hopeful that Roosevelt would be sufficiently flexible INETEEN THIRTY-THREE N'wa s an epochal year. It was the year when the Depression reached its depth, " Amlie to D. D. Alderdyce, November 3, 1935; to when the old order seemed to be crumbling, John Strachey, November 6, 1933; to Goodwin Watson, when many thought the end of an era was November 17, 1933; to George M. Rhodes, July 22, 1935; to Mrs. W. Bayward Cutting, March 31, 1937; at hand; it was the year of Franklin Roose­ to Richard Neuberger, April 21, 1937; to American velt and the New Deal in America and of Youth Congress, June 17, 1937; September 2-3, 1933, Adolf Hitler and national socialism in Ger­ speech manuscripts; 1935 manuscript; Congressional many; it was a year when thoughts of "sys­ News Letter, April 25, 1938 (sent by Amlie to con­ stituents), all in the Amlie Papers; Amlie, Forgotten tems"—"fascism," "capitalism," "communism" Man's Handbook, 112-113; Thomas R. Amlie, "Dia­ —were in vogue, when intellectuals declared lectics Adrift," in Common Sense, III: 15-16 (July, for Marx and the class struggle, when democra­ 1934).

21 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY AUTUMN, 1974 to move left with the tide, and that in one This was strange and heady language for way or another the New Deal would pave the an erstwhile La Follette progressive, and it way for the coming of the co-operative com­ was clear that in the climate of these months monwealth.* Amlie temporarily forsook his faith not only But what if the system collapsed before the in the country's traditional economic system New Deal could be radicalized or the people but also in its traditional political processes. educated to accept socialization? This was He had little but scorn now for those radicals the scenario that Amlie saw as distinctly possi­ who favored a more cautious approach. He ble in the summer and fall of 1933: a collapse dismissed orthodox socialists as "garden varie­ of the system, a power vacuum, groups strug­ ty .. . liberals," fruitlessly spending "their gling to take power. It was in this cataclysmic time talking about Tom Mooney, Civil Liber­ mood that he reached his most extreme rad­ ties, Peace . . . etc."'' They were "congenital icalism: when he spoke in Nietzschean terms parliamentarians." They would "never be about the "will to power," when he sternly able to administer the 'coup de grace.' "^ He discussed the inexorable "logic of events," stressed that what was needed was "not a when he declared that "the freedom guaran­ political party, but a mass movement" par­ teed by the Bill of Rights lies behind us," taking of "the nature of fascism or commun­ when he looked to central Europe for mass ism in the sense that it will completely absorb movements as models for his own country, the individual members,"^ and suggested that when he envisioned a militant radical move­ "we have more to learn from the methods of ment seizing power in time of collapse by organization used by fascists than . . . from extraconstitutional means.^ "One thing is cer­ any other group. . . ."*" His radicalism took tain," he stressed, "and that is: that the ulti­ on an authoritarian and elitist tone: he em­ mate transition is the thing that is of first phasized the child-like mentality of many importance; and we must be prepared to use Americans, declared that their educability had the means necessary to achieve the objective. definite limits, and concluded that they could We have entered a period when he who does be provided with "trappings of some sort."** not will the means does not will the end. . . . Most interesting was Amlie's analysis of The people . . . will have lost most of their the nature of "Liberalism." This analysis, interest in . . . personal freedom. . . . They like his overall approach at the time, was an will want ... a leader . . . who has ... a extreme one. Liberalism, as he saw it, was sense of direction; and . . . they will want a strong when capitalism was an expanding leader . . . who [has] ... a sense of power." force. But "Liberalism is . . . only a growth "In the transition period . . . civil liberties upon Capitalism, and if Capitalism perishes will perhaps receive short shrift. ... As then it [Liberalism] cannot be expected to Veblen might say, 'It will all be a great pity,' survive as an important force, and least of but so much for that."^ all as a substitute for Capitalism."*2 Amlie, as this concept of liberalism suggested, here •• Amlie to Henry I. Noe, February 15, 1933; to viewed America as a monolith—a capitalist Franklin D. Roosevelt, February 20, 1933; to Howard monolith. The Bill of Rights, political liber- Y. Williams, May 27, 1933; to Ross A. Collins, May 31, 1933; to Elizabeth Hawkes, June 26, 1933; to »Amlie to Selden Rodman, October 30, 1933; Sep­ Charles Dietz. July 18, 1933; to E. J. Onstad, August tember 2-3, 1933, speech manuscripts, both in the 31, 1933; to Aubrey WiUiams, November 27, 1933, and Amlie Papers. January 17, 1934; to Agnes M. Jenks, February 16, 'Amlie to Howard Y. Williams, May 27, 1933, in 1934; to Ray W. Truesdill, August 3, 1934; to Milton the Amlie Papers. E. Scherer, November 24, 1934; September 2-3, 1933, " Amlie, "The End of Capitalism," 8. speech manuscripts; 1933 speech manuscript, all in "Amlie to Alfred M. Bingham, September 28, 1933, the Amlie Papers. in the Amlie Papers. = Amlie to Howard Y. WilKams, May 27, 1933; to i» Amlie to Selden Rodman, October 30, 1933, in the Selden Rodman, September 20, October .30, 1933; to Amlie Papers. F. J. Schlink, September 22, 1933; to Alfred M. Bing­ '1 Amlie to Selden Rodman, September 20, 1933; to ham, September 28, 1933: to L. G. Scherer, October 9, Parley P. Christensen, November 7, 1933; September 1933; to Parley P. Christensen, November 7, 1933; 2-3, 1933, speech manuscripts, all in the Amlie Papers. September 2-3, 1933, speech manuscripts, all in the 1= Amlie to Howard Y. Williams, May 27, 1933, in Amlie Papers; Amlie, "The End of CapitaUsm," 9. the Amlie Papers. 22 ROSENOF: THOMAS R. AMLIE

ties, and constitutional processes were all sub­ sumed under the general social-economic- political-cultural heading of "capitalism." Capitalism was not only an economic system, but an inclusive social order, an historical epoch. Rather than looking at America's po­ litical and economic traditions as separable and somewhat antagonistic, he viewed one in the context of the other, and was prepared to sacrifice one to rid the nation of the other. Moreover, Amlie clearly underestimated the durability of American constitutionalism. While he rejected the class rhetoric of Euro­ pean socialism as unsuited to American condi­ tions and psychology, he nevertheless looked upon America as objectively facing the Euro­ pean—and German—experience unless strong preventive action could be taken by the left. But Germany's constitutional traditions were not America's, and the United States was not a Weimar Republic. In this extreme mood of 1933 Amlie also thought he saw a possible way out of the bind of psychological lag—the gap between what must be done economically and what the people were ready to accept. Believing that Americans were still living psychologically and ideologically in the expanding capitalist word of the nineteenth century, he nonetheless argued that they were characterized by a la­ tent radicalism. This latent radicalism was not conducive to gradual change, quite the contrary; its very nature demanded quick and no-nonsense action. "The American people," he held, "have always mistrusted the idea of Society's Iconographic Collections gradualism. . . . Even the unemployed man A picket outside the J. I. Case Company of Racine sleeping on the park benches still feels that during the strike of 1934. we may have another period of boom and capitalist charm, and that he may then have civil liberties, and democratic processes were his opportunity. This hope is gradually fading restored as axioms to the radical program.** out, but memories tend to linger. The phil­ Nineteen thirty-four was a hopeful year. osophy of the American at this point tends While he emphasized the tenacity with which to be to let the system run as long as it will Americans stuck to the old verities, Amlie run, and then discard it, and not to proceed proceeded in the belief that Americans could into . . . gradualism, but to have a complete be induced to accept radical change. In a change. . . ."*3 This extreme radicalism gave' sense the contest became one between in- way as the epochal mood of 1933 receded. The cataclysmic emphasis gave way to an educa­ " Amlie to E. F. Marlatt, March 9, 1935; to Cecelia tional campaign; the revolutionary elan gave Howe, March 18, 1935; to Howard Y. WilHams, April way to electoral change; constitutionalism, 24, 1935; to George M. Rhodes, December 2, 1935, all in the Amlie Papers; Amlie, Forgotten Man's Hand­ book, 112, 119; Thomas R. Amlie, "The American " Amlie, "The End of Capitalism," 8; September Commonwealth Federation: What Chance in 1936?" 2-3, speech manuscript, in the Amlie Papers. in Common Sense, IV: 6-7 (August, 1935).

23 Society's Iconographic Collections Unemployed at a relief station in Winnebago County, February, 1935, receiving fish furnished by the Wisconsin Consei~valion Department. herited ideas and the corrosive effect of fundamental change, if it were proposed in hunger, depression, and unemployment upon terms that were essentially American and those ideas. Amlie continually stressed to his which they could understand." The 1934 elec­ less hopeful radical brethren that for the first tions, with the smashing defeat of Republican time history was on their side; capitalism was conservatives and the triumph of the Pro­ collapsing. People were not yet ready for gressive party in Wisconsin and the Farmer- radical change, but the movement was in a Labor party in Minnesota, convinced him radical direction; in a few "months" or that the leftward trend was greater than he "years" psychological and ideological condi­ had dared to hope. The issue henceforth, he tions would be "ripe" for a radical third concluded, would not be between Hooverism party. The vogue of Technocracy in 1932- and the New Deal but between capitalism 1933 provided perhaps the most concrete and the co-operative commonwealth.*^ proof of all this in Amlie's mind. Here was a movement which had captured the nation's "Amlie to J. G. "Vennie, November 6, 1933; to G. H. imagination, which was radical, and which Selden, November 27, 1933; to Howard Y. Williams, spoke in terms of the American idiom and the January 8, March 24, 1934; to Elmer E. Smith, Janu­ American fascination with "facts" rather than ary 19, 1934; to Francis H. Wendt, March 23, 1934; to Horace W. Townsend, April 3, 1934; to H. Gale "theories." Technocracy showed "that the Atwater, April 4, 1934; to Fred A. Meyer, April 4, American people were ready for a radical and 1934; to Henrik Shipstead, April 7, 1934; to Norman

24 ROSENOF: THOMAS R. AMLIE

The people were on the move; they were ments could be seen and utilized as transition­ dissatisfied with the present order of things; al phenomena. Amlie thus felt that such they were shaken by the years of Depression. groups as the Townsendites, the supporters of But to whom were they responding? Amlie Coughlin, and the followers of Long, must grew increasingly concerned in 1934-1935 not be attacked or alienated, that hopefully about the vogue of "panacea" movements- when the people saw the futility of the pana­ movements which provided an outlet for frus­ ceas they would turn to the more substantive tration but which were not truly radical, move­ programs of the production-for-use move­ ments led by demagogues who played upon ment, that (like the New Deal itself) enthusi­ people's prejudices, movements which were asm for the Townsends, the Coughlins, and taking away (at least for the short run) the the Longs was a transitional stage from rigid potential constituency of a genuinely radical capitalist orthodoxy to production-for-use— and rational production-for-use movement. that it was too much for the people to make These movements, he argued, led by such men the transition all at once.*^ as Senator Huey Long, Dr. Francis Townsend, and Father Charles Coughlin, with their stress 'HE KEYNOTE of Amlie's edu­ on gimmicks, easy cures, and funny money, cational campaign at mid-decade would be dangerous if they gained strength was "abundance." He tried to make the issue on their own terms. Their economic plans one of abundance versus scarcity, the poten­ were ill-conceived and wholly inadequate to tial abundance of America's productive facili­ the crisis. They contained elements of racial- ties versus the waste and idleness of those religious prejudice and dictatorship. The productive facilities under the profit system, funny money vogue among farmers (who as the abundance of a planned production-for- debtors would benefit from currency expan­ use system versus the "artificial scarcity" of sion) was anathema to labor (which would the New Deal's recovery program. In the suffer from inflation), and would thus drive abundance idea Amlie thought he had a a wedge through the necessary farmer-labor theme which in its simplicity and reasonable­ basis of any genuine and viable radical move­ ness could capture the imagination and votes ment.*^ of a depression-ridden people; a theme that But Amlie also saw hope in such move­ could capitalize on the very absurdity of the ments. In his travels he noted how farmers Depression, the paradox of poverty in the were imbued with funny money doctrines, but midst of plenty, of factories idle and farms suggested that "they accept the funny money unsown while people were in want; a theme viewpoint for the simple reason, that nothing that could be presented graphically rather better is offered them."*'' Men like Father than abstractly, that could appeal to people Coughlin were the farmers' heroes, but this as people across class lines, that could attune was because "these men . . . stand out in the itself to America's technic-factual bent, withal farmers' mind . . . [since] they have dared a theme that could work both economically to challenge the old order. . . ."*^ The upshot and politically.^" As he explained it early in was that the funny money and panacea move-

"Amlie to Thomas H. Wright, February 27, 1935; W. Lermond, May 4, 1934; to Rudolph Tapovatz, to David H. Delhi, March 14, 1935; to Sam Sigman, November 13, 1934; to E. J. Lawson, December 21, March 14, 1935; to Harold Gilbert, March 18, 1935; 1934, all in the Amlie Papers. to Norman Thomas, April 23, 1935; to D. D. Alder­ " Amlie to Horace Fries, June 19, July 28, 1934; to dyce, November 3, 1935; to C. D. Mason, January 3, Walter A. Morton, July 11, 1934; to Samuel Sigraan, 1936; to George H. Reeder, February 8, 1936, all in July 23, 1934; to Selden Rodman, August 17, 1934; the Amlie Papers. to Vernon Lawrence, January 23, 1935; to Paul J. *'Amlie to O. L. Merritt, March 29, 1935; to Andrew Boyd, March 7, 1935; to Norman Thomas, April 23, J. Pohlman, April 18, 1935; to Harold Loeb, November 1935; to Alfred Bingham, July 17, 1935; to H. J. Kent, 1, 1935; to Joseph M, Mason, January 28, 1936; to October 8, 1935, all in the Amlie Papers. Monroe M. Sweetland, February 29, 1936; to Albert "Amlie to Walter A. Morton, July 11, 1934, in the Keesey, May 25, 1936; to J. Jacob Tschudy, July 28, Amlie Papers. 1936; to Will Everett, August 31, 1936; to Aubrey ^^Amhe to Horace Fries, June 19, 1934, in the Amlie Williams, September 28, 1936; 1935 manuscript, all in Papers. the Amlie Papers.

25 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY AUTUMN, 1974

1935, "we should stress this idea [of abun­ in the 1936 election and to triumph by 1940. dance] and let the implication of social owner­ A beginning, he insisted, must be made; to ship, control and operation follow afterwards. support Roosevelt would solve nothing. Huey Long is getting by simply because he When the New Deal broke down it was vital has taken over the appeal of potential abun­ that radicals have an alternative program to dance although he denies the necessary con­ which voters could turn.^^ Amlie, however, comitants."2* The strategy was to emphasize here faced a traditional radical dilemma—how that part of the case which could be most to respond to reforms which were socially easily sold—abundance—and de-emphasize the beneficial but which would make fundamental necessary means, as Amlie saw them, to changes politically more difficult. He ex­ achieve that abundance, the unorthodoxies of pressed support for the Wagner Act in 1935, national planning and public ownership. for example, but added, "It is quite possible This, like the New Deal and the various pana­ that the defeat of the Wagner bill would be ceas, would facilitate the process of transition a blessing in disguise to the wage earners by from the old system to the new. placing them definitely in a national political But the problem here was just what the movement of their own. . . ."^^ Yet he now appeal of Huey Long showed it to be: every­ accepted the reality of a gradual approach, one could call for an economy of abundance. and generalized that if a "piece of legisla­ Socialists could call for it; conservatives could tion ... is distinctly the best that can be call for it; even New Dealers, whose scarcity achieved, and if it . . . moves in the right economics was the target of the attacks, could direction, it ought to be supported."^^ Such call for abundance as their ultimate goal as limited measures would not solve the eco­ distinct from their "emergency" programs of nomic problem, but they could be useful for production restriction. The fact was that transitional purposes. He was now "willing abundance, like the often-heard call for a to favor a good deal of Socialist gradualism "balanced" economy, had no necessary ideo­ . . . because of its educational effect on logical anchor. As Alfred M. Bingham, editor public thought."2^ of the journal Common Sense and Amlie's Amlie had suggested in 1935, when Presi­ good friend and collaborator during these dent Roosevelt spoke of the "recent depres­ years, put it in May, 1936, "I feel there will sion" and wrote his famous "breathing spell" be a particular difficulty in our position in letter, that the New Deal was moving to the view of the Republicans' increasing emphasis right, thereby opening the way for a radical on . . . [New Deal] non-production and plow­ movement of the left.^'^ In this, of course, he ing under. Hoover is becoming the apostle of underestimated FDR's flexibility and maneu­ the economy of abundance I"^^ And the con­ verability. And in the end, in the election servative prophets of abundance seemingly year of 1936, the New Deal and Roosevelt had as good a case as Amlie: capitalism, after absorbed the radicals' potential constituency. all, had been associated before 1929 with the Labor, for example, reveled in the Wagner highest standard of living ever known to man. Act, and Amlie considered the formation of Abundance was thus a popular keynote, but it was not to the American people a necessar­ ^.'Vmlie to J. B. Irvine, September 20, 1935; to ily radical one; the need was to sell the Amer­ Floyd B. Olson, January 27, 30, 1936; to Oliver Carlson, February 6, 1936; to Henry G. Teigan, February 18, ican people on its implications, on the pro­ 1936; to William T. Evjue, June 2, 1936, all in the grams necessary to achieve abundance—and Amlie Papers; Amlie, "The American Commonwealth that was the rub. Federation," 7; Amlie, Forgotten Man's Handbook, 127-128. Amlie remained hopeful through 1935 and =" Amlie to Rae F. Bell, May 13, 1935, in the Amlie into 1936 that native American radicalism in Papers. the form of a third party could become suffi­ ''^ Amlie to William H. Sommers, April 8, 1935, in ciently popular to make a significant showing the Amlie Papers. ^ Amlie to Henry Pratt Fairchild, January 23, 1935, "Amlie to Thomas H. Wright, February 27, 1935, in the Amlie Papers. in the Amlie Papers. ^'AmUe to C. E. Stead, October 3, 1936 [1935]; see == Alfred M. Bingham to Amlie, May 21, 1936, in also Amlie to Herbert S. Roswell, March 18, 1935, both the Amlie Papers. in the Amlie Papers. 26 ROSENOF: THOMAS R. AMLIE

Labor's Non-Parti&an League to back Roose­ American people were not yet ready even for velt for re-election the coup de grace to any a radicalism presented factually and in terms viable radical third party effort.^^ The New of the American idiom, that far more limited Deal brought a measure of recovery, though programs were the only politically feasible it did not, as Amlie insisted it could not, truly ones. He thus decided to devote his time to restore prosperity: millions remained unem­ Congressional activity rather than to the third- ployed. But while its programs proved eco­ party movement. The ultimate goal remained nomically inadequate, they also proved po­ the same—the co-operative commonwealth; litically potent. The New Deal appealed to but the political strategy now changed. Most special interest groups as special interest of his attention during this period was de­ groups, and it gave them what they wanted; voted to the Industrial Expansion Act, a plan the New Deal's programs were palliatives but based upon the proposals of Mordecai Ezekiel they also filled pocketbooks. Nineteen thirty- of the Department of Agriculture, which he six was thus a pivotal year: it established cosponsored with three left-wing Democrats, Roosevelt as the leader of the politically sig­ Maury Maverick of Texas, Jerry Voorhis of nificant left; it smashed any hopes for a truly California, and Robert G. Allen of Pennsyl­ radical, production-for-use party; and it left vania. The Act, which never came close to men like Amlie little choice but to try to passage in an era increasingly distrustful of move the New Deal leftward more or less from "planning," called for an "AAA in reverse," within. for machinery to bring about voluntary agree­ By 1937-1938, despite the recession that ments in major industries to provide for co­ broke in the summer of 1937, the American ordinated production increases, with co-op­ economy and psyche had stabilized. The eco­ erating businesses guaranteed against loss, and nomic stabilization came with the nation's with a planned division of the income result­ productive plant being used at far less than ing from increased production. It illustrated full capacity; the social-psychological stabiliza­ both continuity and change in Amlie's think­ tion came with millions still out of work. The ing and political education: continuity be­ panic of 1933, which had joined the com­ cause it was geared to plan for abundance and munity together in fear of the common crisis, because it was designed (as he saw it) to be had long since receded; established verities transitional; change because it was far less shaken but (as Amlie knew all too well) never drastic than the proposals which he thought really cast aside during the early and mid- could be sold to the American people in 1933- thirties now returned in force. Those with 1936. jobs grew more and more impatient with The fundamental reality of 1937-1938, Am­ those on relief; they grew more and more lie argued, was the fact that the 80 per cent of weary with the plight of the poor, the un­ the people "within the system," whether they employed, the downtrodden. A key and per­ were businessmen, farmers, or union workers, sisting problem of American democracy—how were divided from the 20 per cent of the peo­ in a democratic country, when most people ple outside the system. The division was not are satisfied with their lot, can the problem between classes but between "insider" and of social injustice toward a minority be "outcast"; and those within were no longer solved—surfaced once again, even though the willing to support those without. The requi­ Depression remained, and even though the site was a program which could meet the needs recession came. The mood of the nation had of those outside the system, yet gain the sup­ grown more conservative, the cataclysmic port of most of those within. Amlie thought mood of 1933 now seemed surrealistic, the he had found such a plan in the Industrial Ex­ constructive hopes of 1934-1936 now seemed pansion Act. It would not involve public own­ too ambitious, the plans and programs of erst­ ership or production-for-use or other concepts while radicals now became more modest. beyond the American ideological pale; it Amlie in this setting concluded that the would use the symbols and devices that the New Deal had already sold to the American ^ Amlie to Richard Neuberger, April 16, 1936; to Howard Y. Williams, April 16, 1936; to Alfred M. people to promote economic scarcity, but use Bingham, July 3, 1936, all in the Amlie Papers. them to promote economic abundance; it

27 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY AUTUMN, 1974 would not seek support from the majority to Industrial Expansion Act, limited as it was, succor a minority outside the system but would Amlie hoped, would prove not only politically rather seek to integrate that minority back feasible but also would be a long step down into the system through jobs made possible the road to the co-operative commonwealth.^^ by increased production. And once Ameri­ In a more narrowly political realm, Amlie cans had achieved full production, Amlie still looked forward to a realignment. He hoped, through a plan wherein the govern­ hoped that events would place conservatives ment and not the entrepreneur was the risk in one party, and New Dealers, progressives, taker, they would never again allow them­ and liberals in another—whether a New Deal- selves to be returned to an economy of scarci­ ized Democratic party or a new third party.^" ty, nor would they choose indefinitely to sub­ But in his quest for political realignment, sidize entrepreneurs who took no risks. The Amlie, unlike most liberals and radicals, re­ sponded favorably in 1938 to Governor Philip F. La Follette's attempt to establish a third party, the National Progressives of America. While many were repelled by the rather mid­ dle-of-the-road stance taken by the governor, by the break with Roosevelt and the New Deal, and by the allegedly fascistic trappings of the new organization, Amlie took a more moderate approach. He granted that La Follette presented no definite program, yet he was impressed by Phil's emphasis on the need for an economy of abundance as against the New Deal's scarcity economics—a message he himself had been preaching for years—and he was hopeful that this would lead the gov­ ernor to the Industrial Expansion Act. At the very least, he hoped, the La Follette chal­ lenge might cause Roosevelt to abandon scarcity economics and turn to measures geared to bring about full production.^* The NPA, of course, died aborning. La Follette went down to a smashing defeat in his home state of Wisconsin in 1938. Amlie thereafter turned to the Democratic party as

=» Amlie to Will Everett, April 27, 1937; to E. A. Mitchell, July 6, 1937; to W. E. Zeuch, December 3, 1937; to Albert Petzen, January 21, 1938; to Harry A. Sugden, March 17, 1938; to Ernest E. Spenle, March 31, 1938; to J. P. Schroeter, April 4, 1938; to Aubrey Williams, April 26, 1938; to W. G. Peters, August 10, 1938; 1937 manuscript, all in the Amlie Papers; Thomas R. Amlie, "The Answer to Fascism," in Common Sense, VI: 8-10 (August, 1937). =" Amlie to Byron G. Carney, April 5, 1937; to W. H. Schleck, August 12, 1937; to Howard Y. Williams, August 30, 1937; to Harry W. Laidler, December 1, 1937; to Alfred M. Bingham, June 17, 1938; Congres­ sional News Letter, March 28, 1938, all in the Amlie Society's Iconographic Collections Papers. '1 Amlie to Aubrey Williams, April 26, 1938; to Depression era picture of a woman on the rear porch Oscar Ameringer, May 9, 1938; to Henry P. Fairchild, of an Appalachian shack, from Amlie's personal files. May 27, 1938, all in the Amlie Papers. 28 ROSENOF: THOMAS R. AMLIE the party for liberals. To continue third restored full prosperity; war did that, as Am­ party efforts, he now held, would only split lie said war could. The economy of abun­ the reformist vote and elect conservatives; dance came not with the national economic he now endeavored in Wisconsin and Minne­ planning of a co-operative commonwealth but sota to persuade those in the Progressive and with the national economic planning of a Farmer-Labor parties to join the New Deal world war—followed by a cold war. Democrats.^2 Political realities, not a change Amlie's appeal to people as people, to in ideology, had made him a liberal, a New America as a psychologically classless nation, Dealer, and a Democrat. Such was the culm­ had its problems. To be sure, European rad­ ination of his decade-long political education. ical rhetoric had no place in American politic­ al reality; yet in the depression-ridden thirties men did tend to think of themselves in terms of their economic roles; farmers were pre­ MLIE'S experience is suggestive occupied with their plight as farmers, work­ A', abou t America: about the pro­ ers were preoccupied with their plight as work­ cesses of change in the nation, about political ers. The New Dealers gave the farmers an realities and economic needs, about the ten­ AAA; they gave the workers a Wagner Act; acity of traditional ideology. Ironically and in so doing they undercut the political enough, in view of his failure as a national viability of American radicalism. Amlie was political leader, in view of his failure to quite aware of the popularity of immediate make radicalism a viable political force, Amlie reforms geared to group interests, but there may well have been right about the social and was an economic rationale for his position as economic character of America in some basic well as a social-psychological one. The prob­ essentials. He never thought that change lem was that the specific farmer-labor de­ would come easily to Americans (except per­ mands alone would not resolve the Depres­ haps briefly in 1933). He was ever aware of sion. He noted in 1934 that "it would be the gap between popular thought and eco­ easy to prepare a program that would contain nomic reality, and this was the dominant con­ something that would appeal to all of these cern, problem, and motif of his political edu­ . . . groups. . . . On such a program, we would cation. He continually focused on the key have no trouble in getting elected. . . . But difficulty: how to rally the great majority of after we get elected to office, what then?"^'' Americans politically against the few at the "I realize that we could make a better show­ top in a country in which the Horatio Alger ing at the polls in the next election," he ethos remained strong—and the many con­ added in 1935, "if we were to follow a re­ tinued to believe that they, too, could one formist program of higher income taxes, great­ day be the few. He wrote in 1938 that "peo­ er relief benefits, etc., but . . . such a program ple very largely forget what happened five would be completely ineffective in the face or six years ago, because they want to forget of a contracting world economy."^^ The it. They still remember the charm of the dilemma of the decade thus remained: the boom period in the 20's. . . ."^^ And in the political solution was not economically viable, end, a war boom, as Amlie had feared, brought and the economic solution was not politically in its wake an even fuller return to the old viable. verities; prosperity renewed faith in the op­ Yet in the context of 1933-1934 the situa­ portunities and openness of the free enterprise tion had not yet stabilized, the nation was in system, albeit the prosperity of world war. a state of uncertainty and flux. If ever there Economically, too, Amlie may have been es­ was a chance in America to "sell" a radical sentially right. The New Deal, after all, never program it was during those years. And the

'"'Amlie to Benjamin Sonnenberg, November 19, 1941; to Paul J. Bringe (ca. June, 1942), both in the "Amlie to D. D. Alderdyce, March 6, 1934, in the Amlie Papers. Amlie Papers. '''Amhe to Aubrey Williams, November 13, 1938, in •''° May 18, 1935 speech manuscript, in the Amlie the Amlie Papers. Papers.

29 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY AUTUMN, 1974 problem may not have been so much the stood steadfastly by the nation's political tra­ overall nature of Amlie's appeal—if radical­ dition—democracy, constitutionalism, civil ism ever could be sold in America it would liberties. America is an anomaly to those who have to be sold in terms of the American think in terms of inclusive social "system.s." idiom, American values, and American tradi­ Is America essentially a capitalist nation, in tions—as in who made the appeal. If Roose­ which "democracy" is more or less a facade? velt and his New Dealers had moved left in Or is it both capitalist and democratic, not 1933-1934, if they had called for public own­ a monolith but a joining together of two in­ ership in terms of the American idiom, if congruous forces which to many yet seem com­ they had called for an economy of abundance patible and intertwined? The New Dealers in through production-for-use, if they had com­ 1933 renewed capitalism in the name of de­ bined their specific programs with a sche­ mocracy and liberty; Amlie in the same year matic economic plan, the result might have prepared to set aside civil liberties in the been different. 'The New Dealers, after all, name of a new noncapitalist social order of shared in basic essentials the radicals' Depres­ justice and equity. At mid-decade Amlie's sion analysis: the maldistribution of wealth, radicalism was fully in the democratic tradi­ both agreed, lay at the core of the crisis. The tion, but by that time the epochal mood of difference lay in the New Dealers' dogmatical­ 1933 had passed. Capitalism had survived the ly limited solutions. The problem thus was crisis—but so had political liberty. not only one of the radicals' political failure but also of the New Dealers' ideological fail­ ure—given the New Dealers' own basic values and analyses.^^ And yet there was a further *• For an elaboration of this point, see Theodore Rosenof, "Roads to Recovery: The Economic Ideas factor: while the New Dealers failed to tran­ of American Political Leaders, 1933-1938" (Ph.D. scend America's economic tradition, they also dissertation, University of Wisconsin, 1970), passim.

Society's Iconographic Collections A 1936 photograph of an elderly Atlantic City couple living on public relief, from Amlie's personal files.

30 The Ku Klux Klan in Madison, 1922-1927

A Wisconsin Klan member's button, from the Society's Collections. By Robert A. Goldberg

|N THANKSGIVING night, Depressed by the Klan's slow growth, Sim­ 0 1915, William Joseph Simmons, mons turned for help in promoting the order a former fraternal organizer and ex-Methodist to E. Y. Clarke and Mrs. Elizabeth Tyler of circuit rider, led sixteen men to the summit the Atlanta-based Southern Publicity Asso­ of Stone Mountain in Georgia. There, under ciation, who on June 7, 1920, signed a con­ a fluttering American flag and a burning tract with Simmons, stipulating that the Asso­ wooden cross, the group knelt and proclaimed ciation would propagate and enlarge the Klan. its allegiance to the revived Ku Klux Klan. In order to conduct the membership drive, The inspiration for this event Simmons the Association ceased all non-Klan activities traced to a vision he experienced upon his and became the Propagation Department of return from the Spanish-American War. Look­ the Invisible Empire. Clarke and Tyler en­ ing up at the sky one day, he had seen the listed more than 200 organizers, or kleagles, clouds transform themselves into charging and directed them to exploit any issue or white-robed horsemen, which he interpreted prejudice that could be useful in recruiting as a sign from God to re-create the Invisible men for the movement. The kleagles worked Empire of the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan. on a commission basis, and thus sought to However, unlike its predecessor of the Re­ secure as many new members for the Klan as construction period, this Klan was not con­ they possibly could. The sharp rise in the fined to one section of the nation, nor was it secret order's membership reflected their suc­ primarily white supremacist. Instead, the cess, for between June, 1920, and October, Klan of the 1920's posed as a defender of 1921, 90,000 to 100,000 men became Klans- Americanism and Protestantism against their men.* supposed detractors—Catholics, Jews, blacks, When representatives of the Ku Klux Klan radicals, immigrants, bootleggers, and evolu­ first entered a state, they established a net­ tionists. Perhaps as many as five million men work of provisional Klan chapters, over which throughout the United States responded to the Klan Propagation Department in Atlanta the many-sided program expounded by its re­ exercised strict control. In order to organize cruiters, but despite the size and importance a state fully, the Propagation Department ap­ of the organization, its character is still largely pointed an individual from a previously or- shrouded in mystery. In its first five years the Ku Klux Klan ^ Charles C. Alexander, The Ku Klux Klan in the grew slowly. By 1920 the Invisible Empire Southwest (Lexington, Kentucky, 1966), 6-8; Henry P. Fry, The Modern Ku Klux Klan (Boston, 1922), 39; consisted of only 5,000 to 6,000 men in scat­ Kenneth T. Jackson, The Ku Klux Klan in the City, tered Klans throughout Georgia and Alabama. 1915-1930 (New York, 1967), 10.

31 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY AUTUMN, 1974 ganized state to the position of King Kleagle. city never developed much heavy industry, it This official then hired his own kleagles to was characterized by a diversified group of travel all over the new state, or realm, to small factories requiring skilled labor. In­ recruit members and to establish Klans. Of deed, manufacturing accounted for nearly a the ten-dollar initiation fee, or klectoken, the third of the total employment.* kleagle received four dollars; the national Between 1910 and 1920 the population of headquarters, five dollars; and the king klea­ Madison increased by 50 per cent, to over gle, one dollar. The king kleagle and all 38,000 persons. A similar high rate of growth of his organizers were responsible solely to continued throughout the 1920's, reaching the Propagation Department. The provision­ 56,000 persons by 1930. The inhabitants were al organization system continued until the predominantly white and Protestant. In 1920 Klans satisfied their membership quotas and there were only 259 blacks in the community received charters. After that, the national or­ and in 1926 only 1,000 Jews. The number of ganization and the king kleagle had much Roman Catholics had risen from 6,641 in 1916 less power over a chartered Klan; for example, to 10,250 in 1926, thus constituting slightly most of the money gained from initiation fees less than 25 per cent of the population. The remained in the hands of the chartered local city was, for the most part, ethnically and chapter.2 culturally homogeneous, and the vast majority In 1920 the Propagation Department, in of recent immigrants possessed a cultural response to a request from a group of Mil­ background closely resembling that of the waukee men, appointed a king kleagle to or­ native-born population.^ ganize Wisconsin. That fall, several individ­ Madisonians enjoyed a rich cultural, intel­ uals met secretly aboard the Coast Guard lectual, and social life. Residents could choose cutter Hawk anchored in the Milwaukee among three daily, two weekly, and thirteen River. At this meeting they agreed to form monthly newspapers published locally. Con­ Milwaukee Provisional Klan #1. Because of certs, lectures, plays, and movies were numer­ the king kleagle's failure to expand the or­ ous. The University as well as Madison's ganization beyond Milwaukee and its suburbs, three literary societies enabled men and wo­ the department replaced him in the summer men to pursue their interests in the arts. of 1921 with William Wieseman. During his Madison was also a city of lodges and clubs. reign the Ku Klux Klan spread into every More than thirty secret, patriotic, benevolent, county in Wisconsin.^ religious, or ethnic organizations served to supplement the daily activities of the town's citizens.^ ADISON, the state's capital, On August 26, 1921, an unusual want ad M was an early target for Wiese- appeared in the classified section of a Madi­ man's kleagles. During the 1920's Madison son newspaper, the Wisconsin State Journal. was not only the site of the Wisconsin state It read, "Wanted: Fraternal Organizers, men government and its many bureaus and agen­ of ability between the ages of 25 and 40. Must cies, but also the home of the University of Wisconsin, which drew to the city a student body from all over the United States and *John W. Alexander, An Economic Base Study of Madison, Wisconsin (Wisconsin Commerce Papers, vol. from many foreign countries. Although the I, Madison, 1953), 69. " Kimball Young, John Lewis Gillin, and Calvert L. Dedrick, The Madison Community (Madison, 1934), = Norman F. Weaver, "The Knights of the Ku Klux 25; U.S., Department of Commerce, Bureau of the Klan in Wisconsin, Indiana, Ohio, and Michigan" Census, Fourteenth Census of the United States, 1920: (Ph.D. dissertation. University of Wisconsin, 1954), 53- Population, III: 1131; U.S., Department of Commerce, 54; R. G. Lynch, "The Ku Klux Klan in Wisconsin" Bureau of the Census, Fifteenth Census of the United (series of articles), Milwaukee Journal, April 9, 1928; States, 1930: Population, III: 1333; U.S., Department Wisconsin, Attorney General, closed case file j{(A6469, of Commerce, Bureau of the Census, Census of Re­ State of Wisconsin v. Knights of the Ku Klux Klan of ligious Bodies: 1916, I: 436; U.S., Department of Com­ Wisconsin, series 4/0/31, in Archives-Manuscripts Di­ merce, Bureau of the Census, Census of Religious vision, State Historical Society of Wisconsin. Bodies: 1926, I: 463. ^Milwaukee Journal, April 9, 1928. "Madison City Directory, 1925, pp. 109, 112-115. 32 GOLDBERG: MADISON KU KLUX KLAN

had spawned the doctrine of Bolshevism. Moreover, since the Jews did not believe in Justice the divinity of Christ they could never become eligible for membership. The kleagle did little more than distribute Klan literature to inter­ ested Madisonians and left the city shortly after his arrival.^ The Wisconsin State Journal immediately 0 ^0 a 9 voiced its disapproval of the organization. » $3 I It called upon all Madisonians to consider carefully the claims of the Klan before join­ ing, then pointedly asked, "Do we want here 3 i 'an invisible empire,' the very name of which 1 -•« means that it is a force above and beyond the I ^ *^ law, for the authority of which as it sees fit a it substitutes its own will?"*" The Masons were angry because of the statement, "Masons Preferred," in the Klan's newspaper advertise­ ment. In the words of Charles E. Whelan, the former Grand Master of Madison's Masons, Liberty the ad was an "insidious effort to prostitute the institution of Masonry to a movement en­ I tirely out of line with its principles. . . ."** William T. Evjue Collection, SHSW Almost a year later, in July, 1922, F. S. A KKK automobile or window sticker. Webster registered at the Monona Hotel in Madison. King Kleagle Wieseman had ap­ be 100% Americans. Masons Preferred."''' pointed Webster, a resident of Chicago, as Many Madisonians probably never saw the chief organizer for the Klan in Dane County. ad; others who read it perhaps thought it For the next three months Webster conducted innocuous. But some understood its meaning. a secret recruiting drive from his hotel room. A kleagle of the Ku Klux Klan was in their By early fall he had organized a Madison city recruiting men to organize Madison and Klan under the title, "The Loyal Business­ Dane County for the Invisible Empire. On men's Society." The society held weekly meet­ September 3 the kleagle spoke in Madison ings in the Woodmen of the World Hall on and outlined several of the Klan's objectives— Main Street in downtown Madison. In order the promotion of Anglo-Saxon Protestant to prevent detection, the Klan used a chain solidarity, the maintenance of law and order system for sending messages. If, for example, and white supremacy, the protection of Amer­ Webster desired to inform the membership ican womanhood, and the extension of justice of a change in activities, he telephoned one and liberty to all men. The recruiter de­ Klansman. That Klansman would then call scribed the Invisible Empire as nothing more three others. They in turn would each inform than "a high, close, mystic, social, patriotic, three more. The men repeated this procedure benevolent association having a perfected until they had notified all of the members of lodge system."* Catholics and Jews could not Madison's Klan of the change in activities. become Knights of the Invisible Empire: Cath­ The Klan succeeded in maintaining its secre­ olics because their allegiance to the Pope made cy through September, 1922, and few Madi­ it impossible for them to profess sincerely the sonians were even faintly aware of its pres­ ideals of 100 Per Cent Americanism; Jews be­ ence.*^ cause they constituted an unassimilable racial group whose members, according to the Klan, I Ibid. •"Ibid. 'Wisconsin State Journal, August 26, 1921. •^Ibid., October 18, 1921. 'Ibid., September 4, 1921. ''Capital Times, October 10, II, 1922.

33 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY AUTUMN, 1974

In early October Madison Provisional Klan ever, an important feature of the Klan's city #7 publicly proclaimed its existence. Webster program. One man, whom a Madison police informed the Capital Times that it had se­ officer attempted to recruit for the Klan, cretly inidated 800 men into the Invisible emphasized that "they were not so much Empire. "We have," he said, "members of against Catholics as they were for white su­ the Ku Klux Klan in every important place premacy and America for Americans."*^ The in the city. We have members among city Madison organization never boycotted Jewish and county officials. They are also in the or Catholic businessmen, nor did its Klansmen state capitol. We have them in the schools."*^ ever burn any crosses before Jewish synagogues This was not an entirely empty boast, since or Catholic churches. One Klan lecturer said, William McCormick, a former chief of police "We have no quarrel with any man because detectives, recalls that "pretty near all the of his religion. We do not care how a man men in the department were Klansmen."** worships God. But the Klan stands for mili­ On October 12, two days after the Klan's tant Protestantism."** initial announcement, the kleagle divulged The Ku Klux Klan beckoned the lodge- plans for a future outdoor, white-robed in­ joiners by providing the fellowship, festivity, itiation and demonstration at which he claim­ and mystery that these men craved. Its elabo­ ed over 900 men formally would swear al­ rate and secret rituals, unusual garb, and legiance to the Klan. This figure included charity work made it appear like any other 100 men who had joined the organization in fraternal order; and its picnics, dances, barbe­ the previous two days. Later, Webster asked cues, and outdoor initiations were major so­ Madison's Mayor I. Milo Kittleson for per­ cial events attended by the entire family. mission to bring Klan lecturers to the city. These activities served not only to entertain The mayor replied, "If they are as they set Klansmen and their families but also to at­ forth, I see no reason in the world why they tract new members.*^ should not be given the same consideration as any other organization."*^ PROBABLY the Klan's most ef­ Madisonians joined the Klan for a variety fective lure was its promise to of reasons. Some, attracted by the patriotic "clean up" Madison and, in particular. Little image of the organization, were sincere in Italy. Also referred to as "Greenbush" or their belief that America's institutions and more commonly "the Bush," Little Italy was values were in danger. The Klan was, these culturally and ethnically distinct from the men felt, a vehicle by which the doctrines of rest of the city. Triangular in shape, it was 100 Per Cent Americanism could be strength­ bounded roughly by West Washington Ave­ ened and extended. The Wisconsin Klan nue, South Park Street, and Regent Street. pledged in its Articles of Incorporation "to Within this area lived most of Madison's 484 conserve, protect, and maintain the distinctive Italians, the largest unassimilated nationality institutions, rights, privileges, principles, tra­ group in the city. The first significantly large ditions, and ideals of pure Americanism."*^ group of Italians to arrive in Madison were Others believed that the Klan would unite construction laborers who helped erect the all Protestants under a single banner and re­ State Historical Society building at the turn store faith in God and in the supremacy of of the century and later the state capitol the Bible. Kleagle Webster also appealed to building. As the years passed more Italians anti-Catholic and anti-Jewish prejudices. Spe­ settled in the city, mainly in the Bush, where cifically, Webster promised prospective mem­ they clustered together and perpetuated their bers that the Klan would eliminate "Catholic control" over the city's government and school " Personal interview, Madison, June 4, 1973. system. Religious intolerance was not, how- ^"Milwaukee Journal, April 8, 1928; Weaver, "The Knights of the Ku Klux Klan," 73; Capital Times, "76id., October 12, 1922. November 24, 1922; Milwaukee Journal, September 20, " Interview with William McCormick, Madison, No­ 1923. vember 18, 1973; Capital Times, October II, 1922. "Weaver, "The Knights of the Ku Klux Klan," 43, '^Capital Times, October 11, 12, 1922. 50; Fry, The Modern Ku Klux Klan, 35; Milwaukee "Wisconsin, Attorney General, File #A6469. Journal, April 8, 1928. 34 ©

CD^£ J«*

Ptioto by John Newhou Aerial view of Madison's Greenbush area, also known as "The Bush" or "Little Italy". Approxi­ mate boundaries were (1) West Washington and Regent streets; (2) Park and West Washington; (3) Regent and Park. Other landmarks included (4) the "Death Corner"; (5) Madison General Hospital: (6) Milwaukee Road tracks; and (7) Britlingham Park, known to many Italian- Americans as Columbus Park. traditional customs and institutions. Many Billeteri, and Frank Congelesi—as proof, and Madison residents developed suspicions about to the streets of the Italian section—Milton, this growing "alien presence."2" Regent, South Murray, Mound, Francis, and Madisonians were concerned about the South Lake—named in police and newspaper Italian community for other reasons also. reports as the sites of illegal liquor operations Little Italy was the production and distribu­ as further proof of their contentions. In 1923 tion center during Prohibition for the Madi­ and 1924 the number of liquor raids declined son and Dane County liquor trade. During sharply, but liquor was still easily obtainable. 1922 when Prohibition officers conducted In 1923 the police arrested over 470 men for numerous raids in Madison, many of the city's public drunkenness but arrested only ten men residents already believed that Italians were for selling intoxicating beverages. In the fol­ behind the widespread violation of the liquor lowing year Prohibition agents seemed to con­ laws. They pointed to the names of those duct raids only in response to increased pub­ arrested—Tony Lamonico, Peter Valenti, Joe lic agitation; as the agitation decreased, so '^ Frederic G. Cassidy, Dane County Place-Names did the number of raids. Madisonians be­ (Madison, 1968), 66; Young et al.. The Madison Com­ came especially anxious about the situation munity, 31-32, 39; Weaver, "The Knights of the Ku when the police revealed that liquor was being Klux Klan," 79; Frank A. Gilmore, The City of Madi­ son (Madison, 1916), 54; Fourteenth Census of the sold to high school students. As the liquor United States, 1920: Population, III: 1136; Wisconsin traffic expanded, police officers complained State Journal, March 20, 1929. that the courts hampered their search and

35 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY AUTUMN, 1974 seizure procedures. Some charged that the ful to present itself as an organization of city's judges dealt too leniently with the boot­ aggrieved citizens, a militant Protestant and leggers. Madison's faith in its own police 100 Per Cent American fraternal order dedi­ force also declined during this period, espe­ cated to the eradication of crime and corrup­ cially in 1922 and 1923 when the department tion. Its stated objectives promised something charged six of its men with drinking on duty. for everyone, and it is probable that only a On May 6, 1924, the editor of the Capital few took out membership because of a single Times wrote, "Evidently moonshine is above feature of the Klan's program. the law here. Evidently this community is But in actuality the secret order's crusade willing to admit that its law enforcing offi­ for moral reform was narrow and restricted. cials cannot cope with the situation here."2* The real target of the Klansmen was the boot­ Little Italy was, in addition, afflicted with legger, who they believed to be the root of all a reputation for violence. According to one corruption in the city. Unlike Klans in some Madisonian, "You didn't dare walk down states, the Madison organization did not at­ through there. You couldn't even drive a car tack wife-beaters, adulterers, "neckers," or through there cause you might pick up a "petters." The rest of the Wisconsin Klans shot."22 Between 1913 and 1923 six men mirrored this stance. As one state Klan leader were killed in the Italian neighborhood; in said, "Sometimes women would want us to 1924 the total number of murdered men rose go against their husbands for drinking or to twelve. The newspapers believed that the running around with other women. We re­ six slain in 1924 were the victims of a "rum fused to do that."2^ war." The Capital Times told its readers that On October 13, 1922, F. S. Webster enun­ two rival Italian clans were battling for con­ ciated the goals of the local Klan. Klansmen trol of Little Italy's liquor trade. When a were determined, he said, to make Madison war erupted in an Italian community, the again a fit place in which to live. The or­ Times remarked, "one must choose between ganization was ready to lend its services to the three S's—schiopetto, stilleto, strada: the the mayor or the chief of police to accomplish rifle, the dagger, or flight."^^ The Madison this objective. Later in the year the Klan police proved ineffective in combating the announced formation of the Klavaliers, a violence or apprehending the murderers.^^ group which the kleagle described as a mili­ The city suffered from one other major tary unit trained to fight crime, fires, floods, social problem. In early 1924, a private in­ riots, and strikes. The commander of the vestigator announced to a shocked citizenry Klavaliers promised that the unit would serve his discovery of fifteen houses of prostitution. only in conjunction with and under the com­ Although the brothels were, for the most part, mand of the Madison Police Department. scattered around the city, six were located in However, the city's chief of police, Thomas the vicinity of Little Italy. Again the public Shaughnessy, rejected this offer of assistance. wondered why its police force had failed to Webster also vowed that the secret order suppress the activities of the city's criminal would protect Madison's public schools from elements.25 dangerous influences. In particular, the Klan Distrustful of their own police force and pledged to launch a crusade to strip school court system, some Madisonians turned to the textbooks of disparaging remarks about the KKK as the only force capable of driving the nation's past actions and leaders.^''' bootlegger, the prostitute, and the murderer Denunciation of the Invisible Empire fol­ from the community. And the Klan was care- lowed shortly. The Capital Times dedicated itself to a campaign to drive the Klan from ^ Capital Times, November 9, 13, December 14, 15, the city by exposing it to public view. At 22, 1922, January 2, 17, April 11, May 18, August 21, first it tried to make a joke of the order, but, October 31, December 31, 1923, March 13, April 17, as Klan strength increased, it assumed a more May 6, 1924. serious attitude, and for the next five years ^ Personal interview, Madison, June 4, 1973. '^Capital Times, March 24, 1924. '"Wisconsin, Attorney General, File |A6469. ^Ibid., March 17, October 16, December 2, 3, 1924. ^ Dawn (Chicago), December 9, 1922; Capital Times, ^Ibid., March 8, 10, 12, 14, 31, 1924. October 13, November 21, 22, 1922. 36 watched the Madison Klan closely. In regard to Klans in other states, the Capital Times executed an interesting tactic. It demonstrated a tendency to place news items concerning Klan brutality and corruption on page one while relegating articles dealing with violence against Klansmen to the back pages of its editions. The Wisconsin State Journal, Madi­ son's other newspaper, maintained that the Klan was weak and insignificant. The Journal hoped that by ignoring it, the hooded order would fall under its own weight. In addition to the Capital Times, the Elks, Madison's Federation of Labor, and several Catholic groups publicly opposed the Klan. However, a few local organizations withheld opposition until the Klan was in decline.^s The KKK received support from several of the city's leading citizens. One of them, the Reverend Norman B. Henderson, pastor of the First Baptist Church and president of the Lion's Club and Madison's Ministerial Union, delivered a sermon entitled, "Do We Need the Ku Klux Klan?" Dr. Henderson believed that the Klan was indispensable be­ cause it opposed narcotics, liquor, the white slave trade, organized gambling, and corrupt Society's Iconographic Collectio businessmen. He also felt that the Klan "was Italian stonecutters at work on the lions' heads above the best friend the negro in the south had."^^ the main entry to the State Historical Society building, Reverend Henderson did not elaborate on this 1899. curious remark. The Ku Klux Klan engaged in charity work These charity activities reflected the sincere in 1922. On November 16, it contributed |25 desire of most Klansmen to help their fellow- each to the Volunteers of America and to the man, and they also served as an effective pub­ African Methodist Episcopal Church, an offer lic relations device by creating a more favor­ which Webster said proved that the Klan was able opinion of the secret order and attracting not anti-black. The church evidently thought new members.^* otherwise, for the money was returned. In The Klan employed a number of other re­ December the Klansmen made three more cruiting techniques. Klansmen, for example, charity donadons totaling $150 to the Salva­ would speak with eligible co-workers and per­ tion Army, the Madison Empty Stocking sonal friends and try to enlist them. At least Fund, and the Volunteers of America. A note once Klansmen telephoned teachers in four delivered with each donation read, "As time of Madison's schools and inquired about their passes the people will learn the real purpose religion. Eight Protestant teachers subsequent­ of the Klan and when this time is reached ly received Klan literature in the mail. The there will no longer be a suspicion that the Klan reportedly recruited in the state capitol Klan is an anti or lawless organization."^^ building and on the campus of the University of Wisconsin. Dean S. H. Goodnight in­ formed the press that Klansmen had approach­ "^Capital Times, October 18, November 23, 1922, ed several faculty members and students. In August 24, December 4, 1923, May 6, 1924, December 31, 1926; Wisconsin State Journal, May 6, July 3, 1924. ^Dawn, December 2, 1922; Badger American (Mil­ ^ Wisconsin State Journal, November 19, 1923. waukee), January, 1924; Capital Times, November 16, ^"Capital Times, December 21, 1922. 17, 20, 23, December 21, 1922.

37 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY AUTUMN, 1974 fact, the Klan's Field Bulletin No. 32 ex­ structure, but it was never built. However, pressed the organization's intention of con­ membership continued to increase, and in trolling the campus. As a first step, it called the summer of 1923 Wisconsin's king kleagle for the establishment of a Klan fraternity at announced that the Madison Klan now con­ the university named Kappa Beta Lambda tained 2,500 men.5'' which stood for Klansmen Be Loyal. Klans­ men planned quietly to seize control of other groups and eventually make the university a iN MARCH 8, 1924, the Klan center for the promotion of Christianity, made its first public appear­ Americanism, and Klansmenship.^^ 0 ance. Twenty-five hooded and robed Klans­ The Klan lecture bureau also helped secure men assembled along the shore of Lake Men­ new members. The national organization sent dota to initiate several men. Before the group speakers to Madison, to expound on the sub­ departed it burned a wooden cross which jects of Americanism and militant Protestant­ drew a large crowd of curious spectators. Ten ism. One such lecturer. Dr. George Berry days later the Klansmen burned another cross Rutledge, was so highly regarded as a speaker which was visible from the downtown area. that in his honor the chapter canceled a Klan stickers began to appear on store win­ scheduled initiation and urged the members dows along Capitol Square and even on the to bring friends. "This lecture will make door of the governor's office, exhorting Madi­ converts and we want as many non-members sonians to join the Klan and to stand by the to hear it as possible."^* Klan speakers also public schools.^^ appeared before such organizations as the In May Klansmen staged a rally in a pas­ Madison Woman's Club, which in January, ture near Waunakee. As was the Klan's cus­ 1923, heard a lecturer claim that twenty-six tom, a wooden cross was set aflame. When of the nation's governors and 62 per cent of a townsman spied the burning cross and the members of Congress were Klansmen.^"* sounded the fire alarm, a crowd of 500 men To accelerate recruitment, Kleagle Webster responded and approached the field, some told prospective members late in 1922 that if shouting obscenities and jeering the Klans­ they joined immediately their initiation fee men. When the Kluxers tried to leave the would be only ten dollars. However, he in­ area, they found the exit routes blocked, and formed them that after 1,000 men had joined, the rally quickly became a brawl. The Klans­ future recruits would be required to pay $185. men eventually returned to their automobiles This policy was never put into effect, even and fled across open fields.-^* though by the end of 1922 the local chapter Nevertheless the Klan was undaunted by claimed a membership of 1,000.^^ the incident, which probably strengthened the The year 1923 was a quiet one for the determination of the membership to make Madison Klan, highlighted only by sporadic the order an important and influential part press releases. In March it announced plans of the community. Newspaper accounts of to form a female auxiliary. A Klan spokes­ the event portrayed the Klan as an innocent man claimed that over 1,000 white, Protestant victim of mob violence and undercut those women had expressed a desire to join the who contended that it was a lawless organiza­ order. Four months later the newspapers re­ tion of violent men. ported that Klansmen were busy collecting Throughout 1923 and 1924 Madison's funds for the construction of the first Ku Klux Klansmen participated in several statewide Klan temple in the state. Subsequently the Klan rallies and conventions. At a Racine Klan decided to issue stock to finance the '" Wisconsin State Journal, March 24, 1923; Badger ^"Capital Times, October 14, 17, 1922, January 17, American, April, June, July, 1923; Capital Times, 1923, April 18, July 25, November I, 1924; Weaver, July 30, 1923. "The Knights of the Ku Klux Klan," 87-88. '''Badger American, March, April, 1924; Capital *= Capital Times, August 23, 1923. Times, April 17, 18, 1924. =* Ibid., January 5, 1923. "" For two slightly different accounts of the incident ^'•Dawn, December 2, 1922; Capital Times, Novem­ in Waunakee see Wisconsin State Journal, May 17, ber 24, 1922. 1924; and Capital Times, May 17, 1924. The Knights of the Ku Klux Klan OF MILWAUKEE WISCONSIN

rally, for example, the Madison contingent Invite you, your family and friends to attend their first annual conducted initiation rites for 1,500 Wisconsin men, of whom almost 200 were Madisonians. Spring Festival E4 Entertainment The Madison Klavaliers also entertained by TO BE HELD AT performing an exercise in precision drill. The PLEASANT VALLEY PARK Wisconsin Klan held other meetings in Mil­ Milwaukee County, Formerly Shooting Park waukee, Cornell, Darien, and Ladysmith, and FLAG DAY, SAT., JUNE 14, 1924 on July 1, 1924, Madison was host to a kon- ONE P. M. TO MEDNIGHT—RAIN OR SHINE klave of the Dane, Green, Rock, Jefferson, To Reach Park, See Map and Instructions Below Sauk, Iowa, Grant, and Lafayette county Klan organizations. Over 2,000 Klansmen in full regalia gathered in a pasture just outside the city to initiate 250 men. A Klansman could not enter the field until he had shown his membership card and uttered a password to three separate sets of masked sentinels. The members of the order formed a large circle around a burning cross and an altar before •rtXtayiiMii»''n\yf. GUIDE WITH VLAG. iBII.F. froni Madison. HllhiriT <« which the initiates were ordered to kneel and (inut Kulh lo HithHi; ( Ihe City of mony completed, a Klan officer proclaimed,

"Mortal man cannot assume a more binding Music Mzuiy Other Features, Plenty of it the entire day. too numerous to menlion. If oath. . . . Always remember that to keep you cannot come early, come Lectures later—BUT COME- this oath means to you honor, happiness, and By excellent speakers. life, but to violate it means disgrace, dishonor, Dancing The Public is and death. . . ."^^ The Klan officer next In the big pavilion. Invited Refreshments poured purifying water on the shoulders, Plenty of eats and drinks. For further information address head, and heart of each man, to signify ac­ Admittance to Grounds 25c per person. Children free. Post Office Box 1042 ceptance by the secret order. Madison's first Parking space for automobiles. Milwaukee. Witconiin konklave concluded with the playing of hymns by a Klan band.'*" The konklave marked a climax for the Madison chapter. Soon after it, the first signs of internal strife and decline began to appear. C. B. Lewis, the new king kleagle of Wiscon­ sin, provoked dissension by removing Webster John Vetter Papers, SHS'Vi from his position in the Dane County organi­ Poster advertisirtg one of the numerous social occasions zation. According to some Klansmen, Web­ sponsored by the Milwaukee Klan in the 1920's. Others ster was replaced because he failed to obtain advertise Klan-sponsored showings of The Blrlh of a permission to stage a series of revival meetings Nation. on the campus of the University of Wisconsin. Others believed that Lewis fired Webster be­ tion's recruiting policy. The Wisconsin Klan, cause of the slow growth of the Klans in Dane Webster charged, sought quantity and not County. On August 16, Lewis announced the quality in membership. He accused Lewis o£ appointment of Joseph Jones as the new chief fostering a recruiting campaign whose main kleagle. He did not consult with local Klans­ principle was "God give us ten instead of men about Webster's removal or Jones's ap­ God give us men."'*! Two days later when pointment, and many were bitter about such dictatorial actions. Refusing to accept his ^Try, The Modern Ku Klux Klan, 89. dismissal passively, Webster mailed a letter *" Capital Times, June 28, July 1, 2, 1P24; Wisconsin State Journal, July 2, 1924; Badger American, July, to Madison's Klansmen claiming that Lewis 1924; Fry, The Modern Ku Klux Klan, 89-90. removed him for violating the state organiza- "•Capital Times, August 16, 1924.

39 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY AtJTUMN, 1974

Webster threatened to form his own Klan if It." Police protection was heavy, there were the king kleagle did not reinstate him, many no incidents, and after the parade Klansmen local Klansmen rallied to his cause. They attended initiation ceremonies for new mem­ were joined by other Klansmen upset about bers, then listened to speeches and songs and the monetary policy of the national organiza­ watched a fireworks display which ended early tion, which had failed to return any part of the next morning.*'' the ten-dollar initiation fee of the local Klan. On December 2, 1924, an unknown assailant Lewis was able to quell the insurrection by murdered Joseph Brusca, the fifth man to die explaining the reasons for Webster's removal of gunshot wounds in Little Italy in 1924. and clarifying the Klan's financial policies to On the following day Madison Patrolman a closed meeting of the Madison chapter. But Herbert Dreger was shot to death in the Italian the dispute hurt the Klan; some members left community near the intersection of Desmond the order never to return.*^ Court and South Murray Street at a spot Neither the inability to secure a university known as "death corner." The police arrested building nor the near mutiny delayed the Salvatori Di Martino and Frank Vitale for start of a Klan-sponsored religious revival in the Dreger murder, but the courts later ac­ August, 1924. The Reverend A. C. Rains- quitted both men of the charge. The Capital berger, who conducted the crusade under a Times demanded that something be done large tent in a field near Madison, hoped to about the crime situation: identify the Klan with Protestantism and thus Are YOU willing to accept the challenge or attract new members. Rainsberger delivered are you going to slip back into your rocking only two sermons, "The Gospel through the chair and your evening slippers and wait K.K.K." and "Christ, the Klansman's Criterion until the monster hits YOU in some way— of Character." The revival culminated in an a moonshine wrecked son, a ruined daugh­ open-air Klan rally featuring the initiation of ter, a murdered friend, diseased citizens, a those men the evangelist had recruited. Some debauched city?*^ of Madison's ministers attended the cere- The murder of Patrolman Dreger presented mony.'*^ the Klan with an opportunity to bolster its In September the new kleagle confirmed membership rolls at a time when its strength reports of renewed strife. Klansmen had to and prestige were declining. Fewer men had hold extra meetings each week in order to joined in 1924 and the order was suffering rebuild the order's finances and membership. financially. The state Klan provided proof By early October Jones felt that the Klan of the sickly condition of Madison's Provi­ had sufficiently replaced the losses suffered sional Klan |7 when in December, 1924, Wis­ as a result of the August revolt. To demon­ consin's Grand Dragon issued charters to the strate renewed Klan strength, he scheduled a more substantial local Klans, but denied one rally for October 4, 1924, and persuaded to the Madison chapter. Instead, it was linked Mayor Kittleson to grant a permit for a Klan with other local organizations to form the parade. After dark on October 4, almost 2,000 more viable Dane County Ku Klux Klan. Klansmen marched unmasked into the city, Klan leaders hoped to use this strategy to at­ through Little Italy, and around Capitol tract more men and, therefore, bring more Square. The marchers were orderly and well money into the order.*^ disciplined, each Klansman walking in silence More than 200 masked and robed Klansmen with his eyes straight ahead and paying no attended Dreger's funeral on December 5. The attention to the large crowds that lined the next day the Klan offered to aid the police streets. While the bulk of the marchers were in the "clean up" of Little Italy, and the members of the Dane County organization, Klan delegations from Milwaukee, Racine, "Ibid., August 6, 9, 15, 16, 18, 19, 1924. and Rockford also participated. Interspaced «>Ibid., August 16, 27, 30, 1924. between marching delegations were a Klan "Ibid., September 8, 20, 2S, 26, October 4, 6, 1924; fife and drum corps and several floats, one of Wisconsin State Journal, October 4, 5, 1924. which depicted a little red schoolhouse with ^'Capital Times, December 3, 1924. '^ Ibid,, January 3, 1925; Milwaukee Journal, April the slogan, "The Nation's Hope—Stand By 8, 1928. 40 GOLDBERG: MADISON KU KLUX KLAN

of the Police and Fire Commission, about Rist's investigation, and through Drew, Rist met Samuel Rahn, the secretary of the Dane County Ku Klux Klan. Kleagle Jones and Secretary Rahn saw their chance. They offered to aid Rist in collecting evidence for the pro­ posed raid, an offer which Rist gratefully accepted.** Rahn sent several men into Little Italy to buy liquor. They brought the bottles back to Klan headquarters and gave them to the mayor's special investigator, furnishing the evidence Rist needed to schedule a raid for December 20. To conduct the raid he needed thirty men, and again the Klan came to his aid. Rahn and two police officers, Lyman Mason and Taylor Gray, both of whom later revealed that they were members of the Klan, drew up a list of raiders. The mayor depu­ tized the thirty men without questioning their qualifications or affiliations. No one ever William T. Evjue Collection, SHSW informed the district attorney, the chief of C. B. Lewis, the Klan's Imperial Representative for police, or the state prohibition commissioner Wisconsin. about the proposed action. Under the direc­ tion of seven police officers, the raiders ar­ chief kleagle renewed this offer a week later. rested fifteen "of the most noted police char­ The Klansmen, Jones said, were ready if depu­ acters in Madison" for violation of the liquor tized to end crime in Madison, Little Italy, or laws. "Every place that we raided," said one the entire state. He assured the city that the special agent, "we got the goods on them. It Klan would not take the law into its own was a good thing because it cleaned the place hands but would act only upon the request of up a little bit."*9 the mayor or chief of police.'*^ Two days after the affair the Capital Times Shortly after the shootings. Mayor Kittleson accused the mayor of being duped by the Ku brought Fred Rist, a Milwaukee private de­ Klux Klan, alleging that the Klan had hired tective, to Madison to investigate the deaths Rist early in December to plan and direct the of Brusca and Dreger and to probe other raid. The mayor replied that he did not think criminal activities in Little Italy. Rist was that the raiders were Klansmen and refused to work in secret and was not to inform the to reveal the names of the men because he Madison Police Department of his investiga­ feared for their safety. The Women's Chris­ tion. The mayor believed that there was a tian Temperance Union, Madison's Woman's leak in the department and that it therefore Club, and the First Baptist Church all sup­ could not be trusted. While Rist spent the ported the mayor and expressed their approval next few days studying the details of the two of the anti-liquor operation.5" murders, worried Madisonians inundated the mayor's office with letters demanding a liquor raid on Little Italy. In order to ease the pub­ " Capital Times, December 5, 6, 13, 1924. •"* Fred J. Rist v. The Capital Times Company, a lic furor, Kittleson asked Rist to gather evi­ Corporation, Dane County Circuit Court, 1925. dence for such an operation. Rist happily *" Ibid.; Wisconsin Kourier (Milwaukee), December complied because he believed that the two 19, 1924, January 9, 1925; Milwaukee Sentinel, Decem­ dead men were casualties of Little Italy's rum ber 22, 23, 1924; Capital Times, December 22, 1924; war and that a liquor raid might possibly Wisconsin State Journal, December 21, 22, 1924; per­ sonal interview, Madison, June 4, 1973. furnish evidence relating to the murders. The '°° Capital Times, December 22, 24, 26, 29, 1924, mayor informed Dr. E. H. Drew, the chairman January 3, 5, 8, 1925.

41 g

hlNOMIA uxmv.s PPP**

--*%*^,''?#^

Klan homes in Wisconsin, copied from the program of the KKK State Convention held in Oshkosh. Note that the retoucher was unable to find room to insert a painted flag above the Milwaukee building. Mll.U.M hl-S

I \ I. f^

MIM HAI, l'(ll\T n vi; VHoo

William T. Evjue Collection, SHSW

'HE RAID temporarily checked August of that year the membership had the declining fortunes of the thinned to less than 1,000 men. Conflict and Dane County Klan, since the image of an un- dissension even infected the Klan's Women's corrupted law enforcement agency attracted Auxiliary. In May the Dane County branch new members. However, the revival was short­ of the women's Klan pleaded with its mem­ lived. The number of new membership ap­ bers to forget their grievances and return to plications was not large enough to offset the the fold." losses suffered by the order since August, 1924. At the beginning of 1925 there were only "1 Weaver, "The Knights of the Ku Klux Klan,' 142; 2,000 Klansmen in Dane County, and by Capital Times, May 5, August 13, 1925.

42 GOLDBERG: MADISON KU KLUX KLAN

As the number of sincere and decent Klans­ guilty of disorderly conduct and fined $25.00.^-'' men declined, the voices of religious intoler­ After 1925 the Klan virtually ceased to exist ance became more influential. In 1925 the in Madison, and a year later there were only only overt anti-Catholic incidents in the his­ scattered reports of Klan activity. In August, tory of the Madison chapter occurred. In 1926, the Klan attempted to refill its depleted January the Klan opposed a plan to vaccinate ranks, but recruitment efforts failed to bring school children against disease because the many new members into the organization. innoculations were to be administered in One of the last actions of the Ku Klux Klan Catholic parochial schools. The Klansmen in the capital city occurred on December 8, were afraid that Protestant youths would be 1926, when Madison's Klan leader, M. M. exposed to the "Vatican Virus" while await­ Shirk, asked the city's Board of Education for ing immunization. The newspapers, however, permission to present a patriotic play in one never reported that the children would be of the local high schools. The Board members sent to Catholic schools for vaccination, and denied Shirk's request. As the order languish­ children were innoculated in the schools which ed, several men formulated plans to bring a they regularly attended. Later in the month new patriotic society to Madison. On Febru­ the Klan charged that the Madison public ary 8, 1926, "Major General" Lew Wallace school system was dominated by "Romanists," McComb and "Major" William Dean an­ after the Board of Education refused to allow nounced that they were organizing a regiment it the use of a high school auditorium for a of the Minute Men of America, a society public meeting. The Dane County Klan's en­ established by a dissident faction of the Den­ dorsement of Edward Dithmar for the United ver, Colorado, Klan in 1925. Like the Ku States Senate also reflected anti-Catholic senti­ Klux Klan, it promised to support the public ment, since it urged members to vote for schools, to encourage the growth of patriotism, Dithmar, a 100 Per Cent American who op­ and to prevent lawlessness, but it did not, posed the "Rome Ring" that controlled Madi­ however, imitate the mode of attire of the son. The primary election in September pro­ Knights of the Invisible Empire. Instead of duced one final anti-Catholic incident. A white sheets, the Minute Men adopted the Madison Klanswoman challenged nine Cath­ uniform of the colonial soldier. The new olic nuns as they cast their votes in the elec­ group was also less restrictive in its member­ tion, contending that the nuns' ballots were ship requirements; all white, native Ameri­ invalid because they voted under names they cans, regardless of religious affiliation, were assumed when they entered their order. A eligible to join. But the organization directed Madison court later ruled in favor of the its most strenuous recruiting efforts toward sisters.^^ the former Klansmen. McComb and Dean The final major Klan event in Dane Coun­ told them that the Minute Men could achieve ty took place on Labor Day in 1925 when the Klan's ends without inciting racial and several thousand Klansmen and their families religious hatreds. Nevertheless, the recruiting from all over Wisconsin gathered in Madison campaign was unsuccessful, and after acknowl­ for a state konklave and parade. Only a few edging failure, Madison's Minute Men quietly Klansmen from Dane County participated in disbanded.^* Meanwhile the decline of the either of these activities. The procession Madison Klan accelerated. By the end of through Madison was similar to the Klan 1927 its funds were exhausted, its last members parade in 1924; the column consisted of bands, were dispersed. floats, and marching Klansmen. Violence, The death of the Invisible Empire in Madi­ however, marred the event. A spectator rushed son was primarily self-inflicted. Some Klans- into the line of march, pulled a Klansman from his horse, and threw him to the street, ''' Wisconsin Kourier, January 2, 16, 1925; Capital fracturing his collarbone and breaking two of Times, September 29, 30, 1925. his ribs. Madison police officers intervened '"^ Capital Times, September 8, 1925. quickly but the assailant fled. Later the police '^'Ibid., February 8, II, 13, August 12, 14, 24, Sep­ arrested Wayne Olson for shouting obscenities tember 25, 26, 29, October 7, December 8, 1926; Jack­ son, The Ku Klux Klan in the City, 231; Weaver, "The at the passing Klansmen. Olson was found Knights of the Ku Klux Klan," 134.

43 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY AUTUMN, 1974 men abandoned the order because of its au­ the men who they believed menaced the com­ thoritarian structure; local Knights resented munity, but except for one liquor raid, the the fact that they were restricted from partici­ Klan did little to "clean up" Madison. Be­ pating in their own organization's policy­ cause of its lack of effort and achievement, making process and from choosing their more these Klansmen lost interest in the organiza­ important local leaders. Tangled financial tion.s'' affairs at the national and state levels in­ Their defection also reflected the success of creased the bitterness provoked by dictatorial Philip La Follette, who became Dane County's practices, since the organization did not keep district attorney in January, 1925, and the records of the money it received from initia­ following month inaugurated a series of liquor tion fees or the sale of Klan regalia. News of raids that continued throughout the remainder financial irregularities committed by Klan of the year. La Follette's promise that liquor officials on the national and state levels would be harder to obtain in Madison and the caused many to resign formally from the order action taken to achieve this goal generated a or to allow their dues to lapse.^^ renewed confidence in the city's ability to The commission system of recruitment pro­ solve its problems. In addition. Little Italy duced other difficulties for the Klan. If a experienced a decline in violence after 1924. man were white, Protestant, native-born, and The lawless elements of the community ap­ possessed ten dollars, he could easily pass the peared to be under control. There was no organization's entrance requirements. Most need now to seek the aid of an Invisible Em­ Klansmen were honest, hard-working, and pire."* law-abiding men, but the order also attracted The popular conception of the Ku Klux an immoral and irresponsible element. Re­ Klan as an organization of blood-thirsty bigots ports of Klan violence and lawlessness shock­ who lynched blacks and attacked Catholics, ed the members of the Madison chapter who Jews, and immigrants is not applicable to the had sworn to uphold law and order. They Madison Klan nor to the majority of Klans could not justify the floggings, murders, and scattered throughout the United States in the brandings committed by Klansmen in other 1920's. The Klansmen of Madison were or­ states. The behavior of Klan leaders added dinary men bewildered by changes that threat­ to their disillusionment. For example, in 1923 ened to disrupt their lives and their city. To E. Y. Clarke was indicted for violation of the these men the Klan represented an opportuni­ Mann Act. Two years later the police arrested ty to restore Madison to a happier, more tran­ the Grand Dragon of the Indiana Klan for quil time. However, to imply that they viewed the rape and murder of his secretary. In Wis­ the Klan as nothing more than an agency consin, Klansmen discovered that some of the dedicated to combating moral laxity and law­ kleagles who organized their state had just lessness would be a distortion. It was also a been paroled from prison. Nor was the Dane social organization where a man and his fam­ County Klan immune from scandal. The ily could enjoy the company of friends. But county Klan's secretary, Samuel Rahn, was the Invisible Empire promised these men sued for divorce on the grounds of adultery more than it could deliver. As time passed, and nonsupport. In addition, the Capital its defects became harder to ignore. Racked Times revealed that one of Madison's more by internal dissension, the Madison chapter active Klansmen had once been arrested and of the Ku Klux Klan slowly died. fined for criminally assaulting a woman. Men who believed that the Klan stood for law and order, the sanctity of the home, and the chasti­ ty of American womanhood left the order in '^'Milwaukee Journal, April 5, 10, 13, 1928; Weaver, disgust.^'^ "The Knights of the Ku Klux Klan," 130. «" Weaver, "The Knights of the Ku Klux Klan," 131; Those Madisonians who joined the Klan Milwaukee Journal, April 8, 9, 1928; Jackson, The Ku because of their anxiety about the city's crime Klux Klan in the City, 157; Capital Times, March 2, and vice situation were disheartened. Weekly 1923, December 26, 1924, January 9, 1925. •>• Weaver, "The Knights of the Ku Klux Klan," 130. lectures and social events did not calm their ''^Capital Times, February 9, 25, July 25, 31, Octo­ fears. They wanted the Klan to move against ber 13, December 31, 1925. 44 The Kennedy Image: Politics, Camelot, and Vietnam

Bv Kent M. Beck

ORE THAN ten years after frequently the product of decades of historical M Dallas, John F. Kennedy is a experience, the Kennedy literature has leaped fading celebrity and an emerging historical from contemporary debate to favorable (but figure. Appropriately, the tenth anniversary not uncritical) remembrance and fundamental of his death featured the release of a movie revisionism in less than fifteen years. A be­ (Executive Action) presenting a conspiratorial wildering montage of partisanship and reflec­ version of the assassination as well as several tion, the public image of Kennedy was nur­ serious attempts to measure the legacy of the tured by controversy in the early 1960's, thousand days that preceded the tragedy. magnified by the assassination, and challenged "A nation reveals itself," President Kennedy by the anguish of the Vietnam War. In short once observed, "not only by the men it pro­ order, the politician became a martyred states­ duces but also by the men it honors, the men man and the statesman, for many, became the it remembers." A survey of the way that unwitting or deliberate architect of a tragic Americans have honored and remembered the war. thirty-fifth President can tell us much about These shifting and overlapping currents John F. Kennedy and convey even more about have been manifested in contrary emotions. In the American experience before and since his 1971, college undergraduates, in a national passing. poll, named John F. Kennedy as the recent In a wry and tasteful 1964 memoir, Kennedy American figure they most admired. The Without Tears, Tom Wicker regretted that same year a student editor at the University the late President would surely become "one of Wisconsin dismissed the late President as of those sure-sell heroes out of whose face or "one of the bigger pigs." Using more polite words or monuments a souvenir dealer can language. Dean Acheson concluded that "he turn a steady buck." The garish and exploitive did not seem to me to be in any sense a results which Wicker feared have certainly great man." Shortly after the national me­ materialized but, significantly, Kennedy has morial to JFK was dedicated, Richard Walton not simply been cast into "cold stone or heart­ published a work which held that "Cuba, less bronze" or become "immortal as Jefferson, Berlin, Vietnam—those are his monuments." revered as Lincoln, bloodless as Washington."^ In life as well as in death, widespread adu­ Compressing and spanning moods that are lation and intense skepticism run through the entire Kennedy literature like a constant thread. Among the most adoring and the ^Tom Wicker, "Excerpt from Kennedy Without Tears," in Jay David (ed.). The Kennedy Reader (New most skeptical from the start were liberals York, 1967), 80. who alternatively hailed Kennedy as a cham-

45 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY AUTUMN, 1974 pion and feared him as a fraud. "I tried to Burns argued that Kennedy had been an ef­ size up the man and was baffled," said Hans fective lobbyist for Massachusetts and recoiint- Morgenthau, recalling the first time he met ed some impressive senatorial moments, like Kennedy. Morgenthau continued, "What if his leadership of a successful struggle against anything, I asked myself, is behind that bland, a conservative plan to reform the electoral slick, polished facade, acting in word and ges­ college and a 1957 speech attacking the French ture with almost mechanical precision?"^ presence in Algeria.^ Defenders pointed out Morgenthau's quandary captured the liberal that Kennedy had been seriously ill in 1954 perplexity in defining the substance behind and that other liberals, like Hubert Hum­ the Kennedy style. In 1960, some liberals, like phrey, also had been unwilling to take on Ernest K. Lindley, regarded Kennedy as a McCarthy.6 leader of much promise, "remarkable in many To those liberals who actively supported ways," and were convinced that "already an him, Kennedy demonstrated an encouraging aura of greatness has begun to surround him." capacity for growth and an engaging command More typically, other liberal commentators, of ideas. To James Michener, he seemed "a like Gerald Johnson, saw the contest as a very able man with a brilliant mind, sub­ sterile choice between two plastic men repre­ stantial courage, an enormous sense of history, senting competing interest groups ("Bur­ and an attractive personality, cold perhaps but roughs Against IBM") and devoid of any basic reassuring."'' commitment to principle.^ John F. Kennedy's The liberals' debate over Kennedy gained major qualification for the Presidency, ac­ urgency with their belief that the 1960's re­ cording to Johnson, was that he was not quired strong and effective presidential leader­ Richard M. Nixon. ship. Eric Goldman expressed the universal Kennedy's political performance before liberal perception that Eisenhower had be­ 1960 provided liberals some reasons to cheer come "a symbol of drift to a nation already and many more reasons to doubt. In subse­ far too ready for drift." Arthur Schlesinger, quent years, Theodore Sorenson readily con­ Jr., agreed that "our nation must awaken from ceded that "John Kennedy was not one of the the Eisenhower trance and get on the march Senate's great leaders." Lackluster in accom­ again."^ A decisive Chief Executive, follow­ plishment, Kennedy's congressional record in­ ing in the footsteps of Wilson and Franklin cluded simplistic outbursts blaming Roosevelt D. Roosevelt, could make the Presidency a for selling out Poland and Truman for losing dynamic force for social change. Eisenhower, China. In the early 1950's, he was embarrass­ like Coolidge, had made the White House ingly silent about Joseph McCarthy. Accord­ into a rest home—a weak prop of the status ingly, many liberals endorsed Eleanor Roose­ quo.^ velt's description of the young candidate as In his acceptance speech, Kennedy stated "someone who understands what courage is that the coming election offered a choice "be- and admires it, but has not quite the inde­ pendence to have it.""* Liberals with a more positive view of Ken­ ^ James MacGregor Burns, John Kennedy: A Political nedy challenged such mistrust in 1960. In an Profile (New York, 1960). For the serious Kennedy student, Burns' book is well worth reading. A useful able campaign biography, James MacGregor annotated bibliography of the pre-1968 literature is James Crown, The Kennedy Literature (New York, 1968). - Hans Morgenthau, "Monuments to the Late Presi­ "Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., Kennedy or Nixon: Does It dent," in Truth and Power (New York, 1970), 156-157. Make Any Difference? (New York, 1960), 25-26. ^ Ernest K. Lindley, "The Ticket—A Rating," in 'James A. Michener, Report of the County Chair­ Newsweek, July 25, 1960, p. 47; Gerald Johnson, "Bur­ man (New York, 1961), 33. roughs Against IBM," in the New Republic, August " Eric Goldman, The Crucial Decade and After: 8, 1960, p. 12; also "If He Scrapes Off the Barnacles," America, 1945-1960 (New York, 1960), 344; Schlesinger, ibid., November 7, 1960, p. 16. Kennedy or Nixon, 33. * Theodore Sorenson, Kennedy (New York, 1965), ° Schlesinger, Kennedy or Nixon, 25. A passage from 43; Eleanor Roosevelt in Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., A Schlesinger is particularly revealing of the liberal out­ Thousand Days: John F. Kennedy in the White House look: "Everything, as Kennedy looked at it, went back (Greenwich, Connecticut, 1967), 22. to the question of Presidential leadership." 46 BECK: KENNEDY IMAGE

tween the fresh air of progress and the stale, dank atmosphere of 'normalcy.' " It was, lib­ erals agreed, "a time for greatness," as Ken­ nedy's preconvention slogan suggested. But many progressives worried that the young Senator might not be great enough to be a worthy successor to Roosevelt. "It's not fair to ask Kennedy to be FDR," noted TRB in January, 1961.i» But, in fact, most liberals did measure the New Frontier against the standards of the New Deal. Al­ though they approved his domestic program and were enthusiastic when the President took action against United States Steel in 1962 and proposed a wide-ranging civil rights bill in 1963, liberals fretted over his inability and/or unwillingness to pursue his reform proposals aggressively. The Progressive repeatedly com­ plained that the President displayed "a dis­ turbing absence of deep commitment to and involvement in the progressive programs he was proposing, a seeming lack of fighting Milwaukee Journal faith in his principles, and a willingness to Kennedy and Reverend George W. Vann, pastor of reach accommodation and compromise even St. Paul's A.M.E. church of Madison, share speaker's before the battle began."i^ platform at the University field house. Ironically, the liberal ambivalence toward Kennedy paralleled the independent liberal HILE his previous record and view of the 1930's which deplored Roosevelt's presidential shortcomings cre­ political expediency. Unlike their earlier w ated doubts about Kennedy among liberals, counterparts, however, most liberals in the the same factors drove many conservatives to early 1960's did not flirt with radical alterna­ anger and outrage. Victor Lasky's biting tives to the direction of administration policy polemic, JFK: The Man and the Myth, and were not placated by an impressive record topped best-seller lists in the fall of 1963. of accomplishment. There was no equivalent Lasky's Kennedy was a ruthless opportunist of the Hundred Days, and Kennedy's early whose triumph "provided a testament to the ventures in foreign affairs appeared to be in­ drawing power of the chameleon in United ept. The Bay of Pigs, an inconclusive Vienna States politics." Over hundreds of pages, summit, the erection of the Berlin Wall, Lasky portrayed the President's career as a Soviet space spectaculars—all confirmed Amer­ series of calculated shifts designed to advance ica's post-Sputnik sense of insecurity which his political prospects. A devious campaigner was particularly prevalent among liberals. in 1960, Kennedy, according to Lasky, "never Only after the Cuban missile crisis and the oiulined any specific program or even any very coming of the "Negro Revolution" as well as specific catalogue of faults" and "squeaked the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty did liberals be­ through to victory on the strength of person­ come more hopeful about the future. ality and tactic." In office, he generated "mo­ tion largely without movement."^^ If liberals worried about Kennedy's failures, 10 "XRB from Washington," in the New Republic, conservatives also deplored his popularity and January 9, 1961. "• "Shores Dimly Seen," in the The Progressive, Janu­ depicted his appeal as a grave symptom of ary, 1964, p. 4; also 3-5. This candid editorial is an able expression of the liberals' "considerable degree of '•^ Victor Lasky, JFK: The Man and the Myth (New divided feeling about our thirty-fifth President and York, 1963), 24, 4, 501. See 499-512 on manipulation his works." of the media.

47 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY AUTUMN, 1974 cultural decadence. The emergence of Ken­ the high tide of Democratic liberalism, John nedy was explained by conservatives in terms F. Kennedy was celebrated as a latter-day that liberals would later apply to Ronald Theodore Roosevelt, who aroused the nation Reagan. Sliortly after the 19(50 election, the by the force of his personality and had, in­ National Review lamented that "in an age deed, gotten the country moving again. "He where thought is painful and decision-making transformed the American spirit," concluded unthinkable, the polling booth becomes a Schlesinger. Sorenson added that he "stood registrar of popularity. We have retreated for excellence in an era of indifference." In back to our school days, and Jack Armstrong the mid-1960's Kennedy was remembered as Kennedy will chair the dance committee." an honored prophet—a realistic activist and On a more somber level, William F. Buckley, a cultivated advocate of peace, justice, and Jr., agreed with his archrival Gore Vidal in reform. 1967 that "the Kennedys' trinitarian (family, David Wolper's 1964 film tribute (shown money, image) grasp on American life has to a tearful Democratic National Convention) proved enormously successful because it en­ used the lyrics of "Camelot" to identify the gages the gears of a middle class society that New Frontier strikingly as a "fleeting wisp has pretty well abandoned its ideals, theo­ of glory . . . for one brief shining moment." logical and moral."^' Despite the emotional power of such eulogies, After the frustrations of the Kennedy years there was never an unchallenged Kennedy and the shock of the assassination, Lyndon cult. In an almost Hegelian fashion, instant Johnson's legislative craftsmanship dazzled myths generated instant critics. As early as liberals and led some to believe that LBJ was a December 7, 1963, column, William F. Buck­ the rightful heir to the Roosevelt mantle. ley, Jr., asked, "Are we now being stampeded "We have a great President now," Adlai Ste­ into believing that Kennedy was the incarna­ venson told a friend in early 1964. Time tion and that respect for him requires that magazine came to concur with Stevenson's we treat his program like the laws of the assessment, "The point is that Lyndon John­ Medes and the Persians?"'" son understands power—and its uses.''^* While Time magazine did a glowing cover By November, 1966, historian Thomas story on Arthur Schlesinger, Jr.'s, Pulitzer Bailey judged that, except for Vietnam, John­ Prize winning A Thousand Days, some review­ son's "achievements have been little short of ers sharply criticized the adoring tone of the amazing." Kennedy, in contrast, "entered the New Frontier memoirs. Henry Pachter's "JFK White House pledged to get the country mov­ as an Equestrian Statue: On Myth and Myth- ing again but it was not moving forward con­ makers" was a dispassionate "left-handed spicuously when the fatal shots rang out in compliment" to the court histories of Sorenson Dallas." Reflecting the conventional wisdom and Schlesinger. Pachter was motivated by a of the mid-1960's, a housewife stated that concern that the two authors had produced "Johnson is a mover of men. Kennedy could "a waxen image which can be placed right inspire men but he couldn't move them."'^ beside George Washington who could never As Lyndon Johnson basked in popular ac­ tell a lie."''' Andy Logan's overview, "JFK: claim, most liberals and many Americans em­ The Stained-Glass Image," contended that braced the memory of his predecessor. During after the assassination "the minor Kennedy myth . . . had expanded uncountable times, been transformed and purified, burst all mortal bonds, and soared toward the realm " National Review, as quoted in Lasky, JFK, 6; Wil­ liam F. Buckley, Jr., "Gore Vidal on JFK," in The Jeweler's Eye (New York, 1968), 221. " "All Over? Or Just Starting?" in Time, September "William F. Buckley, Jr., "JFK, the Morning After," 4, 1964, p. 19. In a brief passage, Johnson is compared in The Jeweler's Eye, 331. favorably to Truman, ELsenhower, and Kennedy. " Henry Pachter, "JFK as an Equestrian Statue: On " Thomas \. Bailey, "Johnson and Kennedy: The Myth and Mythmakers," in Earl Latham (ed.), J. F. Two Thousand Days," in the New York Times Maga­ Kennedy and Presidential Power (Lexington, Massa­ zine, November 6, 1966, p. 30; "Mover of Men," Time, chusetts, 1973), 45. The Latham anthology is an out­ August 6, 1965, p. 22. standing introduction to the Kennedy literature.

48 ''l *

Milwaukee Journal This partial view of the crowd attending the rally for Kennedy at the University of Wisconsin field house, October 23, 1960, vividly demonstrates the change in styles of dress and grooming in the last decade and a half.

of the supernatural." Historian Christopher tunist, an Old Frontiersman with youth and Lasch regretted that "the cult of the Ken­ class. nedys showed that culture had become prac­ Mayer believed that Kennedy had actually tically synonymous with chic."'* projected "no magic and no mystique beyond Substantive critiques of the New Frontier, the mystique of competent power." Mayer from both left and right, were soon to be obviously found Kennedy eminently resistible heard. Liberal Milton Mayer, in the Decem­ in both life and death. Yet less than a year ber, 1964, issue of The Progressive, clearly later, British journalist Henry Fairlie, a con­ was not impressed by the Kennedy legacy. servative, declared in the October, 1965, Com- "The country, and with it the world, was not much better and not much worse after three years of vigor." The President himself was "Andy Logan, "JFK: The Stained-Glass Image," in ironically a "cool and calculating man at American Heritage, August, 1967, p. 5; Christopher whose death a whole people cried and cried Lasch, The New Radicalism in America, 1889-1963 (New York, 1966), 311, 310-318. and cried."'^ Kennedy, for Mayer, was merely " Milton Mayer, "November 22, 1963," in The Pro­ a shrewd political operator—a clever oppor­ gressive, December, 1964, pp. 24, 23.

49 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY AUTUMN, 1974 mentary that American intellectuals had been overthrow" and said that "so comforting were "raped" by President Kennedy. The "proper the reports, that the delegates felt able to intellectual attitude to power" for Fairlie was confirm that nearly 1,000 U. S. servicemen "doubt, disappointment and disillusion." Any stationed in Vietnam would be withdrawn by active intellectual support for a political candi­ the end of the year."22 date and/or participation in government Most importantly, the Vietnam War fit into brought "a loss with no adequate compen­ a Cold War paradigm and seemed a messy sating gain." "As soon as the politician but inexpensive and necessary involvement. dresses himself up in fancy clothes, glamoriz­ Kennedy's policy, as later expressed by Theo­ ing his office and his power," according to dore Sorenson, was a further effort to contain Fairlie, "the intellectual is a sucker for his Communist expansion, "to halt a Communist- favors."^" sponsored guerilla war and to permit the local Along with many other observers at the population peacefully to choose its own fu­ time, Fairlie held that the growing intellectual ture." The vast majority of Americans had disenchantment with Lyndon Johnson was no doubts about the morality or the wisdom mainly the result of an elitist view that the of such a struggle in the early and mid-1960's. President was a "slob" rather than honest Moral purpose and national self-interest went differences over policy. Seduced by the Ken­ hand-in-hand. Had the President been asked nedy myth, intellectuals were unable to see "why he had increased this nation's commit­ that Johnson was only a normal politician: ment," Sorenson replied that he might have "At all times, and no matter who exercises it, quoted William Pitt, " 'We have gained every­ power is ugly and brutalizing: President Ken­ thing that we would have lost if we had not nedy was allowed to make it appear attractive fought this war.' "^^ and redeeming. . . . Power is safe only if it Even as early as 1965, however, with the war is exercised without enchantment, without continuing, some participants in and friendly claim to reason, and without pretense to observers of the New Frontier found more virtue: President Kennedy was allowed to burden than glory in Kennedy's Vietnam endow it with all three."^' policy. Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., quietly con­ cluded that Vietnam was "his great failure in foreign affairs." Theodore H. White, another CORES of eulogies and assess­ admirer, stated that Kennedy's "greatest sub­ S'ment s were written immediately stantive failure was in Southeast Asia."^* after November 22, 1963, but few, if any, These muffled doubts about Kennedy's mentioned the Vietnam War in sizing up the Vietnam stance followed some isolated sniping record of the Kennedy Administration. This at the general direction of American foreign omission was not surprising since Vietnam policy during the Thousand Days. Shortly was a relatively peripheral national issue in after the assassination, I. F. Stone warned the fall of 1963. There were 16,000 "advisors" against "canonizing Kennedy as an apostle of serving in Southeast Asia but their role was peace." The Kennedy Administration, for supposedly limited to the support and train­ Stone, was "the first U. S. government in the ing of local troops. After a fact-finding mis­ nuclear age which acted on the belief that it sion by Robert McNamara and Maxwell was possible to use war or the threat of war, Taylor in early October, the White House as an instrument of politics despite the possi­ issued an optimistic policy statement that "the bility of annihilation." Historian William G. major part of the U. S. military task can be Carleton wrote in the fall of 1964 that "dur­ completed by the end of 1965." In an issue ing his first two years in office, Kennedy dominated by coverage of the assassination, Newsweek reported on "the first high-level review of the war in Vietnam since Diem's ^ "South Vietnam; The Break-Even Point," in News­ week, December 2, 1963, p. 57. ^Sorenson, Kennedy, 649, 661. ^ Henry Fairlie, "Johnson and the Intellectuals," in ^Schlesinger, A Thousand Days, 909-910; Theodore Commentary, October, 1965, p. 50; see 49-55. H. White, The Making of the President 1964 (New "^Ibid. York, 1965), 41.

50 BECK: KENNEDY IMAGE seems needlessly to have fanned the tensions States to say that we're going to kill tens of of the dying Cold War."^^ thousands, maybe millions, of people, as we The transformation of the Vietnam War have, refugees . . . women and children. . . 7"^^ from a minor nuisance into an endless ob­ Writing in the spring of 1968, Kennedy re­ session as well as the emergence of the New called his past role with considerable humil­ Left spawned a different intellectual atmos­ ity: "I was invovled in many of the early de­ phere, more receptive to the dissents of Stone cisions on Vietnam, decisions which set us on and Carleton. In 1963, most commentators our present path. It may be that the effort guessed that Kennedy would be remembered was doomed from the start. ... If that is the for his successful handling of the Cuban case, as it well may be, then I am willing to missile crisis, his civil rights bill, or the re­ bear my share of the responsibility before cently ratified Nuclear Test Ban Treaty. By history and before my fellow citizens."^^ the late 1960's and early 1970's, however, the By 1969 what Robert Frost had welcomed bipolar confrontation of 1962 and the hopeful as the "next Augustan age" had evaporated "first step" of 1963 paled in significance along­ into what Richard Rovere labeled "a slum side the stark consequences of the introduction of a decade." Once a confident hawk who of thousands of support troops into Vietnam volunteered to go to Vietnam in 1965, a dis­ in 1961. As years went by, the initial com­ illusioned Daniel Ellsberg released the Penta­ mitment and the ultimate escalation had gon Papers in 1971. Ellsberg later compared fewer and fewer defenders. himself to the Nazi Albert Speer and posed The President's brother and closest advisor, the question that haunted an entire genera­ Robert F. Kennedy, for example, made a halt­ tion, "How could our leaders—honored and ing but fundamental break with the past on respectable men—have involved us so long in Vietnam.28 The young Attorney General had this hopeless butchery? How coidd we have let been fascinated by counter-insurgency warfare them, with so little protest?"^" and, even as a Senator, kept a green beret on Those who echoed Ellsberg's concern ap­ his desk. Visiting Saigon in February, 1962, plied his question to the New Frontier. In he was publicly belligerent and self-confident: a January, 1971, essay, "Camelot in Retro­ "We are going to win in Vietnam and we spect: Bitter Memories of a Cold Day," shall remain here until we do." (In the early Gerald Clarke asked, "How could we have fall of 1963, Kennedy privately mentioned been thrilled by that pompous Inaugural Ad­ that the United States might do well to get dress. . . ? How could we have been excited out of Vietnam.) In the fall of 1964, he re­ by its swollen Cold War rhetoric?" Richard sponded rather arrogantly to a reporter's ques­ Walton lamented, "We were all so eager for tions about his brother's record: "Mistakes? Kennedy to defeat the despised Nixon that It's a bad thing to say, but I don't think we we just assumed that what he said was accept­ made any."^'' able. . . . Blinded by our passion to defeat Three years later, Kennedy was a chastened Nixon, we did not really listen to Kennedy."^' man. In a November, 1967, television inter­ Clarke agreed with Walton, "If we voted for view, he saw the war as essentially immoral: Johnson in 1964 and got Goldwater, so too "Do we have the right here in the United

^I. F. Stone, "We All Had a Finger on That Trig­ "" Robert F. Kennedy, as quoted in Theodore Soren­ ger," in In A Time of Torment (New York, 1967), 14; son, The Kennedy Legacy (New York, 1969), 159. William G. Carleton, "Kennedy in History: An Early ^ Robert F. Kennedy, To Seek a Newer World (New Appraisal," in Latham (ed.), /. F. Kennedy and York, 1968 ed.), 162. Presidential Power, 161; see 160-166. '" Daniel Ellsberg, "The Responsibility of Officials " For a discussion of Robert Kennedy and Vietnam in a Criminal War," in Papers on the War (New York, see "Vietnam: The Tortured Path," in William vanden 1972), 278. Heuvel and Milton Gwirtzman, On His Own: RFK, '^ Gerald Clarke, "Camelot in Retrospect: JFK- 1964-68 (New York, 1970), 209-244. Bitter Memories of a Cold Day," in the New Republic, " Robert F. Kennedy, as quoted in T. George Harris, January 16, 1971, p. 13; Richard Walton, Cold War "The Competent American," in Latham (ed.), /. F. and Counterrevolution: The Foreign Policy of John Kennedy and Presidential Power, 125. F. Kennedy (New York, 1972), 8.

51 ^:^^IF^ Society's Iconographic Collections During the crucial Kennedy-Nixon debates in the fall of 1960, a Milwaukee Journal photographer snapped these pictures of the television screen. had we chosen Kennedy and wound up with "an anti-communist crusader" whose person­ Nixon four years earlier."^^ ality made him "the first television-star Presi­ The new Kennedy revisionism seeks to dent" but whose policies proved that he was bring the late President before the bar of his­ actually "an entirely conventional politician." tory for his part in the disaster of Vietnam. Diplomatic overtures, like a "magnificient" Yet if the revisionists share a general in­ speech preceding successful negotiations to dictment, they differ on the degree and the end nuclear testing in the atmosphere by the nature of John F. Kennedy's personal com­ two superpowers, did not characterize the plicity. Richard Walton, a Stevensonian lib­ Kennedy years. Far more typical, for Walton, eral with a New Left viewpoint, and Henry were the Bay of Pigs and the Diem coup, the Fairlie, a British conservative, both paint massive buildup of nuclear and tactical weap­ Kennedy as an aggressive Cold Warrior need­ ons as well as the founding of the Green lessly fanning international tensions. David Berets. "What a tragedy," Walton concluded, Halberstam, an intriguing "half-way" revision­ "that the anti-communist impulse in Kennedy ist, blames Kennedy's top advisors for the prevailed over his idealism, his genuine sym­ Vietnam debacle but admires the President, pathy for the poor peoples of the world."^^ for all his faults, as the best of the lot. For Halberstam's Kennedy was more of a de­ Halberstam, Vietnam was a Greek tragedy tached cynic than a committed Cold Warrior. with some fools, a few villains and many able "Kennedy was committed only to rationality men who should have known better. Less and brains, nothing more," contended Halber­ philosophical and more accusatory, Walton stam.^^ If there was "an element of the hard­ and Fairlie contend that Vietnam was due to liner in him," Kennedy was basically "cool the posturing of a President beset by Cold and cautious and not about to rush ahead of War delusions and driven by the "politics of events or the current political climate by expectation" to provoke or manufacture crisis calling for changes in the almost glacierlike situations. quality of the Cold War." Possessing a prob­ Walton and Halberstam describe the same ing, analytical mind, "he was more sensitive figure but have clashing perspectives on the to changes in the world than most of his con­ essence of the man.^^ Walton's Kennedy was temporaries; but as a political figure he was cautious and almost timid."^^ Both hawk and dove, Kennedy sought to manage the Cold ^^ Clarke, "Camelot in Retrospect," 13. War, avoid a nuclear conflagration, and hus­ ^ The differences between Halberstam and Walton band his strength for the next election. over Kennedy's foreign policy attitudes are part of a larger debate about the President's psyche and char­ Halberstam held that Kennedy was "more acter. James Barber in The Presidential Character (Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey, 1972) saw Kennedy (like Franklin Roosevelt and Harry Truman) as an "active- nent psychohistorians, see Alexander and Juliette positive" President, a self-confident, flexible, and pro­ George, "Psycho-McCarthyism," in Psychology Today, ductive leader. Nancy Gager Clinch in The Kennedy June, 1973, pp. 94-98. Neurosis (New York, 1973) presented a totally nega­ ^ Walton, Cold War and Counterrevolution, 233. tive view of all the Kennedys and depicted the Presi­ "• David Halberstam, The Best and the Brightest dent as driven by neurosis to provoke foreign crises. (New York, 1972), 96. For a sharply critical review of Clinch by two promi- ^Ibid., 24, 96.

52 Many political observers credit Kennedy's photogenicness and superior TV makeup as prime factors in tipping the election scales in his favor.

skeptical, more subtle than his public pro­ old businessmen of the Eisenhower years. "•*! nouncements,"^^ but Walton believed that In contrast, Adlai Stevenson and Chester presidential rhetoric was usually an accurate Bowles received favorable treatment in both measure of the reality of presidential policy. accounts. Visionary statesmen, Stevenson and The military buildup of 1961 is a case in Bowles, the real liberal leaders, were slighted point. This escalation constituted, in Wal­ by Kennedy. ton's words, the launching of "a mighty of­ Walton observed that the realists "operated fense against communism, one that would on Kennedy's wavelength"*^ and associated turn the tide that, in his campaign speeches, the President with their attitudes. Halber­ he saw unfavorable to the Tree World.' "^^ stam, on the other hand, saw Kennedy as Instead of the central ingredient in a grand straddling the line between the hardliners and strategy, Halberstam depicted the missile as­ the diplomatically-oriented faction in his ad­ pect of the 1961 buildup as a political ploy, ministration. Despite his rapport with the an indication of the administration's weak realists, Kennedy could be wary of their ad­ domestic position. The administration chose vice. The President reportedly quipped once to double the number of strategic missiles, that Rostow had ten ideas, nine of which knowing that there was no "missile gap" and would lead to disaster, but one of which was that the new weapons would add nothing to worth having. the nation's military security. But Secretary On Vietnam, Kennedy, in Halberstam's of Defense Robert S. McNamara persuaded view, "was never in any deep sense a be­ the President to approve the proposal on the liever." Kennedy "seriously questioned the rationale that the increase represented "the wisdom of a combat commitment, and at the smallest number we can take up on the Hill end had grave doubts about the viability of without getting murdered."^^ the counterinsurgency program, whether we Halberstam and Walton share a common should be there at all." But "he had never disdain for many of Kennedy's advisors while shown those doubts in public."*^ disagreeing on the President's relationship to Unlike Haberstam, who accepted the Cold his associates. Halberstam's The Best and the War as "still a major part of our life" in the Brightest is a long critique of realists like early 1960's, Walton considered Kennedy's Dean Rusk, Walt Rostow, McGeorge Bundy, foreign policy to be mainly an irrational Maxwell Taylor, and McNamara as arrogant "construct of fact, fear and fantasy" indicat­ and narrow technicians convinced that "sheer ing "an alarmist, dogmatic view of the world intelligence and rationality could answer and with perhaps a touch of machismo.'"^'^ Henry solve anything."*" "They were intellectuals," Fairlie, in The Kennedy Promise, found the Walton remarked of the same group, "but understood the new world no better than the " Walton, Cold War and Counterrevolution, 229. ^"Ibid., 71. ^ Halberstam, The Best and the Brightest, 212, 299- 'Ibid., 300. 300. This point is repeatedly made, but this section ' Walton, Cold War and Counterrevolution, 67. contains a summary of Halberstam's position. ' Halberstam, The Best and the Brightest, 71-72. •" Walton, Cold War and Counterrevolution, 53; see Ubid., 44. 49-53.

53 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY AUTUMN, 1974

President to be a product of the "hysteria" of our parents and our own amazed and im­ unleashed by Sputnik, "locked in the ideology mature perception of events."*^ Even as re­ of the Cold War." Kennedy, Fairlie continued, visionists like Walton and Fairlie reached imparted this sense of insecurity to the entire print, the first stirrings of what may become nation: "From midday on January 20, 1961 a counterrevisionist trend have been heard in until midday on November 22, 1963 the peo­ the past few years. ple of the United States lived in an atmos­ While agreeing with some of his critique, phere of perpetual crisis."*' reviewer Tom Wicker assailed Fairlie's impli­ In 1965 Fairlie wrote that President Ken­ cation that "John Kennedy more or less in­ nedy had "raped" American intellectuals. By vented the imperial presidency" and scorned 1973 he argued that the Kennedys had raped his attempt to place "at Kennedy's door vir­ American society, "if one remembers the tually the entire history of the subsequent turbulence of the United States during the decade." With some irritation. Wicker re­ second half of the 1960's, at least part of the torted that "10 years later Richard Nixon explanation can be found in the pitch of conducts a more imperial foreign policy than feverishness at which the American people Kennedy ever dreamed of, as did Lyndon had been kept for three years by the politics Johnson."'" of crisis." The "political method" of John Political pundit David Broder used the and Robert Kennedy had the effect of bring­ eighth anniversary of the assassination to com­ ing "the political institutions of the country pare and contrast Kennedy with Johnson and into disrepute by the promise to transcend Nixon. Broder asserted that "there is little them."*8 reason to think that either the Democratic The charismatic Kennedy brothers, abetted delegates or the nation's voters made any mis­ by the Supreme Court, the War on Poverty, take in judging that Mr. Kennedy was the best and the civil rights movement, created a mood man of the three." of general expectation that "the limits of Johnson's legislative record and Nixon's politics could be transcended or that politics diplomatic feats may have exceeded the out­ could transcend the limits of the common­ put of the New Frontier. But, according to place world."*^ Thus, "the politics of expec­ Broder, "Mr. Kennedy's standing rests . . . tation" led to "the politics of confrontation." on the qualities of national leadership he Referring to the legacy left by the New embodied. They are qualities which, if any­ Frontier leadership in 1971, Joseph Kraft thing, are better understood today, after eight complained that "much of what passes for years of absence, than they were in his life­ thought in both conservative and radical time." circles is merely a snappy put-down of their Whether or not Kennedy would have esca­ errors." "As the 'nightmare' recedes," Kraft lated the Vietnam War was not the point. continued, "the reputation of the Kennedy "He would not have led the country into intellectuals will certainly recover."** massive war by stealth and indirection as Mr. Suzannah Lessard, a younger journalist, Johnson did, for he would have known as he partially agreed with Kraft's view some months had always known, that a policy that cannot later. "Our dismissal of Kennedy came too be enunciated openly and defended in public easily," she said, "ricocheting off the shock debate is almost certainly bad policy." Covering Richard Nixon's Washington, "this city of frozen-faced men," led Broder to find some truth in the Camelot myth. "Mr. ''^ For purposes of brevity in summarizing Fairlie's Nixon seems to fear the consequences of con­ point of view, the author used a condensation of Fair- lie, The Kennedy Promise (New York, 1973). See also cern, compassion and a generous spirit. His Henry Fairlie, "Camelot Revisited," in Harpers, Janu­ ary, 1973, pp. 68, 74. "76irf., 75-76, 68. •" Suzannah Lessard, "A New Look at John Kennedy," "Ibid., 67. in the Washington Monthly, October, 1971, p. 10. **Joseph Kraft, "'New Frontier' Is 10 Years Old," '*°Tom Wicker, review of Fairlie, The Kennedy in the Los Angeles Times, January 17, 1971, Section Promise, in the New York Times Book Review, Janu­ G, p. 6. ary 21, 1973, p. 1. 54 BECK: KENNEDY IMAGE is government by the grim: Mr. Johnson's was government by the sly." Kennedy, in contrast, was "neither grim nor sly, neither dour nor devious."'^ The unprecedented corruption unmasked by Watergate made Broder's poignant essay even more compelling. In November, 1973, Newsweek's Richard Boeth sadly commented that "ten years after Kennedy's death, there has been no American hero to succeed him."'^ Unable to enjoy or, ultimately, to trust either Lyndon Johnson or Richard Nixon, Ameri­ cans have come to remember their predecessor with mixed feelings of nostalgia and recrimi­ nation. The present debate rests on the con­ current realization that Kennedy was, at least partially, distinct from Johnson and Nixon but that he did, in some ways, set the stage for his successors. The historical interpretations and popular Society's Iconographic Collections images of Presidents in this century have Kennedy and George McGovern in October, I960. fluctuated dramatically and, thus, it is hazard­ ous to predict future perceptions of the New liberalism might cause Americans to place Frontier. The bitter aftermath of World War the 1960's in a more sympathetic perspective. I created a widespread impression of Wood- Less optimistically, the collapse of the great row Wilson as a naive idealist, self-righteously power detente and a return of Cold War ten­ undertaking a mistaken intervention. Axis sions could engender a patriotic spirit that aggression and the coming of World War II, would undermine the revisionist thrust. On in contrast, confirmed Wilson as a prescient the other hand, further crises might serve to statesman who saw the necessity for collective confirm a general revisionist indictment. security. For some, the Vietnam War rekin­ What kind of Kennedy history will be dled admiration for Dwight Eisenhower's written when the relevant papers are released nonheroic leadership. Ironically, New Left around 1990? Certainly the documents will historian William Appleman Williams has deepen understanding to an extent, resolve praised Herbert Hoover for opposing the lib­ some contradictions, and dispel or confirm eral welfare state, while Barry Goldwater has some doubts. But the best evidence must be described Harry Truman as the greatest Presi­ discerned, arranged, and interpreted by the dent of the century. historian. Will future historians go beyond A renewal of national self-confidence in the the court histories and revisionist attacks of late 1970's and/or the revival of Democratic the past decade? This question has a more basic implication. Will America be able to transcend its recent past—to create a society '^^ David Broder, "It Doesn't Seem Like Eight Years," that can look backward without veneration in the Los Angeles Times, November 25, 1971, Part or despair? How well the nation meets to­ II, p. 7. ^^ Richard Boeth, "JFK: Visions and Revisions," in morrow's challenges will determine yesterday's Newsweek, November 19, 1973, p. 76. future.

55 REVIEWS

STATE AND REGIONAL practical acquaintance with the science of architecture. Today, examples of the churches he designed may be seen in Galena, Illinois, The Man Mazzuchelli, Pioneer Priest. By Jo in Dubuque, Iowa, in Prairie du Chien, in BARTELS ALDERSON and J. MICHAEL ALDERSON. Shullsburg and Benton, Wisconsin. All told, (Wisconsin House, Ltd., Madison, 1974. Pp. he constructed about twenty such religious I circa] 174. Illustrated. ,157.95.) buildings. Territorial organizers utilizecl his skill in plotting the city of Davenport and Father Samuel Charles Mazzuchelli, O.P., creating the first State House in Iowa City. early nineteenth-century Catholic missionary In turn, he did not hesistate to proclaim that in the territories of Illinois, Iowa, and Wis­ America, where all faiths were encouraged consin, has long merited a full-length biogra­ and none hampered, supplied the best atmos­ phy. phere for the growth of religion. Born in Milan, Italy, in 1807, Samuel en­ Mazzuchelli devoted the last years of his tered the Dominican novitiate at the age of life to the foundation of a college at Sinsina- seventeen. While completing his studies in wa, Wisconsin, and a sisterhood of women Rome, he accepted the challenge of the Do­ who were destined to administer it. Today, minican Edward Fenwick, bishop of Cincin­ his college building still stands, but the nuns nati, to be ordained for his diocese. In 1829 no longer offer higher education there. when Mazzuchelli arrived in Cincinnati, the The blurb on the dust-jacket of The Man diocese embraced the whole Old Northwest Mazzuchelli announces that Jo Bartels Aider- Territory, from Ohio to the Mississippi River. son and J. Michael Alderson are poets. With In 1830 as soon as Bishop Fenwick ordained true poetical instinct they have sensed the him, he was assigned to Mackinac Island. Its stuff for a folk epic in the doings of their population was so involved in the fur trade biographee. Their book has many characteris­ that Mazzuchelli could do little more than tics of the classic examples of this literary entice a few persons to visit his church on form. Its first sentence introduces the "young Sunday. He knew there was an old F"rench man with lively brown eyes and gentle man­ settlement at the bottom of Green Bay. He ner. Behind him were Italy, wealth, and a sought these people out with better luck. rich culture; before him lay the new world, Nevertheless when he heard of Christian In­ deprivation, and raw, stern survival," toward dians living near Fort Winnebago, present which "a 106 foot sailing ship" bore him. Portage, he moved among them. Next, he Thereafter, episode after episode follows in made his way to Prairie du Chien, where he which, against a background of strife and the arrived in 1835. In the 1830's, American supernatural, Mazzuchelli struggles and ac­ prospectors were pouring into the lead-mining complishes, despite angers, impatience, and area a little farther south. There were many crushing disappointments. Interesting in­ foreign-born Catholics among them. Mazzu­ deed, true probably, but for the sake of his­ chelli decided that Galena was to be the me­ tory, lacking in all critical paraphernalia. The tropolis of Illinois; hence, he moved again Man Mazzuchelli has no introduction or pre­ to that budding city. face, no table of contents, no page-nunabers, Somewhere, Mazzuchelli had picked up a no chapter titles, no footnotes, no index, and 56 BOOK REVIEWS no critical bibliography. If one can overlook with a mixed witness, but on the whole com­ such omissions he may enjoy a story quite ing down on the side of freedom—fought the well told, but Samuel Charles Mazzuchelli liquor traffic, crusaded against war, and spoke still expects a historian for biographer. out rather early in the cause of women. In fact, two Wisconsin Methodist bodies peti­ RAPHAEL N. HAMILTON tioned for the right of women to serve as lay Marquette University delegates to the national ruling body of Meth­ odism in the early 1890's, and a woman was licensed to preach in the United Brethren church in 1883 and another was appointed to Cross and Flame in Wisconsin: The Story of a pastorate in the Methodist church in 1894— United Methodism in the Badger State. By not a really proud achievement, but ahead WILLIAM BLAKE. (Commission on Archives of the times. and History, Wisconsin Conference, United Methodist Church, Sun Prairie, 1973. Pp. 369. Of course the glory of one generation can Illustrations, notes, bibliography, appendix, become the burden of the next. The churches directory of archives and history, index. Hard­ looked upon the nineteenth-century tide of cover, 14.00; softcover, §3.00.) immigration as a challenge and worked earn­ estly to develop language congregations for the Germans, Welsh, Scandinavians, and Itali­ The regional history of a religious denom­ ans, then worked just as earnestly half a cen­ ination is likely to be so self-conscious or so tury later to "Americanize" these congrega­ selective as to be poor history, or so inclusive tions and discontinue the language barriers. as to be unbearably dull. In this commission­ ed history of Methodist bodies in Wisconsin, Any contemporary student of religion William Blake occasionally slips into both should get a measure of humility—and per­ traps, but generally does a remarkable job of haps, hope—as he discovers that problems recording a large and complex story. which face organized religion in the 1970's were confronted at other times, some of them The history covers 145 years, beginning as frequently as the birth of a new generation. with the first Methodist gathering in the state Population movement and changes were in 1828, including in its purview the founding troubling the denomination in the 1890's long and development of the Evangelical Associa­ before the birth of suburbia; local churches tion, the United Brethren Church, and the were unhappy with denominational Sunday Wisconsin and West Wisconsin Conferences School literature in 1889, and they are still; of the Methodist Episcopal (later, Methodist) three times in less than a century the church Church, and the series of mergers culminating bodies met large decreases in membership; in the forming of the Wisconsin Conference and at several intervals the clergy encouraged of the United Methodist Church in 1969. AH themselves with "new programs" of evangel­ told, with changing of administrative bound­ ism and the upgrading of Christian education ary lines and the forming and eventual merg­ which promised a better day. ing of special language Conferences, the his­ tory includes some twenty-nine judicatory Sometimes the Reverend Mr. Blake lets an bodies. Happily, Mr. Blake includes a chart "our" slip into his history and one realizes showing the several hereditary lines and a that he is an involved advocate rather than list of all the religious bodies which are part an objective observer. But above all, I am of Wisconsin Methodist history. impressed that he is a fair man (as indeed I Since so much ground is covered, the book know him to be), and that he tries to tell a can hardly be more than a rather full out­ true story, whether with pride or embarrass­ line. There is little opportunity for telling ment. the stories of notable lay persons or ministers This history will no doubt be the singular or for lengthy interpretation of events. There source in its field for many years, partly be­ is simply too much ground to be covered. cause it would be difficult to underwrite an­ Those who think of religious bodies as other such project and because the market is cloistered from the turmoil of politics and limited; but more especially because Mr. social upheaval will be set straight by this Blake has done, on the whole, a comprehen­ history. The circuit riders went into the sive and responsible piece of work. frontier to counteract the sometimes brutaliz­ ing influence of the wilderness, were involved J. ELLSWORTH KALAS to the full in the slavery issue—sometimes Cleveland, Ohio

57 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY AUTUMN, 1974

Ships of the Great Lakes: 300 Years of Navi­ were reasonably common during the same gation. By JAMES P. BARRY. (Howell-North time period. As ^the more astute student reads Books, Berkeley, 1973. Pp. 256. Illustrations, of the loss of the steamer Lady Elgin, he will bibliography and notes, maps, index. |10.00.) wonder what happened to the valiant efforts of a Northwestern University divinity student At long last a volume dealing with Great who saved the lives of many survivors, which Lakes shipping has been produced that gets defeats Mr. Barry's description of the "crowds away from the Chamber of Commerce variety helpless" to render aid. The choice of some of photographs and pictorially should satisfy vessels to portray the development of shipping the most avid nautical fanatic. The book also raises the question of "so what?" in some contains 230 "slick-paper" illustrations that cases, i.e., the steamers Rescue and Ironsides. obviously have been chosen with great care by Their importance to the overview of lake the author. Furthermore he has not only shipping is doubtful. gleaned archives and libraries on both sides One other trap, that of repetition of photo­ of the inland waters, but he has also received graphs, occurs only in a few instances, but the co-operation of several of the better-known those fans who have as their favorites the collectors of Great Lakes marine lore to bring Assiniboia, Midland City, or USCG Mackinaw together a more delectable variety of prints will be pleased. One might question the role and portraits. In short, Mr. Barry has quite of the last named, as Mr. Barry claims that successfully portrayed the development of by her ice-breaking talents a month and a Great Lakes shipping from the birch bark half have been added to the lake navigation canoe to the thousand-foot bulk carrier. season. Mention of the Concordia as typify­ The text that accompanies the photographs ing the smaller class of vessel to utilize the fits essentially the same category—largely bor­ Seaway might better be served by illustrations rowed. Fortunately the author, in his efforts of "pre-Seaway" visitors of the Fjell and to obtain information, does not pretend to Oranje lines. Other omissions needed to com­ be an "authority." He freely credits his sources plete the picture of lake navigation might in a semi-annotated and combined "Notes and well include steam fish tugs and harbor tugs, Bibliography" section. Thus the volume fits revenue cutters. Corps of Engineers vessels, the description of a "coffee-table" production, and some emphasis on the United States Light­ yet will, if the reader disciplines himself, satis­ house and Life Saving Services. fy the more avid ship enthusiast and even Yet, after all is said and done, what en­ assist the novice researcher. The so-called trances the reader is not the text, but the authorities, however, will find many small in­ pictures. The author, through his careful accuracies and omissions about which to selection and good arrangement, thoroughly grumble. Most of these appear to be the re­ captures the history of Great Lakes navigation sult of the lack of in-depth experience that in a manner that words can never convey. He only years of familiarity with the history of assists the novice by including a map of the lake shipping could have prevented. For ex­ lakes, upon which most little-known ports are ample, too often Mr. Barry relied upon "eye­ mentioned, and can be referred to easily by witness" descriptions of ships and events which turning to the inside of either "fore-"n-aft" were inaccurate themselves. Thus the British covers. Mr. Barry begins to whet the appetite schooner Michigan (1763) is converted to a of those looking for a more nostalgic touch sloop; the Alexander McDougall-owned tug in his epilogue, but again, he cuts it short. Siskiwit becomes the Sisquit; and the well- In brief, he has accomplished what Dana known vessel owner and owner of a marine Bowen and Dwight Boyer failed to do with delivery and reporting service, J. W. Westcott, illustrations, but his style of writing and his becomes a reporter for the Detroit Free Press. decision to use lengthy first-hand accounts re­ move from the reader the warmth and obvious Mr. Barry does an adequate job of visualiz­ personal affection for the lakes that have made ing the development of lake shipping by Bowen and Boyer so popular within the lakes singling out individual vessels or types of region. ships to suit his purpose. By so doing, the reader, as opposed to the casual observer, will find inconsistencies and omissions. One reads RICHARD J. WRIGHT about the bateau, then waits in vain to see Northwest Ohio-Great Lakes how this craft differed from the York and the Research Center, Durham boats, which are not mentioned, but Bowling Green State University 58 Pencil drawings in the Society's Iconography Collections, made from Captain James Van Cleave's watercolors of the Lake Erie steamer. Western World (above), and the Vandalia, which are reproduced in Ships of the Great Lakes.

-z:^ •">• ^ WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY AUTUMN, 1974

"That Disgraceful Affair," the Black Hawk claims, stemmed from Jacksonism which en­ War. By CECIL EBY. (W. W. Norton & Com­ couraged the blood-thirsty and mendacious pany, Inc., 1973. Pp. 354. Illustrations, notes, pioneers in their sport of Indian killing. bibliography, map, index. §9.95.) The narrative carries the reader through the war with clarity except for the numerous It has been more than 140 years since the asides where the author delights in assassinat­ Black Hawk War, and many accounts of it ing the integrity of most characters in the have appeared. Cecil Eby's book is likely to story. It is here that the book is weakest be­ be the last full-length study of the conflict- cause of inadequate use of other scholars' not because it has answered all the questions, work. For example, despite evidence that but rather because there seems little new of William Clark lacked the intelligence to significance to be added. Eby traces the war manipulate the Indians, Eby pictures him as from its roots in a fraudulently negotiated a Machiavellian plotting to subordinate the treaty in 1804 through the forced land cession tribesmen to the fur companies and land west of the Mississippi River in late 1832. speculators. In another instance Joshua Pil- Digging deeply into the treasure house of ma­ cher, Clark's successor as Indian Superinten­ terial at the Illinois State Historical Library, dent in the West, is described as being an he used all of the relevant primary material honest man who wanted to help the Indians. to weave an interesting and usually factually Such a claim would have flabbergasted Indi­ accurate narrative of the war. ans and whites who knew Pilcher and his dealings with the tribesmen. Once the reader Rather than viewing it as a spectacular or accepts such generalizations as rhetorical fluff, unusual event in American frontier develop­ he is usually safe to proceed through the book. ment, Eby considers the conflict a typical one. Although this study ignores much recent He suggests that it followed a regular pattern scholarship dealing with the U.S.-Indian rela­ begun with the destruction of the Pequot at tions and the role of the military in frontier Mystic and extending to the Vietnamese at settlement, it does provide the most up-to-date My Lai. The idea may have some accuracy, account of the Black Hawk War. but once stated, drops from view. Certainly the fighting between the Sac and Fox and their counterparts, the Illinois and Wisconsin pio­ ROGER L. NICHOLS neers, proved more typical than unusual in University of Arizona the annals of frontier conflict. The tale has many villains according to Eby. Illinois Governor John Reynolds, a man of little education and less integrity, sought war to bolster his sagging political fortunes. GENERAL HISTORY Rock Island trader George Davenport urged war hoping that the federal government would pay some $40,000 in claims which he The Impeachment and Trial of Andrew John­ had against the Sac and Fox tribes. President son. By MICHAEL LES BENEDICT. (W. W. Andrew Jackson, whose only crime in the nar­ Norton and Company, Inc., New York, 1973. rative is that of Indian-hater, and William Pp. xii, 212. Notes, bibliography, tables, ap­ Clark, the former explorer, are considered as pendix, index. $6.95.) important cogs in a vast white plot to destroy Indians. In addition to the timid and semi- In this brief but provocative monograph, competent General Henry Atkinson, who Michael Benedict provides a persuasive justifi­ commanded the troops in this war, other lesser cation for the impeachment process in gen­ scoundrels pass through the narrative. eral, and for the impeachment of Andrew The real villains are the pioneers them­ Johnson in particular. Correctly defining im­ selves. The author depicts them as a horde peachment as something political as well as of rabble, intent on grasping whatever the legal in nature, Benedict declares that this is regional wealth offered. They participated in the only available check upon a President's the war to get a look at the country prior to abuse of power and can be used even if his settlement, to get cash from the federal gov­ offenses are technically noncriminal. While ernment, and, most important, "to obtain he cites numerous English and Ainerican cases that supreme badge of frontier manhood, an to support his broad interpretation, the au­ Indian scalp." (p. 20) These motives, Eby thor also notes their ambiguity, and the ab- 60 BOOK REVIEWS sence of specifically pertinent precedents to not explain how Senator Conkling, for in­ presidential removal. In fact, he shows how stance, starts oiu as a "conservative" (55, 64) both Johnson's accusers and defenders used and ends up a "radical" (128, 130), nor how similar, sometimes identical, arguments to Salmon Chase goes through an opposite trans­ bolster their respective positions. formation (67, 136-137). From the facts pre­ At the same time, Benedict interrelates the sented, one is unsure whether these are real constitutional issues at stake with the political changes or whether they are merely products considerations bearing upon the members of of a nonspecific terminology. the 40th Congress—including potentially di­ Yet on the whole, this is an extremely im­ visive monetary and tariff questions, black pressive study. Benedict pays careful atten­ suffrage, and other Reconstruction programs, tion to procedural as well as final votes, to radical losses in the 1866 and 1867 elections, the options not followed as well as those that the struggle for the 1868 G.O.P. presidential were, and to the impact of external events nomination (and, indeed, for control of the and lobbyists' pressures upon Congressional party itself), etc. The result is a complex but behavior. Although clearly more sympathetic coherent and fast-moving discussion of one to the radicals, he concludes that Representa­ of the most controversial episodes in Ameri­ tives and Senators on both sides of the issues can history. were guided primarily by respect for the law and for the office of the Presidency. The re­ The book is not, however, without its weak­ sult is an important and readable piece of nesses, although they are, for the most part, work. relatively minor. Perhaps the most serious is Ironically, Benedict ends his book by de­ Benedict's contention that Johnson was nei­ claring that, due to the Senate's failure to ther the inept political demagogue depicted by convict Johnson, "the unquestionable fact re­ early historians such as Rhodes, nor the heroic mains that it is almost inconceivable that a "champion of the common man" portrayed in future president will be impeached." (180) tlie 1920's, nor tlie "outsider" of McKitrick's Obviously written before Nixon's removal had revision. Rather, he asserts, Johnson was a become a serious possibility. The Impeach­ skillful politician and "a very modern presi­ ment and Trial of Andrew Johnson has a dent, holding a view of presidential authority tone of scholarly detachment generally miss­ that has only recently been established." (180) ing from the myriad post-Watergate publica­ Benedict is certainly to be praised for his at­ tions. And because of this, Benedict's lucid tempt to counteract much of traditional his­ and well-documented discussion of the legal toriography, which accuses Congress of trying and political grounds for impeachment is per­ to usurp unauthorized power as it endeavored haps the best available starting point for to remove a President through lawful means. studying the recent presidential crisis. Yet, in the absence of sufficient new evidence, either about Johnson's personality and phil­ osophy or about the office of the Chief Execu­ PEGGY THOMPSON ECHOLS tive as it was perceived and used in the nine­ University of Wisconsin—Madison teenth century, Benedict's claims remain es­ sentially unsupported. One could argue just as easily, for example, that Lincoln's accretion of power during the war was far more "mod­ ern"—and more successfully so—than his suc­ Visionary Film: The American Avant-Garde. cessor's. By P. ADAMS SITNEY. (Oxford University Further, the author falls into the too-fre­ Press, New York, 1974. Pp. xii, 452. Photo­ quent trap of Reconstruction historians with graphs, notes, index. $13.95.) his use of the terms "radical" and "conserva­ tive" without clearly defining what he means If Jonas Mekas is the prime polemicist of by them. Surrounding his categories with the advance guard cinema and Stan Brakhage and trappings of science, Benedict tries to justify Gene Youngblood are its metaphysicians, P. his classification of individuals through the Adams Sitney emerges with this book as its use of scaling and gamma correlations (a chief historian. Visionary Cinema is an im­ notably weak statistic; the high coefficients pressive accomplishment. Sitney sees himself in this study should be examined critically), quite happily as a descendant of a venerable which relate key impeachment votes to other western critical lineage, and views avant-garde major issues (such as currency). But these do film as an extension of the Romantic tradi-

61 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY AUTUMN, 1974 tion in painting, poetry, and thought. Para­ tion . . . , the flicker effect, loop printing, doxically, he is a conservative scholar of a and rephotography off the screen." These are revolutionary art, the relationship of which to "static, epistomologically oriented films in commercial cinema he characterizes as one of which duration and structure determine, ra­ "radical otherness." ther than follow, content." There have been other historical studies of Finally, there occurs a "transition from the New American Cinema—notably those by structural to participatory modes." This type Mekas, Renan, Tyler, Battcock, Curtis, and has as its ostensible aim the eliciting of active Youngblood—and Sitney himself has edited an response and involvement on the part of the anthology of readings from the influential viewer. periodical. Film Culture. Useful as these Sitney maps what for most readers will be works have been (in Youngblood's case, vital). the terra incognita of the New American Cine­ Visionary Film is the most substantive and ma, laying a grid of historical and theoretical scholarly. structure over the film activity of five decades. According to Sitney, "the greatest un­ Despite the thoroughness of his scholarship acknowledged aspiration of the American and the integrity of his conclusion, the reader avant-garde film has been the cinematic repro­ is advised to keep in mind Korzybski's dictum, duction of the human mind. . . ." The aim of "the map is not the territory." this art has been the portrayal not of existence, Sitney's credentials as chronicler of avant- but of consciousness. The audiovisual experi­ garde film are impeccable. Man and boy he ence, by synecdoche, becomes perception, cog­ has been on scene as enthusiast and critic for nition, and, ultimately, transcendence itself. the three decades of its greatest energy and In demonstrating this thesis, Sitney con­ output. As close associate with Jonas Mekas structs a typology of film works and invents a at New York City's Anthology Film Archive, terminology which, despite its imprecision, he has enjoyed unique access to the most com­ will undoubtedly stick. There are, he suggests, plete collection of New American Cinema two main lines of development, both of which works anywhere. He has probably screened derive from Dadaism and through it from the bulk of the films mentioned more times nineteenth-century Romanticism. One has its than any other living being, their makers in­ roots in the Surrealist films made in France cluded. Yet it is well to remember that the in the 1920's by Bunuel, Cocteau, and Clair. views presented in his book are subject to the This line, termed "subjective" films, develops critical anamorphosis of his schematizing in­ through "trance" and "psychodrama" films, tent. in which somnambulist characters and the Sitney handles gracefully the film critic's personality of the artists themselves are the main problem: his subject by its very nature points of focus, to the "lyric" films, which eludes verbal description. Despite this there confront nature by restructuring it subjective- are several interminable passages that are less ly- criticism than mere descriptive exegesis. There The other line, which Sitney likewise traces are points where his scholarly objectivity de­ to the European "20's," begins in Cubism and volves to a convoluted and procrustean in- Neoplasticism with the films of Richter, Eggel- tellectualism seemingly devoid of an energiz­ ing, Duchamp, and Leger. This cinema type, ing value base. The book makes some strange termed "graphic," concerns itself with anima­ omissions, such major artists as Norman Mc­ tion, collage, and direct or nonphotographic Laren, Will Hindle, Scott Bartlett, John Sco- image generation. fil, and David Rimmer. It would be interest­ The two lines converge through "apocalyp­ ing to see how their work would fit Sitney's tic" and "picaresque" films, in which social categories. commentary is conducted in a context of Beat By subsuming it as a mere characteristic of irony and eschatological concerns, to "mytho­ Romanticism, the author fails to give adequate poetic" films, in which classically universal treatment to the influence of Eastern mystical themes and archetypal characters are em­ thought in the work of visionary film-makers, bodied in extended works of great denseness and, I think, in our culture generally. His and complexity. ability to do so, however, should he have This confluence of forms then gives rise to chosen to, is never in doubt. Visionary Cinema the "diary" films, cinematic "exercises in Ro­ will remain the dominant book in the field, mantic autobiography," and to "structural" if only because no one else is likely to have films, characterized by "fixed camera posi­ the vision, the discipline, or the access to 62 BOOK REVIEWS

master this vast corpus of film material. It ing psychological roots for seemingly incon­ deserves the renown it will no doubt earn. sistent views. Further, as Mrs. Brodie points out at the beginning of this book, Jefferson's JAMES HEDDLE biographers have persistently shied away from William James College the more intimate, particularly the sexual side of the man. By abandoning that reluctance, she claims to have grasped connections be­ tween his private and public selves through which "the whole unfolding tapestry of Jeffer­ son's life is remarkably illuminated. His am­ bivalences seem less baffling; the heroic image Thomas Jefferson: An Intimate History. By remains untarnished and his genius undimin­ FAWN M. BRODIE. (W. W. Norton & Com­ ished. And the semitransparent shadows do pany, New York, 1974. Pp. 591. Appendixes, tend to disappear." (32) In short, Mrs. Brodie notes, bibliography, index. $12.50.) believes that she has succeeded, where six generations of previous biographers have fail­ Addressing a dinner of Nobel Prize winners ed, in capturing the essence of Thomas Jeffer­ in 1963, John F. Kennedy quipped, "This is son. the most extraordinary collection of talent, of human knowledge that has ever been gathered In some measure the claim is justified. Jef­ together at the White House, with the possi­ ferson does emerge from these pages more ble exception of when Thomas Jefferson dined human and more comprehensible. The infer­ alone." Brilliance and versatility have made ences which Mrs. Brodie draws about his love the great Virginian the most fascinating of affairs with the English artist Maria Cosway the founders of the nation, and the continu­ and the slave woman Sally Hemmings rest for ing flow of literature about him attests the the most part on sound evidence and reason­ unabated interest in his life, thought, and ing. Likewise, her treatment of Jefferson's career. Yet despite vast collections of material family relations, first with his parents and and repeated, assiduous attempts to probe his later with his wife, daughters, and sons-in-law, mind and character, he remains the most sheds light on a number of aspects of his career elusive member of his great generation. Com­ and views. All of these are welcome and over­ pared with John Adams' pessimism and self- due contributions to an understanding of criticism, Alexander Hamilton's passions and Jefferson. But those contributions do not alternating ambition and idealism, or even make the book either an epochal revisionist George Washington's massive reserve, Jeffer­ work or a wholly satisfactory biography. son's peculiar optimism about human nature Mrs. Brodie's Thomas Jefferson suffers, I and his contradictory behavior have persist­ think, from two flaws in conception. One is ently defied efforts not only to understand a wrong estimate of the value of this kind of him but also to depict him as a believable "intimate history." For the biographer, unlike human being. Perhaps the most vexing prob­ the novelist, a person's inner life does not lem of all has been the disparity between his furnish a sufficient subject in itself but serves consistently radical libertarian credo and his simply to illuminate his or her outward status as a slaveowner who reputedly kept a achievements and failings. Aware of this re­ black mistress and fathered several mulatto quirement, Mrs. Brodie does try to link Jeffer­ children and who indisputably failed to free son's psychological patterns and personal ex­ more than a handful of bondsmen either dur­ periences with his public career. Yet the bi­ ing his lifetime or after his death. ography remains both skewed and strained. Both Jefferson's versatility and his contra­ Too much attention goes to Jefferson's "inner dictions would seem to make hiin an ideal sub­ life" in proportion to historical career which ject for the talents of Fawn M. Brodie. She that life is supposed to illuminate. The rela­ has previously written excellent biographies tion between his family situation and his ac­ of three diverse nineteenth-century characters tions during the Revolution receives balanced —the Mormon prophet Joseph Smith, the Rad­ treatment, but after that the diplomat in ical Republican Thaddeus Stevens, and the Paris during the 1780's, the politician of the British explorer, scholar, and adventurer Sir 1790's, and the President of the 1800's get pro­ Richard Burton. Each of those subjects pre­ gressively swallowed within the widower, sented intricate problems of divining motiva­ lover, and father. Similarly, the search for in­ tion behind often bizarre behavior and seek­ dividual psychological roots to Jefferson's po-

63 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY AUTUMN, 1974 litical views becomes highly forced. For ex­ has missed a fine opportunity for interpreting ample, his ambivalence towards slavery finds him in that context. little explanation beyond his probable sexual Finding fault with this book causes me re­ involvement with a black woman and his en­ gret because I admire Mrs. Brodie and sympa­ joyment of patriarchal authority over con­ thize with her intentions. Her books on Ste­ centric "families" at Monticello. Here, too, vens and Burton have established her as prob­ the sincere skeptic about racial equality, the ably the most gifted living American biogra­ practicing agriculturist, and the leader of a pher. Her desire to illuminate a public man's squirearchy disappear almost completely with­ thought and behavior by delving into his in the guilt-ridden miscegenationist and the psyche is commendable and does lead to im­ literal and figurative father-master. portant contributions. But this book repre­ The second flaw in the book's conception sents neither Mrs. Brodie's best work nor the is a corollary of the first. Inasmuch as nearly best treatment of Jefferson. The life of Bur­ all the quirks and contradictions in Jeffer­ ton, The Devil Drives, still ranks as her finest son's thinking are explained in individual biography. Those who seek a one-volume bi­ psychological, usually sexual terms, Mrs. Bro­ ography of Jefferson comparable to Benjamin die's interpretation skirts dangerously close to Thomas's Abraham Lincoln will not find it reductionism. This tendency is most damag­ here, or anywhere yet. The fullest, most sensi­ ing in the discussions of slavery. The gulf be­ tive depiction of Jefferson is the one in Dumas tween Jefferson's abhorrence of the peculiar Malone's still unfolding multi-volume work. institution and his continued, witting partici­ The shortest, most nearly comprehensive treat­ pation in it comes under scrutiny almost ex­ ment is Merrill Peterson's huge recent book, clusively as a matter of his personal engage­ which is really a two- or three-volume biogra­ ment with a slave mistress and the treatment phy disguised as one. The most rounded per­ accorded their offspring. Although those are sonal portrait remains that fascinating short interesting and almost certainly significant book written in the 1920's, Albert Jay Nock's aspects of the Virginian's life and thought, Jefferson. Mrs. Brodie's book complements they hardly comprise the totality of his in­ and amplifies those works, and it provides volvement with slavery and race. Missing is fascinating reading. But it does not fill the any sense of the far-reaching, convoluted am­ gap among Jefferson biographies which she bivalences, shortcomings, and divided emo­ has correctly identified and could have em­ tions with which liberal, humanitarian South­ ployed her talents so well in filling. ern whites have always confronted the caste system. Jefferson formed the archetype for succeeding generations of white Southerners JOHN MILTON COOPER, JR. of conscience and good will, and Mrs. Brodie University of Wisconsin—Madison

BOOK REVIEWS

Alderson and Alderson, The Man Mazzuchelli, Pioneer Priest, reviewed by Raphael N. Hamilton 56 Barry, Ships of the Great Lakes: 300 Years of Navigation, reviewed by Richard J. Wright 58 Benedict, The Impeachment and Trial of Andrew Johnson, reviewed by Peggy Thompson Echols 60 Blake, Cross and Flame in Wisconsin: The Story of United. Methodism in the Badger State, reviewed by J. Ellsworth Kalas 57 Brodie, Thomas Jefferson: An Intimate History, reviewed by John Milton Cooper, Jr 63 Eby, "That Disgraceful Affair," the Black Hawk War, reviewed by Roger L. Nichols 60 Sitney, Visionary Film: The American Avant-Garde, reviewed by James Heddle 61 64 Wisconsin from the author, Winnebago State Hospital, Winnebago, WI 54985.) History Checklist Winnebago State Hospital, near Oshkosh, admitted its first patients on April 21, 1873. Recently published and currently avail­ Known as Northern State Hospital until 1935, able Wisconsiana added to the Society's Libra­ Winnebago is one of two state hospitals that ry is listed below. The compilers, Gerald R. Egglcston, Acquisitions Librarian, and James care for the mentally ill. The early chapters P. Danky, Order Librarian, are interested in provide a chronological account of the hos­ obtaining information on (or copies of) items pital that stresses the administrative and pol­ that are not widely advertised, such as publi­ icy decisions made during its first one hun­ cations of local historical societies, family his­ dred years. The later chapters detail the vari­ tories and genealogies, privately printed works, ous services—from medical and nursing care and histories of churches, institutions, or or­ to the food service and post office—that are ganizations. .A,uthors and publishers wishing provided for patients. The author has made to reach a wider audience and also to perform a valuable bibliographic service are urged to extensive use of the superintendents' annual inform the compilers of their publications, reports and those of the state boards responsi­ including the following information: author, ble for the administration of state hospitals title, location and name of publisher, price, in Wisconsin. pagination, and address of supplier. Write James P. Danky, Acquisitions Section. Independent Insurance Agents of Wisconsin. A Brief History of Independent Insurance Agents of Wisconsin on the Occasion of Its Bade, Walter A. Railroads in Sheboygan 75th Anniversary, 1899-1974. [Cover title: County, A Brief History. Part 2. (Ply­ Independent Insurance Agents of Wisconsin mouth, Wisconsin, 1973. Pp. 12. No price 75 th Anniversary Yearbook, 1899-1974.\ listed. Available from the author, 116 For­ (Middleton, Wisconsin, 1974. Pp. 52. Illus. est Avenue, Plymouth, WI 53073.) No charge. Available from Mr. Paul H. Mast, Executive Secretary, Independent In­ A supplement to the author's Railroads in surance Agents of Wisconsin, P. O. Box 96, Sheboygan County, A Brief History. Part L 7427 Huijbard Avenue, Middleton, WI (See Wisconsin Magazine of History, 57:166, 53562.) Winter, 1973-1974.) E. J. Tapping of Milwaukee called for a Bates, Victor. Map of Ghost Towns, Old meeting of insurance agents, which was held Mining and Logging Towns of Northern on June 26, 1899, "for the purpose of organ­ Wisconsin and Northern Michigan. (Chi­ izing a State Association of Wisconsin Fire cago, Illinois?, 1969. 1 sheet. $3.00. Avail­ Insurance Agents." Member agents now ser­ able from the Northern Map Company, vice all types of insurance in every county in 2252 North Kildare Avenue, Chicago, IL Wisconsin. The booklet includes a portrait 60639.) gallery of past presidents, other historic pho­ tos, and a membership roster. The idea of exploring abandoned towns conjures up visions of distant places on the Kohler Company. Bold Craftsmen. (Kohler, frontier but the opportunity for discovery Wisconsin, 1973. Pp. 39. Illus. No charge. exists in Wisconsin too. Bates's map locates Available from the Public Affairs Depart­ sixty-five ghost towns in northern Wisconsin ment, Kohler Company, Kohler, WI 53044.) and northern Michigan and gives a short de­ scription of each site. The Wisconsin sites are The Kohler Company marked its first hun­ in Forest, Lincoln, Marinette, Oneida, and dred years of business in 1973. As part of the Price counties. centennial celebration, it published this pamphlet, dedicated to its employees, past [Note: This item is housed in the Map and present. John Michael Kohler, an Austri­ Section of the Society's Division of Archives- an immigrant, opened a foundry in Sheboy­ Manuscripts.] gan with $5,000 in capital and twenty-one employees. Today Kohler, long one of the Farrow, Julaine. Winnebago State Hospital, largest industries in the state, is a diversified, 1873-1973. (Winnebago, Wisconsin, 1973. multi-million dollar corporation producing Pp. 247. Illus. No price listed. Available plumbing fixtures, electric plants, engines.

65 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY AUTUMN, 1974 and precision controls. The last third of the ty Historical Society, 1115 North 18th Street, pamphlet is about the Kohler family, which Manitowoc, WI 54220.) was prominent in the state (Walter J. Kohler and Walter Kohler, Jr., were both governors John Nagle, who died in 1900, was a promi­ of Wisconsin), and on the development of nent citizen of Manitowoc and publisher of Kohler Village. the Manitowoc Pilot. He wrote a series of articles, later published in the Pilot in 1909, on the history of the county from 1818 to the Kress, John W. One of the Last 'Rugged In­ late 1870's. There is information on the geo­ dividualists'. (Sparta, Wisconsin?, 1972? logical, political, and economic development Pp. 86. Illus. $4.95. Available from the of the area and there are short accounts of author, 411 West Main Street, Sparta, WI the communities or townships of Eaton, New­ 54656.) ton, Schleswig, Cooperstown, Two Rivers, Nearly three-fourths of the book is a reprint Kossuth, Manitowoc, Rockland, Gibson, Cato, of the author's The Great Adventure (Sparta, Centerville, Liberty, Maple Grove, Meeme, Wisconsin, 1962) covering his service with the Two Creeks, Mishicot, and Manitowoc Rapids. 314th Regiment, 79th Division, American Ex­ A list of county and court officers of Manito­ peditionary Force in France during World woc County and a biography of Nagle taken War I. The first and last chapters of Kress's from Dr. Louis Falge's History of Manitowoc current book describe his business career, County, Wisconsin are included. mainly in merchandising, in Pittsburgh and Wisconsin. Reich, Dale E. A History of Whitewater. (Whitewater, Wisconsin, 1974. Pp. 24. Illus. La Pointe, Irene Walker. Captain William $1.50 plus 50 cents for mailing. Available Wilson and His Descendants: Founder of from the author, 805 East North Street, Menomonie, Wisconsin; First White to Whitewater, WI 53190.) Move His Family There and Establish a Permanent Home—July 4th, 1846. (York, Although Whitewater was established in South Carolina. 1974. Pp. [16]. No price 1837 the economic future of the village was listed. Available from Lewis Garrard Wil­ not secured until 1839 when Dr. James Trippe, son, Industrial Minerals, Inc., 3 South Con­ the "founding father," arrived from New gress Street, York, SC 29745.) York and erected his dam and grist mill. This history contains a series of articles on other A genealogical pamphlet on the Wilson subjects in Whitewater history, including family, originally compiled in 1948. Abraham Lincoln and the Black Hawk War, author and Governor George Peck, the Pratt Mead Public Library. Information Services. Institute (a "Mecca of Modern Spiritualism"), Sheboygan, Wisconsin. Index to History of and the Ku Klux Klan activities during the Sheboygan County, Wisconsin, Volume One, 1920's. Reich, the news editor of the White­ by Carl Zillier. (Sheboygan, Wisconsin, water Register, notes that all profits from the 1974. Pp. 36. $3.00. Available from Mrs. sale of the pamphlet will be used to maintain Carol J. Gibson, Information Librarian, the Whitewater Historical Society's Old Rail­ Mead Public Library, 709 North 7th Street, road Depot Museum. Sheboygan, WI 53081.) An index to Volume I of History of Sheboy­ St. Mary's School of Nursing, Madison, Wis­ gan County, Wisconsin; Past and Present, consin. Alumni Association. St. Marys edited by Carl Zillier (S. J. Clarke Publishing School of Nursing, 1923-1974. (Madison, Company, Chicago, 1912.) The Mead Public Wisconsin, 1974. Pp. 64. Illus. $5.00. Library staff is in the process of indexing Available from St. Mary's School of Nursing Volume II. Alumni Association, c/o Personnel Depart­ ment, St. Marys Hospital Medical Center, 720 South Brooks Street, Madison, WI Nagle, John. John Nagle's History of Mani­ 53715.) towoc County, Wisconsin. (Manitowoc County Historical Society Mo7iograph 22, On October 15, 1923, St. Mary's opened 1974 Series. Manitowoc, Wisconsin, 1974. with seven young women. This publication Pp. 19. Illus. $2.00. Available from Mr. celebrates St. Mary's first fifty years of service Edward Ehlert, Secretary, Manitowoc Coun­ to Wisconsin and the United States and in-

66 WISCONSIN HISTORY CHECKLIST

eludes the names and photographs of the ous Ojibwa settlements, and legends and nearly fifteen hundred graduates. stories.

Scott, Margaret Helen. Glory to Thy Name: Van Valkenberg, Philip. Wisconsin Bike A Story of a Church. (Richland Center, Trips. (Madison, Wisconsin, 1974. Pp. 48. Wisconsin, Richland County Publishers, Illus. $3.95. Available from Wisconsin 1973. Pp. 110, xiv. Illus. $3.82. Available Tales and Trails, Inc., Department W, P. from the author, 220 South Ira Street, Rich­ O. Box 5650, Madison, WI 53705.) land Center, WI 53581.) A bike trip through Wisconsin allows the A history of the Methodist Church (now rider to view many of the scenic and historic Trinity United Methodist Church) of Rich­ features of the state. Van Valkenberg, a bi­ land Center, Wisconsin, from 1855 to the cycle mechanic at the Yellow Jersey Bicycle present. This extremely detailed book con­ Co-op in Madison, describes twenty tours for tains a bibliography of primary and secondary adults and children. The introductory ma­ sources, an index, and many contemporary terial provides information on buying a bi­ and historic photographs. cycle, safety, and trip planning. Some of the tours (for example, the Elroy-Sparta State Shawano Area Writers and Shawano County Trail Ride) are part of the Wisconsin Bike- Historical Society, Inc. The Shawano Story, way, which runs from La Crosse to Kenosha, March 19, 1874-1974. [Cover title: The and is one of the longest trails in the United Shawano Story, Shawano Centennial 1874- States. The descriptions contain data on traf­ 1974, 100 Years of History.'] (Shawano, fic density, cycling difficulty, and combina­ Wisconsin, 1974. Pp. 177. Illus. $3.75. tion route and topographical maps by Michael Available from the Shawano Chamber of Duncanson. Most of the trips are in southern Commerce, 304 East Green Bay Street, and western Wisconsin, adjacent to urban Shawano, WI 54166.) areas.

Shawano, which means lake to the south Wietczykowski, Mary Ellen. Mt. Sinai Neigh­ in Menominee, was established on the Wolf borhood Walking Tour. (Milwaukee, Wis­ River during the development of the logging consin, 1973. Pp. 27. Illus. Enclose self- industry in the mid-nineteenth century. In­ addressed, stamped envelope. Available corporated as a city on March 19, 1874, Shaw­ from the Milwaukee Landmarks Commis­ ano is the county seat for Shawano County. sion, P. O. Box 324, Milwaukee, WI 53201.) The centennial booklet records the city's growth in terms of business and professional Mount Sinai, a small neighborhood on Mil­ firms, service and fraternal organizations, and waukee's near west side, is a historic section municipal services. that has witnessed dramatic change in recent years—expansion of Marquette University, Taylor, Lolita. Ojibwa, The Rice People. freeway construction, and the development of (Webster, Wisconsin, 1973. Pp. 81. No Mount Sinai Medical Center. Wietczykowski, price listed. Available from the author, in association with the Neighborhood Devel­ Webster, WI 54893.) opment Program and others, has surveyed thirty historic sites in the area bounded by The Ojibwa, or Chippewa, people migrated West State Street, West Kilbourn Avenue, centuries ago from the east coast of the United North Eleventh Street, and North Fifteenth States to the Lake Superior region. The Street. Previous pamphlets have described author has used information provided by the walking tours of the Juneautown, Walker's St. Croix and Lac Court Orielles bands of Point, and Kilbourntown areas of Milwaukee. Lake Superior Chippewa as part of the Ojibwa This pamphlet contains brief notes on each Opportunities Conference held in the spring site, a locational map, and photographs of of 1973. The eight chapters cover such topics twenty sites. Also available at no charge from as agriculture (maple sugaring and wild rice the Milwaukee Landmarks Commission is a gathering), the impact of Europeans, the vari­ folder entitled Milwaukee Landmarks.

67 Proceedings of the One Hundred and Twenty-eighth Annual Business Meeting of the State Historical Society of Wisconsin

Director's Report, 1973-1974

'ROFESSOR Robert Nesbit, the creditation Committee which visited the So­ prize-winning author of a new ciety's museum and historic sites, the three- one-volume history of Wisconsin published man visitation team observed that "the State in 1973, notes that "local history tends to look Historical Society of Wisconsin is an educa­ at the more smiling aspects of American life." tional organization with a long and distin­ So do annual reports, even though every ad­ guished record of service. Since its founding ministrative job, like local history, has its in 1846, it has labored diligently to fulfill its share of what Professor Merle Curti has obligation as an American history research labeled "the hard, realistic, seamy side of dis­ institution. It has seldom failed in its mission appointments and failures." to preserve the historical and cultural re­ Let's look at the "smiling aspects" of this sources of Wisconsin, the Midwest and the past year of Society activities first. nation, and to make this record available to On the whole, it has been a very good year, the public in a variety of ways. The Visiting thanks in large part to the support which Committee of the AAM was impressed with Governor Lucey and the state legislature gave the history museum and historic sites func­ to the Board of Curators' budget request for tion of this institution and strongly recom­ the 1973-1975 biennium. The Society made mends its accreditation." a special plea in 1973 that appropriations be Another indication of an increasing histor­ increased in order to restore the quality of ical interest as the Bicentennial approaches its program in library, archival, and collecting is the rapid increment in the number of coun­ services; to upgrade its program in historic ty, local, and specialized historical .societies sites, museum, and research services; and to and museums affiliated with the State His­ gear up in order to meet more effectively the torical Society of Wisconsin. In the years be­ increased demands which will accompany re­ tween 1898 and 1959, sixty societies affiliated newed interest in the history of the state and with the Historical Society, an average of one nation during the Bicentennial era. per year. During the period from 1960 There were two major highpoints of the through 1972, the affiliation rate averaged year: (1) the accreditation by the American four per year. But during the past year, fif­ Association of Museums of the Society's Mu­ teen new societies have become affiliates of seum and its five historic sites: Villa Louis, the State Society, reaching a grand total of Stonefield, Pendarvis, Wade House, and 126. Organized into the Wisconsin Council Madeline Island (Circus World Museum had for Local History, they have concentrated this won accreditation in 1972); and (2) the dedi­ year on a co-operative program in historical cation of Old World Wisconsin, the outdoor preservation in conjunction with the Wiscon­ ethnic museum which is the state's major Bi­ sin American Revolution Bicentennial Com­ centennial project. In the report of the Ac­ mission and the State Historical Society.

68 PROCEEDINGS: 1973-1974

The major state Bicentennial project is Old this year equaled the total card production World Wisconsin, the outdoor ethnic museum of 1972-1973. being developed near Eagle by the State His­ In addition to increased state funding, the torical Society in conjunction with the State Society received support for its library from Department of Natural Resources. At the two new sources for the first time. Changes Society's Annual Meeting in June, Old World in the Higher Education Act brought the Wisconsin was the central focus of the pro­ Library a basic grant as a research library gram. Professor John Higham of Johns Hop­ which supports library facilities of academic kins University talked about "Ethnic Diversity institutions. And financial support was re­ and American Unity," Richard W. E. Perrin ceived from the Wisconsin Interlibrary Loan discussed "Wisconsin's Ethnic Architecture," System to develop the Library's resources in Roger Axtell and John W. Winn analyzed the statewide interlibrary loan network that "Old World Wisconsin: Progress and Plans," is being developed through the Council of and Mrs. John C. Weaver spoke about the Wisconsin Librarians. 125th anniversary of the University of Wis­ The acquisition of printed materials in the consin. areas of United States and Canadian national Congressman Henry W. Reuss, whose major and local history and genealogy expanded gift in 1970 made it possible to launch work rapidly during the year. Particular emphasis at the outdoor ethnic museum, gave the key­ was placed on acquiring and cataloging ephem­ note address at dedication ceremonies at Old eral publications of social and political or­ World Wisconsin on June 8. In addition to ganizations in the United States, and some village, town, county, and state representa­ 5,000 new titles were added to this collection. tives, Ernest Knuti, consul for Finland, Rolf All of the Presidential papers offered on film Horn, consul of the German Federal Repub­ by the Library of Congress have now been lic, and Joachim Peters, cultural representa­ acquired. The Readex collection of Early tive of the Pomeranian Society of Germany, American Newspapers on microprint was also were specially invited guests. Mrs. Dudley acquired as a supplement to the fine collec­ W. Pierce, regent of the Wisconsin Chapter tion of original colonial papers already in the of the Daughters of the American Revolution, Library. Substantial additions were made to presented a flagpole and flag to the Society the collections of American Indian and black and presided at the flag-raising ceremony at newspapers, and a beginning was made in the site. acquiring the 1880 census population sched­ ules for states east of the Mississippi which are now complete through 1870. In the areas of finding aids and bibliograph­ ic control of the collections, two numbers of N ADDITION to these highlights, the Wisconsin Public Documents checklist, I the Society made a substantial for 1972 and 1973, were published during the number of advances in each of its divisions. year, and the staff hopes to keep current on Increased appropriations have made it possi­ this publication in the future. Acquisitions ble in the first year of the biennium to re­ staff members are reviewing current Wiscon­ turn for the first time since 1969 to an acceler­ sin publications in the quarterly numbers of ated book purchasing program in order to the Wisconsin Magazine of History. The re-establish the Library as a major research author-title section of the public catalog was collection. In the first seven months of this published in microfiche in June by Green­ fiscal year an expanded Library staff acquired wood Press to supplement the Library's sub­ more books (5,735) than it had acquired in ject catalog which was published by Green­ a comparable period last year (4,286). The wood in book form in 1971. The Library Library has also speeded up the reclassifica­ staff is also cataloging the broadside collec­ tion of its holdings from the old, outmoded tion; and the pamphlet subject catalog, form­ Cutter system to the modern Library of Con­ erly a separate listing, has been integrated gress system, moving belatedly into the twen­ into the general subject catalog under stand­ tieth century in order to make its resources ard Library of Congress headings. The in­ more usable by the public. The staff reclassi­ valuable "Wisconsin Necrology" scrapbooks, fied more titles in November, December, and numbering fifty-one volumes and containing January this past winter (2,241) than in the more than 24,500 obituaries of Wisconsinites whole year of 1972 (2,051). The production from 1846 to 1944, were made available for of catalog cards in the first eight months of purchase on seven reels of microfilm.

69 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY AUTUMN, 1974

The microfilming of the bound volumes have provided leads to significant collections, of rag stock Wisconsin newspapers should be met with local officials about transfer of their completed in the immediate weeks ahead. records, and furnished reference service on Although the Society has cast a fine net for local records in their custody. The Coordin­ many decades to acquire Wisconsin news­ ator for Area Research Centers, John Fleck- papers, occasional titles new to the collection ner, has built stronger ties between the Cen­ are still being discovered, and the Library is ters, the State Archives, and local government grateful to all who made possible the filming officials through an extensive program of per­ of papers from Manawa, Ogdensburg, Westby, sonal contacts and publications. Finally, to Niagara, Florence, Tigerton, and Manitowoc. enhance the research use of local government In the Division of Archives and Manu­ archives, the State Archives has nearly com­ scripts, the staff continued to demonstrate its pleted reclassifying and recataloging all its ability to ingest, process, and service ever in­ present holdings of materials at the Area Re­ creasing amounts of archival material with search Centers. but modest increase in staff and facilities. But Third, the Map Collection is a rich com­ in addition to these necessary, if less than bination of the very old and the new. In little glamorous accomplishments, the Division over a year it has changed from a static to a notably improved the quality of its programs dynamic collection both in terms of accessions and extended the boundaries of its services and patron use. To make its holdings more to the public in three special areas. widely known, the Society inaugurated a pub­ First, the Iconography Section revived and licity program featuring exhibits, class visits expanded an exhibitions program in an effort to inspect the collection, and the preparation to get the Society's extensive photographic of published guides. Nearing completion is collections before the public. Loan exhibits a short brochure giving a general view of the have been sent to the Wisconsin Academy of Collection, and a checklist of the absorbing Sciences, Arts and Letters, and the Wisconsin late nineteenth-century bird's-eye views of Bar Association and the Steenbock Memorial Wisconsin's towns and cities. This checklist Library at the University of Wisconsin-Madi­ will include not only those pictographic maps son are planning exhibitions in conjunction at the Society but also those held by other with the Iconographic collections. The sec­ historical societies, museums, and libraries tion also participated in a major poster exhi­ across the state. A similar checklist of United bition at the John Michael Kohler Arts Cen­ States Geological' Survey quadrangle sheet ter in Sheboygan. In addition, there is a maps of Wisconsin is being compiled jointly twelve-page supplement on "Americans at by the Society, which has a complete set dating Home" in the Society's 1975 calendar. back to the issuance of the first sheets in the Second, the State Historical Society has had 1890's, and the map libraries of the Geogra­ for a quarter of a century a statutory responsi­ phy Departments at UW-Madison and UW- bility "to take an active interest in the preser­ Eau Claire. Preliminary work has begun on vation and use of the noncurrent public rec­ a guide to the great number of maps and ords of historical importance of counties, atlases in the Collection drawn or published cities . . . and other local governmental units." prior to 1800. During the past year there was a greatly in­ creased return on the Society's long-term in­ vestment in its archives program for local governments. The Society acquired a record N TERMS of extension programs, 1,169 cubic feet of historically valuable docu­ I the staff is in the process of pre­ ments from twenty-three counties, eleven paring Bicentennial exhibits for the Museum towns and villages, sixteen cities, and fifteen and the Historymobile. A new visitor center school districts. The Society's thirteen Area has been constructed at Pendarvis in Mineral Research Centers, located at twelve state uni­ Point. In design and layout are new visitor versities and one private institution (North­ centers for Wade House and Villa Louis. And land College), were integral to this program. the new fur trade exhibit in the Astor Fur Local government records acquired by the Warehouse at Villa Louis will be installed Society are placed on permanent deposit in this coming year. A number of small jobs the appropriate regional center where they have been completed, such as the rewiring of are more readily available to both the donat­ Tamblyn's Row in Mineral Point, where ing officials and to local researchers. Curators curator Bill Kitto wrote that "the lights no of the ARCs on the co-operating campuses longer flicker and dim when the refrigerator

70 PROCEEDINGS: 1973-1974 goes on." The new addition to the Jung dex, almost identical in length, had to be Carriage Museum at Wade House is currently priced at $9.50. In addition, the editor pre­ under construction, and new exhibits at Made­ pared the annual index and copy edited and line Island are planned. saw through the press the current cumulated At the Society Museum there is a new regis­ edition of the checklist, Wisconsin Public trar so that day-to-day cataloging of artifact Documents, which lists 1,043 publications is­ materials can continually update the Mu­ sued by the various departments of state gov­ seum's inventory of its holdings. The position ernment during 1972. was authorized by the legislature in the cur­ Within the publishing year, the Magazine rent biennial budget and helped bring the published seventeen major articles, selected Museum program to the level of professional from the more than 150 manuscripts sub­ competence necessary for national accredita­ mitted for consideration, as well as sixty-one tion. The legislature also approved an alloca­ book reviews—half again as many as those tion of $40,500 for restoration of the Society's published in any other state quarterly. Each painting collection in order to make it ex- issue totaled eighty-eight pages, representing hibitable by 1976. a volume of over 300,000 printed words, or In research and publications, the legislature roughly the equivalent of four average-length authorized a new program in oral history in books. conjunction with the Society's existing pro­ The enthusiastic reception by both scholar­ grams in research, field services, and archives ly and popular reviewers of Alice E. Smith's and manuscripts. The result of this planning The History of Wisconsin, Volume I: From and preparation is an oral history program Exploration to Statehood has amply justified that will serve the needs of the Society and the faith, vision, and generosity of the public the state in at least three ways. The Society and private agencies involved in this unpre­ program will focus its own interviewing on cedented undertaking. Two items are worthy important selected areas of Wisconsin's his­ of special mention. The Milwaukee Journal, tory, such as agricultural or business history, which serialized nearly half the book during while assuring enough flexibility to take ad­ the spring and summer of 1973, was suffi­ vantage of interview opportunities in other ciently impressed with the response that it areas when they arise. It will provide a co­ will consider similar treatment of the succeed­ ordinating and clearinghouse service for all ing five volumes. And the distribution of Society interviewing and for other oral history 1,256 copies of Volume I to public libraries, programs elsewhere in the state. And, as far schools, and affiliated historical societies, fi­ as the program's resources will permit, it will nanced by the Wisconsin legislature, placed offer technical advice and assistance to other the book within easy reach of every citizen in individuals and organizations interested in the state. The volume has already won awards helping to supplement the record of the past as the best book in its field from the Council by means of oral history. for Wisconsin Writers and the Gambrinus The most important events affecting the Society—Milwaukee County Historical Society. Wisconsin Magazine of History during the During the past year the Society Press pub­ year relate to format changes. After fifty-six lished five books, including a reprint and an years of letterpress production, the magazine annotated edition of an older book. They switched to offset printing. Beginning with were: the autumn issue a wholly new format, de­ signed by Gary Gore of the Vanderbilt Uni­ Peter J. Coleman, Debtors and Creditors versity Press, was adopted, involving a new in America: Insolvency, Imprisonment cover design, different type faces, wider col­ for Debt, and Bankruptcy, 1607-1900. umn lines, and other modifications which have James P. Danky (ed.). Undergrounds: A increased the legibility and attractiveness of Union List of Alternative Publications in the journal. Libraries of the United States and Cana­ The decennial index, covering the period da. 1962-1972 (vols. 46-55), and containing some 40,000 entries, was completed by Editor Wil­ Emanuel L. Philipp, Political Reform in liam C. Haygood and published in January. Wisconsin: A Historical Review of the As an indicator of what inflation has done Subjects of Primary Election, Taxation, to printing costs, it may be noted that the and Railway Regulation (revised and previous decennial index, published in 1964, edited by Stanley P. Caine and Roger E. was priced at $3.00, whereas the present in­ Wyman).

71 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY AUTUMN, 1974

George Fiedler, Mineral Point: A History materials were a diary and letters concerning (reprint). two trips to California during the gold rush William C. Haygood (ed.), Wisconsin Maga­ days, along with Civil War letters, all written zine of History: Decennial Index to Vol­ by Captain E. S. Redington of Whitewater, umes 46-55, Autumn, 1962 — Summer, Wisconsin. In Wisconsin politics, the Society 1972. received from McDonald, Davis & Associates more films and tapes of Wisconsin political In 1973, the five sites operated directly by campaigns, primarily of Republican candi­ the Society (Villa Louis, Stonefield, Pendarvis, dates for elective office; the records of the Wade House, and Madeline Island) had Democratic Youth Caucus of Wisconsin; and 162,684 visitors, compared to a total of 159,394 the Wisconsin Democratic party of Portage in 1972. At the end of 1973, the five sites had County. Additional materials were added to a grand total attendance since their openings the papers of Thomas Amlie, Walter Chilsen, of 2,157,848. During the 1973 season, the So­ Melvin R. Laird, Philip La Follette, and ciety-owned Circus World Museum at Baraboo Donald Peterson. attracted a total of 195,518 visitors. The Society's resources in Wisconsin busi­ The 1973-1974 biennial building budget in­ ness history were augmented by two new col­ cluded the largest number of historic sites lections of considerable size—the records of projects in Society history. Among the projects the Reedsburg Woolen Mills, and the E. P. completed during 1973-1974 were the gate­ Sherry Papers, containing the records of the house at Pendarvis and the 1890 farmhouse at Flambeau Paper Company, the Wisconsin Stonefield. Other projects initiated during Realty Company, and other family business fiscal 1973-1974 include an 1890 barn, con­ ventures, covering the period from 1885-1940. fectionery, doctor's office, broom factory, and In labor history, we acquired the noncurrent honey house for Stonefield. At Wade House records of the Wisconsin Federation of Teach­ an addition which will provide 50 per cent ers, the records of Madison Local 1404 of the more exhibit space and a long-needed work­ United Steel Workers of America, and addi­ shop is under way for the Jung Carriage tional materials from the Wisconsin State Museum. Council of Carpenters. The Dane County So­ cial Planning Agency donated its records to the Society. There were additions to the rec­ TTEMPTING to maintain a ords of the Wisconsin Federation of Coopera­ k balance between time devoted tives and the Wisconsin Dental Association. to Wisconsin collecting and to the specialized Four new collections were made a part of the areas posed a continuing challenge for the Wisconsin Jewish Archives. Field Services Division in 1973-1974. During Professor Emeritus Cecil Burleigh of the this past year, that Division gave priority to UW School of Music donated his papers; and the summary inventory of the Mass Communi­ Emeritus Professors of Law Nathan Feinsinger cations History Center and to the revision of and William G. Rice added materials to their the inventory of the Social Action Collection. collections. Elizabeth Brandeis and Paul Both have been put in mimeographed form, Raushenbush donated the transcript of their primarily for the use of researchers and pro­ taped interview concerning Wisconsin's Un­ spective donors of materials. In Wisconsin employment Compensation Act, the first in field work, members of the Division decided the nation. More materials were added to two to direct their immediate attention to locating collections of family papers of early Madison twentieth-century family letters, diaries, and settlers, the Joseph W. Jackson, Sr., and the photographs. W. A. P. Morris families. Alonzo Pond, Wis­ From July 1, 1973, through June 30, 1974, consin-born anthropologist, deposited an in­ the Field Services staff traveled 27,278 miles itial installment of his papers. The Icono­ to 143 localities in thirty-eight different coun­ graphic Section received two substantial col­ ties; contacted, by visit, letters, or phone calls, lections of photographs of Wisconsin com­ 1,758 donors or prospective donors; and ac­ munities covering the period 1895 to 1959. cessioned 1,337 gifts of manuscripts, books, In U.S. history, the papers of Fowler Mc­ and artifacts. Cormick, the grandson of Cyrus McCormick, Donations of manuscripts pertaining to have been added to the McCormick Collec­ Wisconsin history covered a variety of sub­ tion. The papers of the late Everett D. Hawk­ jects and spanned a time period from state­ ins, a former UW professor, and a taped inter­ hood through 1972. Among the earliest dated view with Mrs. Henriette Epstein (accom- 72 PROCEEDINGS: 1973-1974 panied by the 200-page transcript) have en­ fit made in Paris, France, in 1893; a wire re­ larged our resources relating to the history corder; a kerosene stove; and a group of fresh­ of social security. In U.S. labor history, the water clam dredging implements. Society acquired a substantial addition from Among the total of twenty accessions for the Amalgamated Meat Cutters and Butcher the Circus World IVfuseum were a Ringling Workmen of North America which included Brothers Barnum &: Bailey commissary wagon; records prior to its merger with the United an original circus bandwagon from the King Packinghouse Workers of America as well as Brothers' Circus of 1955; a circus cage wagon; post-merger materials. The Society also be­ a midget's wardrobe; more than 100 original came the repository for the records of the New circus lithographs; and a number of taped York office of the International Confedera­ interviews on the circus. tion of Free Trade Unions. There were also twenty-one accessions for New collections donated to the Social Ac­ Old World Wisconsin, among which were tion Collection were diverse in subject matter. four structures—one Finnish house, two Finn­ Among the acquisitions were the records of ish barns, and a third log barn—and a variety the New University Conference; Women's of Finnish, Norwegian, and German house­ National Abortion Action Coalition; the hold items. Spartacist League; and Bearings for Re-estab­ Finally, the activities of the State Historic lishment. Also donated were two collections Preservation Office increased substantially pertaining primarily to miscellaneous peace during the year. This office administers the and social concern groups in Milwaukee. federal-state program in historic preservation, The Mass Communications History Center nominating archeological, architectural, his­ received the following new collections: in torical, and cultural sites to the National journalism, the papers of Lewis Sebring, war Register of Historic Places, a select list of correspondent for the New York Herald Tri­ properties deemed especially worthy of preser­ bune, and the late Walker Stone, former vation for their historic value. The statewide Scripps-Howard newsman; in broadcasting, inventory of such sites, from which nomina­ the papers of Gerald Bartell, former chairman tions to the Register are made, was nearly of the Bartell Media Corporation; Frederick doubled during the year by the addition of Fox, designer for stage and TV; John Mac- 745 new sites. At the present time there are Vane of the American Broadcasting Company; 110 Wisconsin sites listed on the National M. S. Novik, radio consultant for the AFL- Register. In addition, the Preservation Office CIO and long-time supporter of educational co-sponsored two conferences, the Midwestern broadcasting; in public relations, the papers Architectural Conference held in Madison in of Gordon Gilmore, former vice-president. November, 1973, and the Conference on Pres­ Public Relations, of Trans World Airlines. ervation and Taxation held in Milwaukee in Among the new collections established by May, 1974. The first was co-sponsored in con­ the Wisconsin Center for Theatre Research junction with the National Trust for Historic were those of actor Hal Holbrook; film and Preservation and the Wisconsin Chapter of TV writer Claude Binyon; playwright and the American Institute of Architects, and the novelist Ronald Tavel; TV writer and UW second was co-sponsored with the Wisconsin Professor of Communication Arts Jerry Mc- American Revolution Bicentennial Commis­ Neely; and TV documentary producers Terry sion with assistance from a grant made by the Miller Adato, Isaac Kleinerman, and Ernest Wisconsin Humanities Committee, an agency Pendrell. The WCTR also became the re­ of the National Endowment for the Humani­ pository for the archives of the American ties. Community Theatre Association and the ar­ An increasing flood of Environmental Im­ chives of the New York Theatre. pact Statements is coming in for review to The Society also recorded 158 accessions for make sure that projects will not cause damage the Museum. Among the gifts received were to the historical, cultural, and environmental a collection of 224 souvenir spoons, accom­ resources of the state. panied by photographs and books about the collection; pottery items made by New Mexico Indians; a collection of Eskimo soapstone carvings; an ebony commode; three carved Chinese lamps; a rotisserie reputed to be 130 OT ONLY has the legislature years old and brought from France by a settler N< been strong in its support of in the Ashland community; a christening out­ Society activities; so also have the members 73 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY AUTUMN, 1974 of the Society and its donors. The year-end the integrity of open stacks, since the oppor­ giving campaign brought in $24,000 last year, tunity to explore the stacks freely is a great up from 37,700 in 1972, and the goal for next aid to research. year is $40,000. Gifts and grants for Old In terms of storage space, the Society build­ World Wisconsin included $25,000 from the ing, which was expanded and remodeled in Janesville Foundation and $500 from the Tall- 1968, already lacks space for library materials, man Trust through the efforts of Mr. Axtell; museum and Old World Wisconsin artifacts, S6,000 of a $20,000 pledge from an anonymous and archival materials. During the coming donor; a $1,000 payment on a pledge of the year we shall begin a feasibility study of al­ proceeds from the Ethnic Cookbook by the ternative means of coping with the space and Wauwatosa Junior Women's Club; $2,500 storage problem. from the Federation of Women's Clubs of In special funding, the Society still has a Wisconsin; $15,672 from the Wisconsin Amer­ desperate need for funds for the development ican Revolution Bicentennial Commission; of Old World Wisconsin from private sources $2,700 from the Milwaukee Branch, American as well as from the legislature. The Museum's Association of University Women; and $45,000 costume replication project has been partially from the Department of Health, Education funded, and applications for additional grants and Welfare for an Ethnic Heritage research are pending. And there is a list of Bicenten­ program. nial projects that will require private funding. Grants from the National Endowment for As we prepare for the Bicentennial in Wis­ the Humanities and the National Endowment consin and the United States, it seems worth­ of the Arts included $6,000 for the exhibit while to contemplate an observation made of "Americans at Home" in the museum and recently by Julian P. Boyd, the distinguished $2,000 for a survey of humidity control in editor of the Papers of Thomas Jefferson: the building relating to the preservation of Our historic shrines, our parks, our restora­ artifacts. Received from the Bassett Founda­ tions, our pageants and our monuments tion was $4,550 for publication of booklets on constitute a vast textbook across the land, the historic sites, $4,000 for processing the wherein millions of people may deepen Evjue Papers, and $500 for a research project their experience, renew their acquaintance on Frank Lloyd Wright from the Evjue with the roots of their institutions, and Foundation. Also received was $57,000 from occasionally encounter those rare moments the sale of land in the Apostle Islands donated of imderstanding and insight that regener­ by Mr. and Mrs. Leo Capser, and $30,000 from ate our strength. the sale of duplicate circus lithographs at the Circus World Museum, which also received The preservation of the history of all of the an anonymous contribution of $5,000. Recent­ people of Wisconsin, the Midwest, and the ly the Kohler Foundation donated a piece of United States—the sole purpose of the State land across from the Wade House so that it Historical Society of Wisconsin—gives all of can be landscaped to make a more attractive us a connection with the past and with the approach to the site. American heritage that can, and I hope will On the seamy side, the Society has had in its modest way, yield that understanding three major problems: security, storage space, and those insights which Professor Boyd so and special funding. The side doors on Lang- eloquently states. If the Bicentennial does no don and State streets have long since been more than that, it will serve a useful purpose closed off, and there is now a checkout point in these post-Watergate years. at the Mall entrance to cut down on losses of items through theft. Moreover, an iron cage Respectfully submitted, was installed in 1974 for storage of the more JAMES MORTON SMITH valuable items. But the library still preserves Director

74 *»^,.

Scenes from the June 8th dedication ceremonies at Old World Wisconsin, the Society's outdoor ethnic museum near Eagle, Waukesha County: (above) Con­ gressman Henry S. Reuss, whose generous gift of fl00,000 got the project under way, delivers the prin­ cipal address; (above right) participating in the ground­ breaking are (left to right) James Morton Smith, Society director, Rolf Horn, German Consul in Chicago, Repre­ sentative Henry Reuss, Ernst Knuti, Finnish Consul in Chicago, Howard W. Mead, Society president, Joachim Peters, Cultural Minister, Pomeranian Society of Ger­ many, representative of Schleswig-Holstein, and Richard W. E. Perrin, retired city planner of Milwaukee and architectural historian; (middle right) the B.G.T.E.V.D' Holzacher Buam Bavarian folk dancers, led by R. E. Unger of Menomonee Falls, one of the groups of singers and dancers which appeared on the dedication program; and (below right) the First Brigade Civil War Band, directed by Fred Benkovic of Wauwatosa, gives a con­ cert, using instruments and musical arrangements of the Civil War period. (Photos by John W. Winn.)

75 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY AUTUMN, 1974

Statistical Appendix

LIBRARY

Acquisitions 1967-68 1968-69 1969-70 1970-71 1971-72 1972-73 1973-74 Bound Volumes 6,820 6,904 5,165 5,744 6,324 6,233 6,608 Pamphlets 4,002 4,636 2,952 1,699 3,816 2,688 3,806 Government Documents (items) 8,704 11,280 2,175 11,385 10,035 3,555 7,350 Reels of Microfilm 7,772 7,055 5,841 5,536 5,653 7,365 7,298 Sheet Microformats 16,856 17,409 14,341 14,850 13,999 12,557 21,243 Total acquisitions 44,154 47,284 30,474 39,214 39,827 32,398 46,305

Persons Served Stack and carrel admissions .... 40,396 36,676 34,358 39,027 36,051 31,049 36,201 Reading room service 10,948 8,056 8,925 10,239 9,811 9,638 7,863 Microforms reading room 9,147 11,168 11,389 9,856 10,014 11,655 13,835 Borrowed for home use 19,649 21,649 17,256 18,033 19,428 18,416 19,130 Correspondence 1,770 1,791 1,848 1,896 1,932 1,961 2,147 Total 81,910 79,340 73,776 79,051 77,236 72,719 79,176

Circulation S istics—Books and Reels of Microfilm Reading room use 55,794 68,176 66,493 65,159 59,002 64,587 71,242 Home use 42,034 43,273 37,905 41,745 43,041 41,743 47,328 Total 98,008 111,449 104,398 106,904 102,043 106,330 118,570

Total Library Holdings Bound Volumes 168,881 Government Documents (items) 279,285 Pamphlets 381,119 Reels of Microfilm 102,967 Sheet Microformats 287,206 Total 1,219,458

MUSEUM

Historymobile 1971-72 1972-73 1973-74 Cities visited 106 83 80 Number of operating days 194 216 193 Number of hours open 1,481 1,878 1,403 Mileage traveled 2,812 2,110 2,792 Attendance: Adults 20,477 25,127 5,564 Children 67,363 84,111 51,440

HISTORIC SITES

Attendance 1971 1972 1973 Stonefield 40,383 41,904 38,861 Old Wade House 34,294 35,526 41,534 Villa Louis 49,809 53,427 49,940 Madeline Island 16,032 17,736 18,974 Circus World Museum 211,346 208,485 195,518 Pendarvis 6,371 10,801 13,375 76 PROCEEDINGS: 1973-1974

ARCHIVES AND MANUSCRIPTS

Materials Organized and Cataloged Manuscripts

Total 1971-72 1972-73 1973-74 Collections Items added to the collections 2,511,990 1,492,030 1,496,452 21,794,870

Public Records: Cubic Feet State records 1,434 1,160 1,094 19,609 County records 233 510 571 4,081

Patronage: Annual Registration by Locality Wisconsin 1,328 1,387 1,537 Other states 312 382 457 Foreign 18 29 24 Total 1,658 1,798 2,018

Patronage: Persons Served Manuscripts 3,149 3,495 3,541 Maps 640 806 771 Archives 857 879 1,137 Iconography 633 1,152 3,074 Area Research Centers 3,117 2,838 3,041 Reference requests (mail and telephone) 2,163 2,076 3,582 Total 10,559 11,246 15,146

Geographic Distribution of Donors 1973-1974

Alabama 6 Maine 3 Rhode Island 1 Alaska 1 Maryland 10 South Carolina 3 Arizona 10 Massachusetts 10 South Dakota 2 Arkansas 2 Michigan 14 Tennessee 7 California 42 Minnesota 22 Texas 18 Colorado 3 Mississippi 4 Utah 2 Connecticut 6 Missouri 9 Vermont 1 Delaware 2 Montana 2 Virginia 14 District of Columbia 26 Nebraska 5 Washington 5 Florida 17 New Hampshire 2 West Y'irginia 1 Georgia 8 New Jersey 16 Wisconsin 546 Hawaii 5 New Mexico 3 Idaho 3 New York 63 Canada 17 Illinois 33 North Carolina 6 England 2 Indiana 7 North Dakota 1 Panama 1 Iowa 16 Ohio 11 Virgin Islands 1 Kansas 10 Oklahoma 3 Wales 1 Kentucky 7 Oregon 5 West Germany 5 Louisiana 3 Pennsylvania 15 Total 1,038 77 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY AUTUMN, 1974

Digest of Board Actions

At Green Bay, October 20, 1973

• Approved report of Awards Committee rec­ Approved the operating agreement between ommending the following awards to be pre­ the Society and the Historic Sites Founda­ sented at the Annual State Convention of tion for operation of the Circus World the Wisconsin Council for State and Local Museum for a three-year period ending De­ History: Reuben Gold Thwaites Trophy to cember 31, 1976; tlie Barron County Historical Society; Cer­ Approved applications for affiliation of the tificates of Commendation to the Albion Adams County Historical Society, the Ger- Academy Historical Society, the La Crosse mantown Historical Society, the Greater County Historical Society, and the South Sinissippi Historical Society, and the Haese Wood County Historical Corporation; Local Memorial Village Historical Society; History Awards of Merit to Dr. Rachel Salisbury, Milton Junction; William Starke, Approved request for continuance of affilia­ Fort Atkinson; and Clifford Townsend, Al­ tion of the Chippewa County Historical bion; Society; • Approved the recommendations of the His­ Adopted the historic sites budgets for 1974 toric Sites Policy Committee that the Wolf recommended by the Historic Sites Com­ house at Monches be sold and the funds re­ mittee; ceived be devoted to Old World Wisconsin, and that the Society purchase the Emslie Adopted a resolution endorsing Heritage house, Mineral Point, spending up to Hill State Park as a project of statewide $23,500 from ORAP funds; historical significance; • Reaffirmed as sound and orderly the cur­ Adopted the Historic Sites Policy and Execu­ rent procedures established by the Local tive Committees' recommendations that the Society Policy and Certification Committee; Society decline to accept the proposal of the National Railroad Museum that the • Approved a City of Baraboo request for a Society assume ownership and operation of temporary easement to Society lands used the Museum at this or any future time; as parking lot for the Circus World Mu­ that the Society relinquish any rights or in­ seum; terests in the National Railroad Museum which it may have by reason of the ease­ • Accepted gifts and grants totaling $128,- ment it holds from the City of Green Bay 967,75 for the period January 1-June 30, for land occupied by the Museum in Cooke 1973; Park; that the Society relinquish any rights • Approved the nomination of the North it may hold in the collections, or any other Point Water Tower, Milwaukee, for an real or personal property, now at the Mu­ Official Marker; seum or to be acquired by the Museum, by virtue of s. 44.03 (3), Wisconsin Statutes, • Voted expressions of appreciation to the 1971; that the Society advise the National Board of Directors of the National Railroad Railroad Museum of the Society's willing­ Museum for arranging the recent tour of ness to relieve the Museum of any and all the site, and to the Women's Auxiliary of obligations of the Museum to the Society the Society for its contribution of the kitch­ under terms of s. 44.03 (1) through (6) by en equipment for the Board Room. termination or alteration of the affiliation of the Museum as provided by statute and At Milwaukee, February 22-23, 1974 the policies of the Board of Curators; and that the Society stand ready to continue in • Accepted gifts and grants totaling $85,041.53 the future to furnish such technical advice for the period July 1-December 31, 1973; and services as are within the capacity of 78 PROCEEDINGS: 1973-1974

the Society to furnish the Museum to im­ • Adopted Awards Committee's recommenda­ prove its exhibits, collections, operation, tions on revised procedures on awards nom­ promotion, maintenance, and development; inations; Adopted the following resolution on the • Accepted gift of property on Highway 23 sale of lands on Cat and Rocky islands: across the road from the Wade House from Resolved, that the Board of Curators ap­ the Kohler Foundation; proves the sale of lands to the Apostle Is­ lands National Lakeshore identified as • Instructed the Director to request the re­ Tracts 16-110 ($17,500), 16-112 ($28,500), turn of a painting on loan to Dr. Edward and 21-104 ($11,000), for a total of $57,000. P. Roemer since 1962; The sale will be made by the Madeline • Re-elected the following members of the Island Historical Museum Trust Fund, Board of Directors of the Wisconsin His­ State Historical Society of Wisconsin, tory Foundation for three-year terms end­ Trustee. ing in 1976: John C. Geilfuss, Milwaukee; It is further resolved that the Board of E. E. Homstad, Black River Falls; and Curators authorizes the Director of the So­ Pharis G. Horton, Madison; ciety or the Director of the Society's His­ toric Sites and Markers Division to execute • Elected to the Board of Directors of the the deeds as trustee of the Madeline Island Wisconsin History Foundation Mrs. Gordon Historical Museum Trust Fund; R. Walker, Racine, for three-year term end­ ing in 1976; Adopted a resolution instructing the Di­ rector of the Society to discuss with Mr. and • Approved the following nominations for Mrs. Leo Capser, donors of the Madeline Official Markers recommended by the His­ Island Historical Museum, the renegotia­ torical Markers Committee: The Snowmo­ tion of the original agreement to olDtain bile, Vilas County; Early Skiing in Wiscon­ more flexibility in museum policy and use sin, Rock County; Chief Win-no-sheek, the of the trust fund. Elder, La Crosse District; S. S. Meteor, Su­ perior; First School Forest in Wisconsin, Laona; Brewing Industry; Lake Superior Story; At Lake Geneva, June 6, 1974 • Approved Historic Sites Policy Committee's • Approved the Executive Committee's reso­ recommendations on a revised order of pri­ lution to the Department of Natural Re­ orities for development projects; sources with regard to the installation of camping sites on property owned by Al • Approved applications for affiliation of the Gagliano; High Cliff Historical Society and Hales Corners Historical Society; • Approved the report of the Awards Com­ mittee recommending the following Awards • Referred to the Executive Committee, with of Merit to be presented at the Annual power to act, the question of determining Business Meeting: Sigma Phi Fraternity the Society's interest in the Dawn Manor of Madison for its work in restoring the property, Wisconsin Dells; H. S. Bradley House; Stevens Point Daily Journal for its sustained and outstanding • Adopted resolutions of appreciation to the activity in contributing to the knowledge following donors to Old World Wisconsin: of Wisconsin by using descriptive narra­ the Wisconsin Federation of Women's tives, excerpts from documents, and illustra­ Clubs; the Wauwatosa Junior Women's tive photographs to present several cate­ Club; the Milwaukee Branch, American As­ gories of historical materials; and to Robert sociation of University Women; and the C. Nesbit for his book, Wisconsin, A His­ Wisconsin Society of the Daughters of the tory; American Revolution.

79 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY AUTUMN, 1974

Minutes of the Annual Meeting

•nHE annual business meeting was held at William Huffman, Wisconsin Rapids -*- Holiday Inn, Lake Geneva, June 7, 1974, Warren P. Knowles, Milwaukee President Howard W. Mead presiding. About Robert B. L. Murphy, Madison fifty members and guests were present. Mrs. William H. L. Smythe, Milwaukee Mr. Orbison presented the treasurer's re­ William F. Stark, Nashola port, which was accepted and ordered filed. Milo K. Swanton, Madison Director James Morton Smith, after summar­ Cedric A. Vig, Rhinelander izing some of the year's more important activi­ Clark Wilkinson, Baraboo ties, stated that his complete annual report would appear in the autumn issue of the Wis­ There being no further nominations from consin Magazine of History. the floor, Mr. Hornbostel moved and Mrs. Friend seconded that the requirements for a In Mr. Heffernan's absence, Mr. Hornbostel written ballot be waived and that the secre­ presented the report of the Nominating Com­ tary be instructed to cast a unanimous ballot mittee, saying that all of the twelve curators for the slate presented. The motion was ac­ whose terms were completed had indicated a cepted and the slate was declared elected. desire to continue their service to the Board. He then presented the following nominees for There being no further business to be the Board of Curators: brought before the Board, the meeting ad­ journed. For re-election for a term ending in 1976 Roger E. Axtell, Janesville Respectfully submitted, H. M. Benstead, Racine JAMES MORTON SMITH Reed Coleman, Madison Paul E. Hassett, Madison Director

Justin M. Schmiedeke Nearly a century of history ends as the last of the stately elms, planted long before work was begun on the Society's building in the summer of 1896, succumbs to disease and the chain saw.

80 THE STAFF*

Office of the Director

JAMES MORTON SMITH, Director RICHARD A. ERNEY, Associate Director BERNADETTE WILHELM, Administrative Assistant

Office of Development and Public Affairs WILLIAM H. APPLECATE, Assistant Director Publications and Graphics Public Information

HARVA S. HACHTEN, Supervisor JUSTIN M. SCHMIEDEKE, Public Information Officer VICTORIA L. F. RETTENMUND, Graphic Artist JUDITH M. KLEINMAIER^

Division of Administrative Services O. W. MARTIN, JR., Director M. JAMES SEVERA, Personnel Officer Business Office Maintenance LEONARD W. BEHNKE, Comptroller ANTHONY W. SCHAEFFER, Supervisor DONNA J. BURGETTE, Accountant WILLIAM M. BAILEY RUTH E. HAYES, Purchasing Agent' MARVIN W. CLARK VERA E. FRIEND FLORENCE J. COLLETTI' lONE J. VAN SCHOYCK JAMES A. CULVER ELDEEN J. SEDGWICK GEORGE DOCKERY ELMER DUFF LuiE J. HALLER Clerical Section LESLIE H. SARBACHER PATRICK H. SHEA MARY C. MCCANN, Sales Supervisor LOREN J. STUCKEY KATHLEEN A. BAER RICHARD P. STULGATIS' MARGIE A. BEAN MILO J. SWENSON BEULAH H. GUNDERSON WILLIE,Jo WALKER MARY A. JOYCE WESLEY L. WILSON' ROBERT F. SYVRUD B. JAMES TSCHUDY Receptionists Secretaries PAULA M. DEVROY DELORES C. PROSSER, Supervisor SUSAN K. NASS* RITA ANN DENEEN^ LINDA L. LEVENDUSKY DONNA L. KALLAS ZoRA J. PEELER CAROLYN MATNEY CYNTHIA JO SOLEM" KATHLEEN A. QUINN' PATRICIA A. WIDERBORG"

Division of Archives and Manuscripts F. GERALD HAM, State Archivist Archives Section Manuscripts Section JACK K. JALLINGS, Assistant State Archivist ELEANOR MCKAY, Manuscripts Curator CHERI B. CARBON'I ELIZABETH SINGER MAULE, Maps Curator FRANCIS A. DELOUGHERY KAREN J. BAUMANN JOHN A. FLECKNER PHILIP L. DRISCOLL" NANCY A. KAUFER JOANNE E. S. HOHLER HAROLD L. MILLER Iconographic Collections Archives-Manuscripts Search Room GEORGE A. TALBOT, Curator JOSEPHINE L. HARPER, Manuscripts Curator CHRISTINE I. SCHELSHORN KATHERINE S. THOMPSON

* As of June 30, 1974. This listing includes only full- ^Retired May 10, 1974 time, permanent staff members and does not include ' Resigned November 2, 1973 research assistants, part-time student assistants, 'Resigned April 27, 1974 guides, etc. "Resigned July 21, 1973 1 Resigned August 24, 1973 " Resigned September 5, 1973 ^Retired June 29, 1974 "Resigned March I, 1974 ' Resigned December 14, 1973 " Resigned January 14, 1974 'Resigned May 31, 1974 "Resigned July 11, 1973 Research Division

WILLIAM FLETCHER THOMPSON, JR., Director DALE E. TRELEVAN, Oral History Coordinator

Museum Division

THURMAN O. FOX, Director CAROL A. SCHMIEDER, Receptionist Exhibits Education

ROBERT W. DEWITT DORIS H. PLATT, Supervisor STEPHEN H. KEMPEN HOWARD W. KANETZKE CHARLES H. KNOX LANCE M. NECKAR RONALD D. LOFMAN JUDITH A. PATENAUDE WALTER W. WHITNEY" KENNETH C. PARKS Anthropology General Collections JOAN E. FREEMAN, Curator JOHN R. HALSEY JAMES S. WATSON, Curator JOAN L. SEVERA, Curator Office of Local History RICHARD A. HORN, Curator WILLIAM J. SCHERECK, Supervisor DAVID W. MCNAMARA, Curator CAROL T. LARSEN, Registrar Historymobile Museum Maintenance BARBARA D. MCMAHON" PHILIP S. MCMAHON" GARY P. GUERTIN" DAVID J. REINEKE RICHARD P. PRIGAN VIRGINIA R. REINEKE

Library Division

CHARLES W. SHETLER, Librarian Acquisitions Section Reference Section GERALD R. EGGLESTON, Acquisitions Librarian MARGARET GLEASON, Reference Librarian SUSAN M. BRYL, Newspapers and Periodicals Librarian JAMES P. DANKY, Order Librarian Catalog Section PATRICIA H. FOLEY JEANNETTE R. REDDICK HERBERT J. TEPPER, Catalog Librarian JANICE M. BIER Documents Section MICHAEL J. Fox ROSANNA M. WEMMER JOHN A. PETERS, Documents Librarian PHYLLIS L. YOUNG ALICE M. ALDERMAN JUNE E. JOHNSON JANE E. SLOAN Photoduplication Section GERTRUDE V. WAGENER VIVIAN W. WOODYARD W. ROBERT AUSTIN, Supervisor SHARON J. EASTERBY-GANNETT Circulation Section STEPHEN J. GIRARD" PAUL S. RUNKLE ELLEN BURKE, Service Librarian LAWRENCE S. SCHEIN KARREN W. AKEY ABEL VILLIRREAL, JR." CONSTANCE M. HELLEGERS" CHRISTINE F. WALTER WILMA E. THOMPSON MERLIN R. WILLIAMS, JR.

Editorial Division

WILLIAM C. HAYGOOD, Director JOHN O. HOLZHUETER, Editorial Assistant GRACE ARGALL, Administrative Assistant^ Society Press Wisconsin Magazine of History

PAUL H. HASS, Editor WILLIAM C. HAYGOOD, Editor WILLIAM C. MARTEN, Assistant Editor WILLIAM C. MARTEN, Associate Editor

'Resigned December 21, 1973 ' Resigned May 20, 1974 'Resigned November 30, 1973 'Resigned November 30, 1973 'Resigned September 14, 1973 'Resigned August 17, 1973 ' Resigned September 14, 1973 ' Retired July 30, 1973 82 Division of Sites and Markers

RAYMOND S. SIVESIND, Director DONALD N. ANDERSON JEFFREY M. DEAN

Villa Louis Stonefield DONALD L. MUNSON, Curator HARRY E. HAMANN, Custodian MELVIN L. HOUGHTON, Curator ROBERT J. JELINEK LYLE C. KIENITZ, Custodian RONALD L. KELLEY Wade House HOPE A. LOVELAND FAY S. DOOLEY, Curator HERMAN C. THOMAS, Custodian MARY G. GARY Old World Wisconsin

Pendarvis JOHN W. WINN, Coordinator ALAN C. PAPE, Curator WILLIAM J. KITTO, Curator KARL J. BOEDER, Custodian

Division of Field Services

BARBARA J. KAISER, Director

DiANNE M. AGRESTA-LINDQUIST Mass Communications History Center SARAH H. COOPER BARBARA J. KALSER, Director JANICE L. O'CONNELL JANICE L. O'CONNELL

Justin M. Schmiedeke The staff, 1973-1974.

83 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY AUTUMN, 1974

Financial Statement

PUBLIC FUNDS STATEMENT-July 1, 1973 to June 30, 1974 Statute Legislative Balance .\PPR0PRIATI0N Number Appropriation Expenditures 6-30-74 General Program Operations 20.245-101 .$1,995,707.33* .1?1,906,669.,58 89,037.75^ Printing Archeological Society Quarterly .. 20.245-102 800.00 800.00 Heat (Sum-Sufficient) 20.245-103 11,542.31 11,542.31 Historic Sites (ORAP) - Acquis, & Devel. 20.245-104 88,392.56** 46,243.47 42,149.09= Historic Sites (ORAP) — Operations and Maintenance 20.245-106 132,530.77 129,999.79 2,530.98' Distribution of the History of Wisconsin .. 20.245-107 71,313.00 13,807.69 57,505.31* .'52,300,285.97 $2,109,062.84 §191,223.13

(101) (106) •Budget Bill 11,933,200.00 ,'5125,500.00 ** Budget Bill $50,000.00 Less Collective Bargaining Prior Year Continuing Balance $38,392.56 Salary Adjustment -3,500.00 -600.00 Salary & Fringe Benefit 'Continuing, .1535,987.80; Lapsed, $53,049.95 Increases 57,800.06 7,630.77 ^Continuing, ,¥42,149.09; Lapsed, None Prior Year Continuing "Continuing, $ 2,512.55; Lapsed, $ 18.43 Balance $ 8,207.33 ••Continuing, $57,505.31; Lapsed, None

REVOLVING FUNDS (20.245-132. Trust Funds) Endowment Funds-July 1, 1973 to June 30, 1974

CAPITAL PRINCIPAL GAINS Balance Balance FUNDS 7-1-73 Income Expenditures 6-30-74 Mary Adams Art Fund $ 14,000.00 $ 975.32 $ 6,885.27 S 884.89 $ 2,050.77 $ 5,719.39 Margaret G. Blanton Beq 10,000.00 235.12 590.90 1.16 824.86 Burrows Fund 374,784.83 24,636.06 13,912.80 26,064.51 37,609.66 2,367.65 William Donahey Bequest .... 5,000.00 58.78 295.45 .29 353.94 Draper Fund 18,745.00 1,305.86 4,478.54 9,467.81 5,013.75 8,932.60 Mary Stuart Foster Fund 128,883.39 8,729.72 6,121.50 8,146.33 6,038.26 8,229.57 Miscellaneous Funds 119,846.34 8,100.17 8,610.76 11,483.83 8,607.15 11,487.44 Hollister Pharm. Lib. Fund .. 59,962.68 3,704.48 29,090.59 1,828.17 1,638.91 29,279.85 Emily House Bequest 1,200.00 83.59 1,568.37 75.85 .28 1,643.94 Maud L. Hurson Becjuest .... 23,594.69 1,643.70 4,199.69 1,491.34 5.49 5,685.54 31,194.95 2,173.46 6,310.00 1,971.74 2,711.62 5,570.12 The John Thomas Lee Fund 20,000.00 1,393.29 3,704.25 1,264.13 2,086.68 2,881.70 Madeline Island Hist. Mus. .. 98,447.67 2,453.16 8,061.13 3,480.41 9.51 11,532.03 Mills Editorial Fund 29,428.00 2,050.07 3,324.44 1,860.04 6.84 5,177.64 Fannie A. Roberts Bequest .. 10,000.00 264.51 590.90 1.16 854.25 E. B. Rowles Bequest 800.00 55.73 105.74 50.57 25.18 131.13 Anna R. Sheldon Mem. Fund 2,700.00 188.10 907.86 170.66 161.91 916.61 Alice E. Smith Fund 10,312.50 22.65 437.68 610.70 .351.04 697.34 Steenbock Fund 55,650.00 3,878.07 5,291.28 3,517.51 1,552.46 7,256.33 Albert J. Tanck Bequest 500.00 14.77 14.77 R. G. Thwaites Bequest 15,100.00 1,051.95 3,763.66 954.42 447.04 4,271.04 $1,030,150.05 $62,445.38 $107,331.97 .$74,814.93 .$68,319.16 $113,827.74 PROCEEDINGS: 1973-1974

REVOLVING FUNDS (20.245-131. Non-Trust) July I, 1973 to June 30, 1974

Balance Balance FUNDS 7-1-73 Income Expenditures 6-30-74 Contingency Fund $ 4,486.12 1 $ $ 4,486.12 League of Women Voters Building 1,260.30 650.00 684.85 1,225.45 Life Membership Fund 5,338.00 5,338.00 Miscellaneous Funds 32,089.64 141,992.34 149,044.20 25,037.78 Monches 9,967.02 1,050.00 1 ,,391.09 9,625.93 Publication Fund 59,523.29 126,218.83 146,802.35 38,939.77 Travel Fund 374.29 374.29 Visual Aids Fund 3,303.79 3,303.79 Historic Sites Fund . (-26,936.07) 218,985.90 217,693.61 (-25,643.78) $89,406.38 $488,897.07 $515,616.10 $62,687.35

REVOLVING FUNDS (20.245-131. Non-Trust) July I, 1973 to June 30, 1974- Historic Sites Fund (Detail)

Balance Balance FUNDS 7-1-73 Income Expenditures 6-30-74 Historic Sites Development & Reserve $ 78,835.45 $ 18,982.60 5,445.48 $ 92,372.57 Stonefield-Operations ( -44,752.44) 69,032.96 75,269.61 (• -50,989.09) Villa Louis-Operations 14,241.92 60,247.39 53,933.63 20,555.68 Wade House-Operations ( -50,455.96) 49,036.07 48,505.86 (• -49,925.75) Madeline Island-Operations 2,764.61 7,708.03 7,990.31 2,482.33 Pendarvis-Operations ( -27,569.65) 13,978.85 26,548.72 (--40,139.52) ($-26,936.07) $218,985.90 $217,693.61 ($-25,643.78)

REVOLVING FUNDS (20.245-141. Federal Funds) July 1, 1973 through June 30, 1974

Balance Balance FUNDS 7-1-73 Income Expenditures 6-30-74 Archeological Survey—Corps of Engineers .. $ $ 419.50 $ (- 419.50) Electoral Data Research ( — 4,817.50) 9,580.94 7,516.82 (- 2,753.38) Historic Sites Survey ( — 3,784.59) 25,541.53 32.997.19 (-11,240.25) La Farge Reservoir Archeological Survey .... ( — 1,110.15) 10,962.14 11,454.47 (- 1,602.48) La Follette Papers 1,829.19 1,829.19 Library Acquisitions 5,000.00 5,000.00 Old World Wisconsin (WARBC) 15,672.00 34.00 15,638.00 Pendarvis Complex 209.05 209.05 Wis. Committee for Public Programs ( — 9,365.53) 18,226.73 8,936.70 (- 75.50) -17,039.53) $84,983.34 $66,368.68 $ 1,585.13

85 WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY AUTUMN, 1974

REVOLVING FUNDS (20.245-132. Trust Funds) Special Projects - July 1, 1973 to June 30, 1974

Balance Balance FUNDS 7-1-73 Income Expenditures 6-30-74 Area Research Centers $ 2,481.51 $ 3,636.55 $(- 1,155.04) Athenaean Fund 326.33 321.70 4.63 Book Fund 20.00 20.00 Howard K. Beale Memorial Fund 203.49 188.22 15.27 Bibliographic Project 1,000.00 1,000.00 Charles E. Brown Memorial Fund 245.60 245.60 Building Addition Fund 10.00 10.00 Carriage Museum—Wade House Park 6,525.81 6,525.81 Circus Museum 246.66 31,054.75 16,500.00 14,801.41 Columbia Power Plant Survey 228.61 228.61 Cut-Over Country Fund 83.64 83.64 Director's Fund 8,221.35 4,720.00 1,841.21 11,100.14 Equipment and Furnishings 5.00 5.00 D. C. Everest Fund 1,500.00 396.93 1,103.07 Evjue Collection 45.50 45.50 Martin A. Fladoes Memorial Fund 49.12 47.58 1.54 GAR Exhibit (- 364.30) 364.30 Guide to Historic Wisconsin 1,244.78 80.00 3,658.68 (- 2,333.90) George I. Haight Fund 199.13 131.19 67.94 C. L. Harrington Memorial Fund 768.50 510.50 258.00 Highway Salvage (- 4,214.81) 5,556.37 9,195.88 (- 7,854.32) History of Wisconsin (-13,139.27) 23,550.21 19,845.00 (- 9,434.06) Historymobile Fund (School App.) 10,256.00 2,205.00 5,711.69 6,749.31 Iconographic Fund 702.60 702.60 Jackson Bequest 246.06 246.06 Kaltenborn Fund 4,113.01 4,113.01 Winifred C. Knapp Bequest 6,000.00 6,000.00 Koshkonong Project 4,321.66 4,321.66 Local History Fund 10.00 10.00 Map Fund 28.80 28.80 F. J. Matchette Papers 800.00 800.00 McCormick Collection McCormick Fund—Books 695.81 223.12 472.69 McCormick Fund—Research (— 9,261.20) 10,475.54 1,214.34 Miscellaneous Unrestricted Funds 7,242.99 76.72 5,040.45 2,279.26 Arthur H. Muenk Bequest 2,054.79 250.00 1,804.79 Museum Funds 2,435.13 3,168.13 3,606.56 1,996.70 National Science Foundation Grant 356.85 356.85 Old World Wisconsin (- 1,293.60) 10,149.18 74,410.20 (-65,554.62) Old World Wisconsin—Norwegian 40.00 40.00 ORAP 200 Fund 42.00 42.00 Painting Restoration 5.96 5.96 Doris H. Platt Education Fund 1,059.80 337.29 316.20 1,080.89 RE-K 4,557.85 826.50 3,731.35 Waldo E. Rosenbush Memorial Fund 100.00 100.00 School Services 176.71 20.00 72.00 124.71 Schwarztrauber Biography Fund 3,500.00 3,500.00 Sellery Room 697.40 403.00 294.40 Stonefield Development Fund 252.23 252.23 Blacksmith Shop 35.00 35.00 Cheese Factory 25.00 25.00 Creamery (- 1,198.94) 950.00 (- 248.94) Dewey House 300.00 100.00 325.90 74.10 Honey House 438.90 438.90 Jewelry Shop 5.00 5.00 Saloon 500.00 500.00 Uhrig Fund 4,100.80 1,951.55 1,903.46 4,148.89 Villa Louis 122.00 122.00 Wade House 55.00 55.00 Wisconsin Society for Jewish Learning .... 915.27 1,050.00 1,660.49 304.78 Frank Lloyd Wright Fund 500.00 500.00 .$44,943.87 $101,490.70 $156,569.01 ($-10,134.44)

86 PROCEEDINGS: 1973-1974

Sustaining Members 1973-1974 Allis-Chalmers Manufacturing Company, Mary Lester of Southeastern Wisconsin, Milwaukee Incorporated, Milwaukee Ambrosia Chocolate Company, Milwaukee The Leyhe Foundation, Incorporated, American Can Company, Neenah Oshko.sh American Exchange Bank, Madison Mr. and Mrs. Charles McCallum, Hubertus American Family Mutual Insurance The Marine Foundation, Incorporated, Company, Madison Milwaukee Appleton Mills Foundation, Appleton Oscar Mayer & Company, Madison Appleton Wire Works, Appleton Miller Brewing Company, Milwaukee Applied Power Industries, Milwaukee Milwaukee Journal, Milwaukee Mr. H. M. Benstead, Racine Modine Manufacturing Company, Racine Bergstrom Paper Company, Neenah Nasco Industries, Incorporated, Fort Atkinson Bucyrus-Erie Foundation, Incorporated, NCR Appleton Paper Div., Appleton South Milwaukee Nelson Industries, Inc., Stoughton Mr. Reed Coleman, Madison Nordberg Foundation, Mihuaukee Connor Foundation, Wausau Northwestern Mutual Life Insurance Co., Consolidated's Civic Foundation, Milwaukee Incorporated, Wisconsin Rapids Parker Pen Company, Janesville Mr. and Mrs. E. David Cronon, Madison Mrs. Robert Pierce, Menomonie Carl and Elisabeth Eberbach Foundation, Inc., Plenco Plastics Engineering Company, Milwaukee Sheboygan Employers Insurance of Wausau, Wausau Rahr Foundation, Manitowoc Evinrude Motors, Milwaukee Red Arrow Sales Corporation, Madison Evjue Foundation, Inc., Madison Roddis (Hamilton) Foundation, The Falk Corporation, Mihuaukee Incorporated, Marshfield First National Bank of Appleton, Appleton Saint Regis Paper Company, Rhinelander First Wisconsin Foundation, Incorporated, Mr. and Mrs. Arville Schaleben, Milwaukee Milwaukee Schlitz Foundation, Incorporated, Milwaukee First Wisconsin Trust Company, Milwaukee Sentry Insurance Company, Stevens Point Mrs. Robert E. Friend, Hartland Mr. and Mrs. F. S. Shattuck, Neenah Fromm Brothers, Incorporated, Hamburg Mr. and Mrs. Donald C. Slichter, Milwaukee The Gardner Foundation, Milwaukee Mr. Mowry Smith, Menasha Corporation Gateway Transportation Company, La Crosse Foundation, Neenah Mr. and Mrs. John C. Geilfuss, Milwaukee Mrs. William H. L. Smythe, Milwaukee General Telephone Company of Wisconsin, Sta-Rite Industries, Incorporated, Delavan Madison Howard B. Stark Company, Pewaukee Mr. John T. Harrington, Milwaukee Twin Disc, Incorporated, Racine The Heil Company, Milwaukee Voigt Charitable Foundation, Racine Highsmith Company, Incorporated, The Vollrath Company, Sheboygan Fort Atkinson Webcrafters Foundation, Incorporated, Mrs. Frank P. Hixon, Lake Forest, III. Madison Mr. and Mrs. W. D. Hoard, Jr., West Bend Company, West Bend Fort Atkinson Western Publishing Company, Incorporated, Mr. Wayne J. Hood, Key Largo, Florida Racine International Harvester Company, Chicago Wisconsin Electric Power Company, Jackson County Bank, Black River Falls Milwaukee Mr. and Mrs. Edward Cole Jones, The Wisconsin Life Insurance Company, Fort Atkinson Madison Jones of Fort Atkinson Foundation, Wisconsin Power and Light Company, Incorporated, Fort Atkinson Kearney & Trecker Corporation, Milwaukee Madison Dr. and Mrs. William Kiekhofer, Madison Wisconsin State Journal, Madison Mr. and Mrs. Raymond J. Koltes, Madison Wisconsin Telephone Company, Milwaukee Mr. and Mrs. Frederick J. Lenfestey, De Pere Zigman—Joseph Associates, Milwaukee 87 RHODA R. OILMAN, a native of Seattle, received a B.A. in eco­ nomics from the University of Washington in 1948 and an M.A. from Bryn Mawr College in 1950. In 1958 she became a Contributors research assistant at the Minne­ sota Historical Society and was named editor of Minnesota History in 1961. In 1971 she shifted to the Society's Educational Services Department to help develop a program of ROBERT ALAN GOLDBERG was multimedia resource kits for Minnesota born in New York City in 1949 schools. The first of these, dealing with the and received his B.A. in his­ history and culture of the Chippewa Indians, tory from Arizona State Uni- was published in 1973. Her articles have ap­ .^^^ versity in 1971. The following peared in Minnesota History, the Gopher *© ^1 y^^'' ^^ gained his M.A. from Historian, Wisconsin Trails, and the Smith­ -•' • the University of Wisconsin- sonian Journal of History. Beginning this Madison, where he is a doctoral candidate. past September, Mrs. Gilman is on a year's At present he is in Colorado engaged in re­ research leave to continue work on a biography searching his Ph.D. dissertation which will of Henry H. Sibley, a project made possible deal with the history of the Ku Klux Klan by a grant from the Minnesota Society's Grace in that state. While at Wisconsin Mr. Gold­ Flandrau Fund. berg has been the recipient of a Knapp fellow­ ship and two Ford Foundation fellowships. He is married and has a son. THEODORE ROSENOF, born in Newark, New Jersey, in 1943, is a graduate of Rutgers Uni­ versity and holds an M.A. (1966) and the KENT M. BECK^ born in Sioux Ph.D. (1970) from the University of Wiscon­ Falls, South Dakota, in 1949, sin—Madison, where he is currently a Post Doc­ has lived in Southern Cali­ toral Fellow in Humanities. For a photograph fornia since 1958. An honors and additional biographical information see graduate of California State the Winter, 1971-1972, issue. University, Fullerton, in 1970, he is currently a doctoral candi­ date at the University of California, Irvine, from which he received his M.A. in 1971. Mr. The 1974-1975 Alice E. Smith Fellowship Beck's major interest is in twentieth-century of the State Historical Society has been award­ American history and the political and social ed to Jacqueline J. Halstead, a graduate stu­ impact of war on industrial societies. At dent at the University of Wisconsin—Madison. present he is at work on a dissertation ex­ Ms. Halstead's dissertation, "The Great Op­ ploring the relationship between the Cold portunity: Northern Teachers and the Geor­ War consensus and Democratic liberals in the gia Freedmen, 1865-1873," will deal with the 1950's. His article, "The Odyssey of Joseph 230 women and sixty men who journeyed to Freeman," is forthcoming in The Historian. Georgia after the Civil War to establish ele­ Like many members of his generation, he mentary schools for the emancipated slaves. first reached political awareness with the The Fellowship, which carries an outright emergence of John T. Kennedy. In the last grant of $600, is awarded annually to a wo­ decade, as his article in this issue demon­ man doing research in American history, with strates, he has shared both the lingering ad­ preference given to applicants who are doing miration and the increasing disillusionment graduate research in the history of Wisconsin which dominate the recent Kennedy litera­ or of the Middle West. The deadline for ture. applications is July 15 of each year. THE HISTORY OF WISCONSIN

ON WISCONSIN

Six recent books about the land we call Wisconsin—its history, geography, politics, and people. All but the first title are available to members of the State Historical Society of Wisconsin at a 10% discount.

1) University of Wisconsin Press, The Atlas of Wisconsin. in pp. Paperbound. $5.95. 2) Alice E. Smith, The History of Wisconsin. Volume 1: From Exploration to Statehood. 765 pp. $15.00. 3) Robert C. Nesbit, Wisconsin: A History. 590 pp. $12.50. 4) Emanuel L. Philipp, Political Reform in Wisconsin. Abridged and edited by Stanley P. Caine and Roger E. Wyman. 200 pp. $12.00. 5) George Fiedler, Mineral Point: A History. 220 pp. $4.50. 6) John O. Holzhueter, Madeline Island & the Chequamegon Region. 64 pp. Paperbound. $1.00.

POLITICAL MINERAL POINT REFORM a history IN WISCONSIN By Emanuel L. Philipp MADELINE AbridKwJ itod Mit«l h> SUnIp) P. Cilnf aiid Rnficr E. WyoH ISLAND 6^ THE Chequamegon Region

By JOHN O. HOLZHUETER

THE STAIT )l[STORICAL SOCCETT OF WISCONSIN 19 7 4 The Purpose of this Society shall be

To promote a wider appreciation of the American heritage with particular emphasis on the collection, advancement, and dissemination of knowledge of the history of Wisconsin and of the Middle West.

State Historical Society of Wisconsin Second-class postage paid at 816 State Street Madison, Wisconsin, and at Madison, Wisconsin 53706 additional mailing offices. Return Requested