V > :.A''>V''w^s*lV'V!/r?^^''(AJ^\l*^'^i';lv;'Vl'J '' , 'M'^ •'';u./";'^^!^. WV''' Wisconsin I Magazine ^ of History Reuben Gold Thwaius CLIFFORD L. LORD The Historian and the American Urhan Tradition CHARLES N. GLAAB "Culture and Business" JOHN LANKFORD Badger Colonels and the Civil War Officer T. HARRY WILLIAMS The Federal Government and History LESLIE II. FISHEL, JR. Circle and Polygon m Wisconsin Architecture RICHARD W. E. PERRIN Proceedings of the One Hundred and Seventeenth Annual Meeting Published by The State Historical Society of Wisconsin / Vol. XLVII, No. 1 / Autumn, 1963 THE STATE HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF WISCONSIN LESLIE H. FISHEL, JR., Director Officers WILLIAM B. HESSELTINE, President HERBERT V. KOHLER, Honorary Vice-President JOHN C. GEILFUSS, First Vice-President GEORGE HAMPEL, JR., Treasurer E. E. HoMSTAD, Second Vice-President LESLIE H. FISHEL, JR., Secretary Board of Curators Ex-Ojjicio JOHN W. REYNOLDS, Governor of the State MRS. DENA A. .SMITH, State Treasurer ROBERT C. ZIMMERMAN, Secretary of State FKED H. HARRINGTON, President of the University ANGUS B. ROTHWELL, Superintendent of Public Instruction MRS. W. NORMAN FITZGEKALD, President of the Women's Auxiliary Term Expires, 1964 THOMAS H. BARLAND GEORGE F. KASTEN CHARLES MANSON FLOYD SPRINGER, JR. Eau Claire Milwaukee Madison Racine M. J. DYRUU MRS. VINCENT W. KOCH FREDERICK L OLSON DR. WILLIAM STOVALL Prairie du Chien Janesville Wauwautosa Madison JIM DAN HILL MRS. RAYMOND J. KOLTES FREDERIC SAMMOND Superior Madison Milwaukee Term Expires, 1965 GEORGE BANTA, JR. ROBERT B. L. MURPHY STANLEY STONE CEDRIC VIG Menasha Madison Milwaukee Rhinelander GEORGE HAMPEL, JR. FOSTER B. PORTER MiLO K. SWANTON CLARK WILKINSON Milwaukee Bloomington Madison Baraboo PHILIP F. LA FOLLETTE WILLIAM F. STARK FREDERICK N. TROWBRIDGE ANTHONY WISE Madison Pewaukee Green Bay Hayward Term Expires, 1966 SCOTT M. CUTLIP EDWARD FROMM MRS. HOWARD T. GREENE E. E. HOMSTAD Madison Hamburg Genesee Depot Black River Falls W. NORMAN FITZCERALD ROBERT A. GEIIRKE GEORGE HAMPEL, JR. ROBERT L. PIERCE Milwaukee Ripon Milwaukee Menomonie MRS. ROBERT E. FRIEND JOHN C. GEILFUSS WILLIAM B. HESSELTINE JAMES A. RILEY Hartland Milwaukee Madison Eau Claire SAM RIZZO Racine Honorary Honorary Life Members WILLIAM ASHBY MCCLOY, Winnipeg PRESTON E. MCNALL, Madison MRS. LITTA BASCOM, Madison DOROTHY L. PARK, Madison MRS. LOUISE C. ROOT, Prairie du Chien Fellows VERNON CARSTENSEN MERLE CURTI The Women's Auxiliary Officers MRS. W. NORMAN FITZGERALD, Milwaukee, President MRS. JOSEPH C. GAMROTH, Madison, Vice-President MRS. MILLARD TUFTS, Milwaukee, Secretary MRS. ALDEN M. JOHNSTON, Appleton, Treasurer MRS. CHESTEH ENGELKING, Green Bay, Assistant Treasurer MRS. SILAS L. SPENGLER, Menasha, Ex-Officio VOLUME 47, NUMBER l/AUTUMN, 1963 Wisconsin Magazine istory WILLIAM CONVERSE HAYGOOD, Editor PAUL H. HASS, Associate Editor Reuben Gold Thwaites 3 CLIFFORD L. LORD The Historian and the American Urban Tradition 12 CHARLES N. GLAAB "Culture and Business": The Founding of the Fourth State Normal School at River Falls 26 JOHN LANKFORD Badger Colonels and the Civil War Officer 35 T. HARRY WILLIAMS The Federal Government and History 47 LESLIE H. FISHEL, JR. Circle and Polygon in Wisconsin Architecture: Early Structures of Unconventional Design 50 RICHARD W. E. PERRIN Proceedings of the One Hundred and Seventeenth Annual Business Meeting of the State Historical Society 59 Book Reviews 82 Contributors 100 Published Quarterly by The State Historical Society of Wisconsin THE WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY is published not assume responsibility for statements made by contribu quarterly by the State Historical Society of Wisconsin, 816 tors. Second-class postage paid at Madison, Wisconsin State Street, Madison 6, Wisconsin. Distributed to members Copyright 1963 by the State Historical Society of Wisconsin as part of their dues (Annual membership, $5.00; Family Paid for in part by the Maria L. and Simeon Mills Editorial membership, S7.00; Contributing, $10; Business and Profes­ Fund and by the George B. Burrows Fund. Wisconsin news sional, $25; Life, $100; Sustaining, $100 or more annually; papers may reprint any article appearing in the WISCON­ Patron, $1000 or more annually). Single numbers, $1.25. SIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY providing the story carries Microfilmed copies available through University Microfilms, the following credit line ; Reprinted from the State Histori­ 313 North First Street, Ann Arbor, Michigan. Communica­ cal Society's Wisconsin Magazine of History tor [insert the tions should be addressed to the editor. The Society does season and year which appear on the Magazine]. Varieties of History, 1963 ^?^*^ ^'^^^ (Above) The opening of an exhibit of the paintings of Edwin Dickinson in the Museum's new first-floor Graphics Gallery; (top left) rural children welcome the Historymobile to their area; (left center) Eugene Klee shown restoring a battered carrousel horse; (bottom left) Bill Wilson patiently reassembles the fragments of an aboriginal skull unearthed at Price Site I in Richland County; (below) Ed Carpenter, Curator of the State Farm and Craft Museum at Cassville, fires the forge in the blacksmith shop. (Photos by Justin M. Schmiedeke) S^a"—> "•sftiesv^ 1 A s '^•H -J - •A.i.-.; V/t\\ REUBEN GOLD THWAITES By CLIFFORD L. LORD On the occa.sion of the fiftieth anniversary of in the public schools. Later—though he never the death of the Society's second director, his many-sided career is reappraised by one of went to college—he took graduate courses his successors at Yale in English literature, economic his­ tory, and international law. He early joined the fourth estate, first while at Yale, then at Oshkosh, later as city and then managing T YMAN COPELAND DRAPER, first sec- editor of the Madison Wisconsin State Jour­ -*-' retary of the State Historical Society of nal. From that position, aged thirty-two, he Wisconsin (1853-1887), spoke frequently and became assistant secretary of the State His­ lovingly of "rescuing from oblivion the he­ torical Society of Wisconsin, and two years roic deeds of the pioneers." Some such serv­ later, in 1887, began a distinguished twenty- ice is long overdue his successor, the Society's six-year career as its secretary. second and most distinguished secretary, Reu­ A short (5'6"), rotund man, he coupled ben Gold Thwaites. Dead just fifty years this a genial and cordial exterior and a highly de­ fall—October 22—he is today remembered veloped skill as a raconteur with an iron will almost exclusively for his editorial labors, which drove him to prodigies of effort and which surely were notable. But he had three accomplishment and made him bring peremp­ other claims to fame. He was a prominent torily to heel those who outraged his sensi­ and accomplished librarian. He was one of bilities or fell short of what he expected. Staff the founders of the Conference of Historical members in whom he was momentarily dis­ Societies, from which grew the American appointed, outsiders who tried to hoodwink Association for State and Local History. And him or capitalize on the Society's high repu­ he was a figure of revolutionary significance tation, quickly felt the lash of his tongue or in the historical society movement, the father pen. Otherwise he was a cheery man of great of the progressive (or "western") historical charm who made close friends easily; of a society. In many ways this was his major contagious and infectious enthusiasm which contribution to American society, yet it is won men to his cause; of enormous drive today substantially unrecognized. which wrought great works. Self-effacing, Born in Dorchester, Massachusetts, May 15, shying from personal publicity, he brought 1853, shortly after his parents migrated from new dynamics and new perspectives to the England, he moved at the age of thirteen with historical society movement. his family to Omro, Wisconsin. There he Thwaites started quietly enough. There helped on the farm and completed his course was little hint of radical innovation in the WISCONSIN MAGAZINE OF HISTORY AUTUMN, 1963 first years after he took over from Draper. the task at hand. For his publication pro­ He concentrated on the library and on his gram he established an assembly line. He first major editorial effort. He was preoc­ personally selected and edited the material cupied also with the delicate maneuverings for the documentaries, wrote and rewrote which sired the splendid new building which the drafts of his books. For most volumes, is one of his monuments and which still Annie Nunns typed the manuscript, Louise serves the Society well as its headquarters. Phelps Kellogg edited copy and supplied foot­ His reports and notes for speeches indicate notes, then Miss Nunns and later Daisy Bee- that his philosophy of public service was form­ croft read proof and saw the books through ing over these years, but at the outset—and the press. On major projects like the Jesuit indeed throughout his remarkably productive Relations he had a corps of other assistants, years in Wisconsin—he carried to new heights in that instance Victor Palsits as biblio­ the traditional functions of the historical so­ graphical advisor, Emma Blair as assistant ciety as it had existed until that time. editor, and three translators. He also enlisted He quickly established his place as one of others to work on his projects. He persuaded the foremost historical editors of his genera­ the Wisconsin legislature to observe the fif­ tion with the Jesuit Relations (73 volumes, tieth anniversary of the Civil War by estab­ 1896-1901) and followed this with Early lishing a War History Commission which Western Travels (32 volumes, 1904^1907). published ten volumes of Civil War material. In his years with the Society, he edited 170 He enlisted the Sons of the American Revo­ volumes and wrote fifteen others. Some were lution to finance the publication of three vol­ published by the Society, some by commercial umes of Draper manuscripts of the Revolu­ firms.