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Wisconsin's German-Language Newspapers

– Today we are pleased to introduce Randi Ramsden as part of the Wisconsin Historical Museums, History Sandwiched In lecture series. As the National Digital Newspaper Program Coordinator at the Wisconsin Historical Society, Randi Ramsden manages the NEH Grant funded newspaper digitalization project that adds historic newspapers from Wisconsin to the Library of Congress’s online database, chronicling America. She started working at the Society in 2016, after studying at both the University of Maine’s Germany, and UW-Madison, and receiving her master’s degree in American Studies with a focus on American history. Her article, “Shaping Identity: The History of German-language Newspapers in Wisconsin,” was published in the fall of 2016 issue of the Wisconsin Magazine of History. Here today to discuss the history of Wisconsin’s German-language newspapers, please join me in welcoming Randi Ramsden. (audience applauds)

– Thank you, Ellie, and thank you all for coming. Yeah, when I came to Wisconsin, I noticed that Wisconsin is inherently German. We love our brats and our beer, and some of us love sauerkraut, not everybody, but it’s readily available here. And so, I’m going to talk a little bit about the history of this German culture that we have in Wisconsin, through the lens of the German-language newspapers that were published here. Germans have been settling in the United States since the 1670s. 5.5 million alone came over between 1820 and 1910. But when we talk about German immigration to the state of Wisconsin, we usually speak of three waves of immigration. The first wave arrived between 1845 and 1855, the second around 1865 through 1875, and then the third, 1880 through 1893. The first wave included a lot of religious refugees, but also failed revolutionaries that were very influential later in the labor and socialist movements in Wisconsin. And the second and third wave were mostly immigrants that left their homeland due to economic hardships, and we will talk about that a little later, too. According to the 1910 census, 630,000 Wisconsinites were either born in Germany or were the American-born children of German-born parents here in Wisconsin. That is roughly 27% of the entire state’s population at the time. And nearly 51% of all foreign-born Wisconsinites were the children of foreign-born parents here. In comparison, the second largest group of immigrants, the Norwegians, made up about 5.5% of the overall population. So we can agree we had a large German-speaking population, especially if you, on top of that, also add about 16,000 Swiss Wisconsinites and about 70, or almost 70,000 Austrian Wisconsinites.

When they arrived here, they built communities, built schools, businesses, and when they spoke to each other, they did that in the language they shared, so that was German. To some, that was a problem. Famously, Benjamin Franklin didn’t like that. He already complained in a 1750 letter to Peter Collinson, a British botanist, about the Germans. “Few of their children in the country learn English.” Germans would import their books from German to read here, and they would also start printing their own newspapers instead of reading Benjamin Franklin’s newspaper. He also said it was not very likely that Germans would ever assimilate to the New World, because, “The German women are generally so disagreeable to an English eye that it would require great portions to induce Englishmen to marry them.” He’s the one to talk, right? (audience chuckles) But, I think he would have been really disappointed if he had been alive a century later, looking at the Germans settling in Wisconsin, because they did the same thing. They held onto their mother tongue, they married their fellow Germans, and then, they also published their own newspapers. Made a little map here, kind of to show you where those newspaper were published in Wisconsin. The various shades of yellow and green reflect the census records from 1910. So the darker the green, the more Germans lived in that area. And then the dots represent the cities in which, or town in which, German-language newspapers were published, between 1844 and 1991. And then the size of the dots corresponds to the amount of newspapers that were published there.

And we can see that Milwaukee is winning here. They were, alone in Milwaukee, 74 newspapers that were published in the German language. But we can see how they were distributed, so a lot of Germans settled in Milwaukee, but also then up north, along the Lake Michigan, and then into central Wisconsin. Today I’m going to focus on the newspapers that were published between 1844 and 1920. In 1844, that’s when the first German-language newspaper was published in the state. And then 1920 because that’s right after World War I. And I think that this time period really, first of all, has most of the German-language newspapers that were published, were published during that time, but also we can track the fundamental changes within those immigrant communities over even 20 years after the third wave of the immigrants ebbed. Between 1833 and 1920, more than 10% of the 2,398 newspapers published in the state were German. That is, 73% of all foreign-language newspapers. So really, the Germans published more than the Norwegians, the Polish, the Swedes that came here. And as I said, the first German-language newspaper was published in 1844, and it was this one, the Wiskonsin-Banner. And as you can see, Germans did not only not learn English, they also decided to come up with their own spellings. So when it came to geographical names, we can see here, the Wisconsin spelled with a K, and also– well, it’s kind of hard to tell on the screen here– but Milwaukee also spelled with an I E, an ending that would be more common in the German language.

newspaper was founded by Moritz Schoeffler. He was born in Zweibrcken in Germany in 1813. And he learned the book printing business. He came to United States in 1842, and then two years later settled in Milwaukee. This newspaper that he published was not the first one he published in the United States, but it was then also known as the Wisconsin-Banner, with a C instead of the K, and then the Wisconsin Banner und Volksfreund. Schoeffler retired in 1874, but the newspaper was published until 1922. This picture shows an issue from September 14, 1844. This is actually the second issue of this newspaper, ever. And I’m showing you this because it just shows the function of these newspapers, these early German-language newspapers. We have an article here that says, Die Rechte der Eingewanderten in Wisconsin, is the rights of the immigrants that came to Wisconsin. And it also features a translation of the Declaration of Independence. So this is really an example of how these newspapers catered to their audience. It was not just about news, but we have this element of what we would now call public service announcements. So immigration rights, what do you need to know if you want to settle here, if you want to stay in the country. Also, the history of their new home, of the country, the state. History of Native Americans who lived in Wisconsin. Everything that would have been different from Germany, where they came from. Also, it would talk about the government and democratic processes. Almost like a Wisconsin, United States 101 introduction to everything you need to know as a foreigner. And that was not necessarily given in newspapers published by Benjamin Franklin or any newspaper men publishing in English here at the time. Later issues, it’s the German-language newspapers would also feature the history of Germany, information about German cities, but that, I think, is more targeted towards the generations that were American-born, later. And who had never been to Germany, but wanted to know more about their homeland, or the homeland of their ancestors that they were still so connected to. In earlier newspapers, you will also find things like this.

This is a Liste der Briefe, it’s a list of names of people who have not retrieved their mail from the Post Office yet. So, if you’re looking into your ancestors, who lived in the German community back in the day, check out the newspapers, and see, maybe you can find their names on one of these lists. And that meant they were way too busy or way too lazy to go to the Post Office. So you can kind of get an idea of what kind of person your ancestor was. We also have detailed news from the homeland. Again, something that other newspapers, especially published in English for a wider audience, wouldn’t necessarily have in such detail. We see regions of Germany, and then also detailed news about cities or towns. And that was really a way for people to still get the news from their hometown, see what the relatives that they left behind, or the friends, might have been up to, what was going on there. I mean, there were big things, big political things in there, but also small things, like there was a train crash, or there’s a store that opened. Smaller things like that, that still helped them to stay connected to their homeland. Also in the newspapers, and that goes for most newspapers published around that time, newspapers were entertainments, similar to, yeah, English-language newspapers. They would be read, often times, by the entire family. They would sit together and read the newspaper, read series life novels that were published in there. Some would have also a part for children to read. And sometimes there would be music, and they could play together and sing together, if they had a piano in the house, for example. Also, there are often times columns filled with local items, and I like to compare that to the social media. Because in there, you could see what your neighbor was up to without having to actually talk to them. So you could see who came over for Thanksgiving dinner. Just little things about the community. And that now give us a great insight into what life was like there.

So while I was going through one of the German-language newspapers from Sauk City, I came across this. I was actually looking to learn a little bit more about the printing business at the time. I found this snippet, and there is the lehrling gesucht that means the newspaper was looking for an apprentice to work at the print shop. But then I looked up and found that notice, and that says, “Kartoffeln sin dals Zahlung fr die Zeitung wilkommen.” “Potatoes are welcome as a payment for the newspaper.” (audience chuckles) So I was intrigued, because I’m wondering now, if I had lived then, how many potatoes would I have had to carry to the publisher’s office in exchange for my newspaper. And I invite you to follow me along on this journey down the rabbit hole. So the price of a newspaper would usually be printed down the first page, so that it’s easy to find. I looked at it, and it’s $2 for the year. So my next question is, how much do potatoes cost? Also that information, I can get from the newspaper. So look at the market prices at the time, and for cities, it was sometimes changed. So I have here, the Sauk City market prices, and I can see the “Kartoffeln neue,” the new potatoes at the time, cost between $0.37 – $0.40. We’ll go with $0.40, just because the math is easier. But now my question is, how many potatoes is that, how many for $0.40? And potatoes were measured in bushels at the time. And then I consulted the Farmer’s Almanac, and found that one bushel of potatoes is about 50 lbs. Which then brings us to the fact that I would have to carry 250 pounds of new potatoes to the publisher’s office in exchange for my newspaper. So now, of course, I’m wondering how many people actually did that, and what did the publisher do with all those potatoes. (audience chuckles)

But we’re not going to go there. I’m showing you this just to see what we can learn from these newspapers. Just a little notice like that, suddenly opens our eyes. We come from a present where we have credit cards, we swipe our credit cards. But the culture there, it was normal to barter for things. You were a farmer so you had your produce, your crops, and you could exchange that. Maybe the publisher took it to the store to then get money for it or other products that he needed. Or maybe he just ate a lot of potatoes, and he really liked potatoes. But we can see how it was different, back then, from what we are used to now. And that’s the great thing about these newspapers, that they can, it’s almost like a time capsule that brings us back to that time. And because there are so many newspapers, you can really look into communities that you are interested in. But what I think is important, too, is to look at all of the newspapers. To see more of the development, the history of the press overall. So I came up with a few more maps, here. And these maps, again, the shades of green represent the immigrant population according to the respective census that the year says on there. Here, I only looked at Wisconsinites that were born in Germany. So not the generations coming after. And then the size of the dots, again, shows the count of the German-language newspapers in the decade leading up to the census in the county. And here we can really see how the Germans spread throughout the state, from 1877 through 1880, ’90 and then 1900. And we can also see the more Germans settled in a county, the more newspapers appeared. Another graph that backs that up, too. So on the left, we can see the new newspapers published by year. So not the overall count, just the new ones in those years. And we can see that those correspond with the waves of immigration.

So we have the three colors represent the first wave, second wave, and third wave. And we can see, at the beginning of the waves, we have an incline of new newspapers that are being published. And then towards the end, a small decline. And then again, with the next wave, it goes up. That we have such a dip in the early 1860s is probably also due to the Civil War, though. Because they didn’t start as many newspapers, then. On the right, we can see the overall number of newspapers by decade. And there we can see, except for 1860s again, we have a steady incline through the 1890s, and then a decline from there. But we’re going to talk about that more.

So, what we know now is we had 123 German-language newspapers titles in the 1890s for all the German Wisconsinites. And that’s a lot. That’s a lot, even when we think about the small communities and how many there were. But when we want to look into the “why,” we have to consider that we tend to think of the German immigrants as one group. Even though we know they came over in waves, but we think of them as German overall. When actually, the people coming over had– There were big cultural, political, geographical differences in those groups. And those are represented in the newspapers. The first wave of immigrants, for example, would have come from the German Confederation, which existed between 1815 and 1866. The German Confederation was made of many kingdoms, states, and the first wave came mostly from the Southwest. So we have a bunch of failed revolutionaries, people who were exiled, but then also religious refugees. And the second and third wave would have come from the North German Confederation, which existed between 1867 and 1870. And the German Empire, 1871 through 1918. And here, the second wave came from the Northwest, mostly Northern Hanover, Westphalia. And they came after or during an agricultural depression. So we have a lot of agricultural laborers, farmers, coming over during that time. And then the third wave from the Northeast, so Prussia, Pomerania, that area. And they came due to the industrialization of the agricultural sector at the time. So again, displaced laborers who would come over and settle here. So when we speak of the Germans that settled here, what do we actually mean by that? What is the German identity? Because they would have lathered identified with being, maybe Catholic or Lutheran, Pomeranian, Prussian, liberals and socialists, or revolutionaries, conservatives, farmers, things like that. In other words, they would have identified more by their differences than considering all of them as one group. And that’s what we can then really see in the newspapers, that is expressed in the content of the newspapers, especially. So when we see, in the beginning, when they came over, and we have the Civil War, most Germans we’ll be seeing in the newspapers were very much for the emancipation of slaves, but not everybody was for the involvement of the North in the war, for example.

So we have some more conservative, and they tend to be Catholic papers, that were against the North entering the war. Whereas others were more for the war. And that is just one example of the political affiliations. But when we look at them now, we see what they have mostly in common. And that is, the language, and the print. They were all printed in German, and they all used Fraktur, which is the print here. I have some of the mastheads to show you. But they were all printed in this broken script, or broken type, that we call it. So we can see that Germans also imported their print culture. And Fraktur was commonly used in Germany until 1941. And so that is what they were used to, and used very German script, so that’s what they would also use when they settled here. So what that means is, they couldn’t just go and print their newspapers wherever there was already a printing press. But they had to have their own technology, their own moveable type to continue their tradition that they knew from home. And Fraktur really became a visual indicator for the language. So even if you couldn’t read, you would know this newspaper is printed in German because you see the Fraktur. I have to say that this morning, I looked at a couple Norwegian newspapers, and in the beginning, they also used Fraktur. So it was common for them, too. There were about 30 Norwegian newspapers in Wisconsin. But they switched over to the Antiqua, so what we’re used to, much earlier than the Germans would have. So we can see here, I brought some advertisements, so it’s for German businesses. And we can see that in the newspapers. Some English businesses would also advertise in German, and then they would use Fraktur.

But then, oftentimes, the name would be printed in Antiqua. And people could generally think, “Okay, I can go to this business and conduct my business in German.” And we can see in the Legal Blanks part, we can really see the difference between the English and the German. So we have a sentence that is part German, part English, here. And we can see the German is in Fraktur, and then the Warrants, Deeds, Notes, that is all in Antiqua. That is English. So we can really see this visual indicator. And that really meant that printing, bringing the printing culture over, meant that there was a manifestation of not only the spoken language, German, because when family read it together, even if they had started speaking English, that would be something they did together in German. But also German literacy, because children would learn to read Fraktur as well as English texts as they were confronted with English. And then we also then see, when we look at pictures with German shops, German stores, they would use Fraktur also in the names of those stores, or the names of the provider. So as we saw earlier, until 1980, the newspaper business was flourishing. And then came the decline. And you can see here, between 1900 and the 1920s, Wisconsin lost about 60% of their German-language newspapers. And then between 1900 and the 1930s, there was even up to 80% of them. And I argue that there are three factors that played into the decline of the German-language press here. Factor one, of course, the war. World War I began in 1914, and was actually very promising for the German-language newspapers business. Because news became more important than ever for the German immigrants.

They wanted to know, they were desperate for information from the homeland where they still had family, where their friends were still at. So the newspaper could really give them hope, here. They would print market prices, because there were rumors that goods were really expensive and that people were starving. And so they printed the market prices from Germany in the newspaper to show, okay, this is how much it costs right now, there. Your family is fine, or there is, in one of the newspapers, I found a letter by a Swiss traveler who had visited the South of Germany, and said, “Oh, tourism is still flourishing. It’s fine, your relatives will be fine.” And that really, again, kept that connection to the homeland. And it was all great for the business as long as the US stayed neutral. But the US entered the war, April 6, 1917, and then things began to change. The Trading with the Enemy Act of 1917 was passed. And it stated that, “The publication or circulation in any foreign language of any news item or comment respecting the United States or any nation engaged in the present war, or their policies, or international relations, shall not be permitted unless the publisher files with the postmaster at the place of publication a complete translation of the entire article in the English language.”

And we can see how this, for small newspapers, would be a logistical nightmare. They talk about Germany a lot, so every article that mentioned just Germany would have to be translated and filed. And newspapers did that. So here we can see an article about the war, actually, and then on top, we see true translation has been filed with the postmaster of Wausau, Wisconsin, as required by the Act. And other newspapers would write it right in front of all the articles on the front page. And here we also have a pledge to loyalty, “This newspaper is a member of the Wisconsin Patriotic Press Association, and pledges its uncompromising loyalty to our government in this war.” There was a growing anti-German sentiment that made it hard for newspapers, or all Germans, really, living in the area at the time. There were demonstrations, book burnings. A professor, a German professor was tarred and feathered by people for teaching German. Even German loan words that had entered into the English language were changed. So sauerkraut, at the time, turned into liberty cabbage. And we can see that, then, in the newspapers, how people reacted.

This, for example, is a map that was published by the Wisconsin Loyalty League, and saying where it was suspected pro-German sentiment in the state. And where people should be careful. People are really encouraged to tell on their neighbor, to spy and see if they were too German, if they were actually the enemy. And not everybody had become a US citizen yet, so those people who were still German were now enemies. And we can see how the newspapers reacted to that. Here, this is an article about citizenship. And it’s stated, “If you applied for your US citizenship before the US entered the war, you might still get it. If you apply now, you won’t.” There were also warnings, the Germania, printed “Gehorche dem Gesetz und halte den Mund.” “Obey the law, and shut your mouth.” They were really encouraged to stop speaking German in public, and really obey the law, do everything that you can, so people can’t tell on you for something. There was also a call for patriotism, like we see that in other newspapers too. Buying liberty bonds, but they were also telling people to buy liberty bonds in German, to show how patriotic they were. And, what we really see is the change in the angle of how the stories about the war were told. Before the US entered the war, articles would say, “Our archenemy France, our archenemy England,” and then it shifted to, “Our ally, England. Our ally, France.” So we can really see that. Because they had to translate it, and file it, and they had to show how patriotic they were. You can see here, the changes in the masthead.

So we have the Nord Stern, La Crosse paper. And now, on top, it says The Pioneer Newspaper of La Crosse, devoted to American aims and ideals. And then on the side, this is an American newspaper, printed in the German language. And we can see this is not in Fraktur, this is not in German, so who is this for? This is not for the reader of the newspaper. This is for their neighbor that sees the newspaper is being dropped off at the step of the door. Or for those who don’t read German, at the drugstore, when they see the newspaper. So if anybody is reading the newspaper in public, others would see, “I’m not an enemy, I’m just reading in German.” And then there were a lot of re-namings of newspapers. So we have The Germania, another Milwaukee newspaper that was merged. And so we see how newspapers are being merged together. So you have two, then you only have one. And with The Herald, and they became Milwaukee America. Which sounds way more American than Germania. And really shows, “Okay, we’re here for America.” We also see the notice, here, in the middle. It’s says “Unser America,” with a C, even though in German it would be a K. “ber alles!” “Our America over everything,” and then “America first.” And here you can really see, “We are Americans. Our America.” And also, “America first,” even though it’s English, it’s printed in Fraktur. So it is for the reader, and to just tell them, “Hey, this is our country, we think America first. We’re not Germans.” So that second factor, because it was not all because of the war, I argue, was the modern newspaper industry. Things had changed. There was more technology.

So we’re talking about communication technology, like the telegraph. News traveled much faster now. Also printing technology. Some only mass-produced newspapers instead of printing a smaller amount of issues at a time. And so we have a shift from the small-town printers, anybody with a printing press could start a newspaper, to now, this is a business. We have newspaper magnates buying all kinds of newspapers under one umbrella, merging a lot of them, making a lot of money with them. And it became a trans-regional business, because also transportation sped up a lot more. So we could bring newspapers from Milwaukee to the countryside much faster than it was possible before. So this, the trend in the overall industry, between 1900 and the 1920s, as I said before, the German newspaper declined by about 60%. All other newspapers, by 30%. And all other foreign language newspapers, by roughly 26%. So we see that there is a trend to declining the number of newspapers published, but we also see that the German, the number of German newspapers is still higher, that ceased to exist at the time. So the third factor that I think is part of the decline of the German language press, is integration. We can see, as early as 1870, 1897, that there are English loan words that enter into the German language. Here, we have “Wir haben jetzt plenty regen.” “Now, we have plenty of rain.” So the plenty is definitely English. And so we can see how Germans are not just, “No, we wouldn’t want any English in our lives,” but slowly it enters their life. And I think that is very much the history of all kinds of immigration. That slowly, over generations, English will enter, when they came here. By the time of the war, we have at least one to four generations of German Wisconsinites living here. And a growing number identifies as Americans or Wisconsinites. So the audience of those newspapers also changes. And instead of addressing Prussians or Pomeranians, suddenly they’re addressing Wisconsinites. Maybe still Wisconsinites with a K, but it is Wisconsinites rather than the identification with where they came from. And so, that way, we can see how a lot of newspapers didn’t need to reach the facet of that immigration community anymore. So what can we learn from the history of these newspapers in general? Well, by World War I, Wisconsin already had a 70-year German newspaper printing tradition. And that is not just easily wiped out by the war, by anti-German sentiment. The newspapers reinforced language, traditions, food, and also the print. So now, we can really see the long-term impacts, especially of the print. When I go to the Rathskeller at the Union, the walls are full of German sayings in Fraktur. Also, when I look at beer labels, or restaurants, it’s everywhere, we’re surrounded by it. And so the evolution of the German language press really shows us how, from a patchwork of immigrant communities, our state grew into the state of Wisconsin, which just has a culture that is rich of the German influences. And I argue that they were very much perpetuated by that printing tradition of the newspapers. So I can take some questions now. Thank you. (audience applauds)