The McCrea papers are divided into three phases of his professional career: the Capital Times, the Madison Press Connection, and his work for Governor Anthony Earl as communications director. An additional series documents general career activities and writing. Coverage is best for the years 1974 through 1986. The records documenting McCrea's employment and his professional activities during the period of his employment with the Capital Times are limited, although scattered information about the Capital Times that was apparently used later as reference material during the 1977-1979 strike is also scattered through the Press Connection series.
The Madison Press Connection files are a useful complement to the newspaper's records which are also held by the State Historical Society of Wisconsin. Overall, however, McCrea's files about the Connection are uneven and spotty. Included here are important 1978 minutes of the Board of Directors missing from the paper's records, as well as notes and proposals that were submitted to the Board. The files also contain some useful insights about the editorial management of the paper and about its advertising, circulation, and promotion. Especially valuable are the letters to the editor received as a result of the paper's publication of Charles Hansen's H-Bomb letter in 1979, although there is no information on the decision to publish this letter. The publication of the H-Bomb letter caused the federal government to drop its injunction against publication of Howard Morland's H-Bomb article by The Progressive, another Madison publication. Also uniquely valuable are insurance deduction lists which provide authoritative information on the MNI employees who went out on strike in 1977 and miscellaneous NLRB records related to the strike. The subject files include a typescript paper by Erwin Knoll about The Progressive's H-Bomb story and an interview with Cedric Parker, perhaps recorded by filmmaker Glenn Silber to publicize the MNI strike, about his career at the Capital Times and alleged Communist associations.
The Earl files comprise about half of the collection. Of these the majority consists of annotated, reading copies of speeches used by Governor Earl. These files have been compared to records received in the Archives from the governor's office and McCrea's file should be regarded as the most authoritative record of Earl's speeches and remarks in archival custody. The majority of the annotations are in McCrea's handwriting apparently to suggest to Earl how to emphasize or elaborate on particular sections. Also included are a few speeches written for Earl after leaving office, speeches written for others, correspondence addressed to the governor, and files on the governor's trade mission to China. The China files include a typescript diary about McCrea's experiences and a similar document prepared by Wisconsin legislator Tom Loftus after a 1981 trip.
