Title: Einar O. Hammar Papers
Inclusive Dates: 1899-1968

Creator:

• Hammar, Einar O., 1897-1965

Call Number: Mss 207

Quantity: 2.2 c.f. (6 archives boxes)

Repository:

Wisconsin Historical Society, Division of Library, Archives, and Museum Collections

Archival Locations:

Wisconsin Historical Society (Map)

COLLECTION MAY BE STORED OFF-SITE: see catalog entry to request materials and for additional information.

Abstract:

Papers of Einar O. Hammer, a former public relations officer for the Wisconsin Department of Agriculture (1944-1954) and director of fraternal affairs for the Sons of Norway in Minneapolis, Minnesota (1956-1964). Included are biographical materials, correspondence, speeches delivered by Hammer and other departmental officials such as W. A. Duffy, other writings including an unpublished book on the history of agriculture in Wisconsin, files concerning the administration of the Sons of Norway and its relationships with other fraternal agriculture organizations, charts, and subject files dealing with Wisconsin agriculture and Scandinavian-American culture.

Language: English

URL to cite for this finding aid: http://digital.library.wisc.edu/1711.dl/wiarchives.uw-whs-mss00207

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Einar Oswald Hammer was born on October 23, 1897 in Webster, South Dakota, the son of Reverend and Mrs. L. E. Hammer, two Norwegian immigrants. Hammer grew up on a farm and attended local schools, then served in World War I before attending St. Olaf College in Northfield, Minnesota. His interest in journalism was manifest even as an undergraduate, as Hammer served as editor-in-chief of the college newspaper. Following his graduation in 1922 Hammer was employed for six years as city editor of the Faribault [Minn.] Daily News. He left Faribault in 1928 to take over publication of the Jackson [Minn.] Weekly Republic. In 1933 he moved to Lone Rock, Wisconsin, where he owned, edited, and published the weekly Lone Rock Journal.

As a result of his publishing success in rural communities and his resulting knowledge of the rural economy, in 1944 Hammer was appointed head of public relations in the Wisconsin Department of Agriculture and Markets. For the next eight years he was editor of the departmental publicity, public relations, and market news. In this capacity he wrote numerous articles, reports, essays, radio talks, and speeches about the role of agriculture in Wisconsin. He also drafted an unpublished book, “Backgrounds of the Wisconsin State Department of Agriculture.”

Hammer was also president of the Public Relations Club of Madison. In 1949 he received an M.S. in agricultural journalism from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Also interested in his own ethnic background, he was a member of the Ygdrasil Literary Society and a student of Scandinavian languages at the University.

Hammer left the Agriculture Department in 1952 to accept a position as public relations director for the Madison Chamber of Commerce. In 1954 he became publicity director for the State American Legion Convention. In that same year he moved to Minneapolis as director of fraternal affairs for the Sons of Norway, an insurance-based fraternal order for Americans of Norwegian descent. Hammer's association with the Sons of Norway had begun in 1945 when he joined the Madison Lodge No. 74. By 1949 he was president of District Lodge No. 5, which governed the state lodges of Wisconsin, Illinois, and Michigan.

As director of fraternal affairs, Hammer was a frequent speaker at national, district, and state lodge events, and he was chiefly responsible for maintaining channels of communication within the fraternal structure. Hammer also edited the Sons of Norway magazine, supplying it with numerous articles and book reviews. Many of these articles were inspired by his organization-sponsored trip to Norway in 1959 and by his interest in the Kensington Runestone issue, the voyages of Leif Erikson, and the archaeological evidence of early Viking settlements in North America. Hammer also directed organizational affairs in relation to other fraternal orders and served on the legislative committee and as head of publicity for the Minnesota Fraternal Congress.

Hammer was married to Magna C. Simpson in 1926. They had three children, Einar D., Lowell E., and Lois Hammer Seymour. In 1964 he resigned from his position with the Sons of Norway. He died on August 21, 1965.

The Hammer Papers consist of biographical material, correspondence, editorials, essays, manuscripts, reports, radio talks, speeches, notes, magazine articles, newspaper clippings, book reviews, charts, and memoranda. Although they span the years 1899-1968, the main body of the collection covers the period from 1944 when Hammer began work for the Wisconsin Department of Agriculture to his death in 1965. As a result, virtually no documentation exists concerning his youth or military service during World War I, and the material concerning his early career with various rural daily and weekly newspapers is sketchy, consisting mainly of editorials and fragmentary correspondence.

The main body of the collection consists of AGRICULTURAL FILES and SCANDINAVIAN-AMERICAN FILES. These two subject categories roughly correspond to the two main phases of his career, although there is some overlap within the files. They are preceded by a file of miscellaneous BIOGRAPHICAL MATERIAL concerning Hammer's life.

The AGRICULTURAL FILES are subdivided into three subseries, Wisconsin Department of Agriculture Files, Agricultural Subject Files, and Miscellaneous Subject Files. Each of these files is alphabetically arranged. The Wisconsin Department of Agriculture Files are comprised of correspondence, editorials, essays, manuscripts, reports, radio talks, speeches, and memoranda. Although the emphasis is on his tenure as head of public relations for the Agriculture Department, a few items relate to his positions with the Faribault Daily News, the Jackson Republic, and the Lone Rock Journal. The files primarily document the public relations products - the articles, releases, and radio talks which Hammer wrote - rather than the policy decisions which went into their creation. The reports concern marketing strategies and progress in agricultural production, his radio talks concentrate on various aspects of the history and popular culture of agriculture in Wisconsin, and the speeches are a collection of addresses given by Hammer and by various other members of the Department including W. A. Duffy. The unpublished book manuscript is a history of Wisconsin agriculture from its beginning to the 1940's.

The Agricultural Subject Files are a collection of reports, notes, memoranda, and other resource material collected by Hammer for use in his publicity. The Miscellaneous Subject Files concern other activities from this period of his career, the Public Relations Club of Madison and the American Legion.

The SCANDINAVIAN-AMERICAN FILES are divided into administrative files pertaining to the Sons of Norway and Scandinavian-American Subject Files. The Sons of Norway records include correspondence, notes, reports, articles, essays, books, reviews, and memoranda which are then arranged according to Hammer's various functional responsibilities: internal administration, fraternal affairs, inter-fraternal affairs, the Sons of Norway magazine, and his trip to Norway.

The Subject Files are a compilation of research notes, correspondence, charts, newspaper clippings, magazine articles, and memoranda pertaining to a wide spectrum of Scandinavian-American history and culture. Particularly extensive are the correspondence and notes on authors and scholars. Some of the material concerns contemporary Scandinavian-American individuals and affairs such as Sverre Rolvaag, the Ygdrasil Literary Society, and sangerfests, but the majority of the material is concerned with the historical controversies surrounding early Viking settlement in North America, the Kensington Runestone, and Leif Erikson.

Miscellaneous photographs received with this collection have been filed in various name files in the Visual and Sound Archives.

Acquisition Information

Presented by Einar D. Hammer, Mrs. Robert J. Seymour, and Lowell E. Hammer, Madison, Wisconsin, July 24, 1972. Accession Number: M72-287

Processing Information

Processed by Randal Sivertson and Carolyn J. Mattern, 1987.

Box   1 Folder   1	Series: Biographical Material, 1944-1952
	Series: Agricultural Files	⇧
	Subseries: Wisconsin Department of Agriculture Files
Box   1 Folder   2	Correspondence, 1927-1966
Box   1 Folder   3	Editorials, 1927-1928
	Essays
Box   1 Folder   4	Ager, Waldemar T.: A Study in Midnight Oil, 1946-1947
Box   1 Folder   5	Public Relations as an Instrument of Administrative Law Enforcement in Wisconsin, circa 1949
Box   1 Folder   6	“A Young Sun Shines” and “Prairie Lore and Legend,” 1932
	Manuscript for book, “Backgrounds of the Wisconsin State Department of Agriculture”
Box   1 Folder   7-8	Manuscript, 1949
Box   1 Folder   9	Outline and notes, 1948-1949
Box   2 Folder   1	Radio talks, 1951-1953
	Reports
Box   1 Folder   10	Milk as a public utility and milk industry regulation, 1948
Box   1 Folder   11	Miscellaneous reports, circa 1948
	Speeches
Box   2 Folder   2	Bordner, John S., 1929
Box   2 Folder   3	Button, Milton H., 1944-1948
Box   2 Folder   4	Duffy, W. A., 1927-1929
Box   2 Folder   5	Hammer, Einar, 1954
Box   2 Folder   6	Hill, Charles L., 1930
Box   2 Folder   7	Knipfel, H. M., 1929-1930
Box   2 Folder   8	Miscellaneous speeches, 1928-1948
Box   2 Folder   9	Rice, Ora, 1948
	Subseries: Agricultural Subject Files	⇧
Box   2 Folder   10	Animal conservation information, 1948-1951
Box   2 Folder   11	Bang's disease control program, 1948-1951
Box   2 Folder   12	Century Farms, 1952
Box   2 Folder   13	Cheese production, 1937-1947
Box   2 Folder   14	Co-operatives, 1948
Box   2 Folder   15	County fairs, 1948-1951
Box   2 Folder   16	Dairy and Food Commission, 1948
Box   2 Folder   17	Dairy husbandry, 1936-1952
Box   3 Folder   1	Dairymen's association, 1948
Box   3 Folder   2	Dog licenses, 1948
Box   3 Folder   3	Famous Wisconsinites, 1940-1953
Box   3 Folder   4	Farm machinery manufacture, 1948-1954
Box   3 Folder   5	Farmers' publications, 1947
Box   3 Folder   6	Fruit growing, 1943-1950
Box   3 Folder   7	Hog raising, 1950
Box   3 Folder   8	Immigration, 1948
Box   3 Folder   9	Livestock disease control, 1948
Box   3 Folder   10	Marketing, 1948
Box   3 Folder   11	Prairie Lore and Legend, 1932
Box   3 Folder   12	Public relations information, 1947-1951
Box   3 Folder   13	Societies (Agricultural), circa 1948
Box   3 Folder   14	Soil conservation, 1941-1948
Box   3 Folder   15	State Board of Agriculture, circa 1947
Box   3 Folder   16	State fairs, 1947-1948
Box   3 Folder   17	State Forestry Commission, circa 1947
Box   3 Folder   18	Statistics, Agricultural, 1948
Box   3 Folder   19	Structure and policy information, Agriculture Department, 1939
Box   3 Folder   20	Tobacco production, 1950
Box   3 Folder   21	Weights and measures laws, circa 1947
Box   3 Folder   22	Wheat growing, 1947
	Subseries: Miscellaneous subject files	⇧
Box   3 Folder   23	American Legion, Wisconsin state convention, 1954
Box   3 Folder   24	Public Relations Club of Madison, 1949
	Series: Scandinavian-American Files	⇧
	Subseries: Sons of Norway
Box   4 Folder   1	History of the Sons of Norway, undated
	Administration
Box   4 Folder   2	Administrative correspondence and reports, 1956-1964
Box   4 Folder   3	Insurance, 1961-1962
	Fraternal affairs
Box   4 Folder   4	District Lodge No. 1 convention, 1964
Box   4 Folder   5	District Lodge No. 6 anniversary celebration, 1962
Box   4 Folder   6	Headquarters anniversary celebrations, 1954-1965
Box   4 Folder   7	Lodge talk outlines, 1960-1965
Box   4 Folder   8	Sonnesyn, Gerhard H., Memorial, 1963
Box   4 Folder   9	West coast and Canadian lodge visitations, 1960
	Inter-fraternal affairs
Box   4 Folder   10	National Fraternal Congress, 1956-1964
Box   4 Folder   11	Talks to other fraternal orders, 1961-1964
	Magazine
Box   4 Folder   12	Book and movie reviews, 1961-1965
Box   4 Folder   13	Editorial materials, 1959-1965
Box   4 Folder   14	Ideas for articles, 1956-1965
	Norwegian trip
Box   5 Folder   1	Correspondence, 1958-1959
Box   5 Folder   2	Travel articles, 1959-1960
	Subseries: Scandinavian-American Subject Files	⇧
Box   5 Folder   3	Christmas customs, 1951-1955
Box   5 Folder   4	Eidsvoll, 1963
	Erikson, Leif
Box   5 Folder   12	1951-1964
Box   5 Folder   13	Memorial association, 1951-1958
Box   5 Folder   5	Fur trappers' canoe routes, 1962-1964
Box   5 Folder   6	Genealogy, 1963
Box   5 Folder   7	Holand, Hjalmar, 1961-1964
	Kensington runestone
Box   5 Folder   8	Correspondence, 1955-1965
Box   5 Folder   9	Magazine articles and clippings, 1899-1966
Box   5 Folder   10	Manuscript and notes, 1955-1966
Box   5 Folder   11	Landsverk, O. G., 1963-1965
Box   6 Folder   1	Moberg, Vilhelm: A Swedish Rolvaag, 1953
Box   6 Folder   2	Munson, Gorham, 1964
Box   6 Folder   3	Norberg, C. S., 1962
Box   6 Folder   4	Norske pionerferder til lakene, 1963
Box   6 Folder   5	Norwegian-American Historical Association, 1958-1964
Box   6 Folder   6	Norwegian literature, 1939-1964
Box   6 Folder   7	Olav V, Visit to America, 1968
Box   6 Folder   8	Pontecorvo shipwreck of 1874, 1960
Box   6 Folder   9	Rock County historical marker address, 1952
Box   6 Folder   10	Rolvaag, O. E., 1964
Box   6 Folder   11	Sangerfests, 1958-1960
Box   6 Folder   12	Thorvald's grave controversy, 1962
Box   6 Folder   13	Viking colonies in America, 1947-1965
Box   6 Folder   14	Viking exploration, 1963-1965
Box   6 Folder   15	Ygdrasil Literary Society, 1946-1955