Title: Alfred T. Flint Papers
Inclusive Dates: 1819-1954

Creator:

• Flint, Alfred T., approximately 1890-1954

Call Number: Wis Mss TQ; PH 1946; PH 1950; PH 1952; PH 1961; PH 1964-PH 1966; PH 1969; PH 1970; PH 2021; WHi(F6); EA 005

Quantity: 3.2 cubic feet (8 archives boxes); 271 photographs (4 folders, 3 albums, and 1 archives box), 0.6 cubic feet of ephemera (2 archives boxes), 75 negatives, 1 film (8 mm), and 1 booklet (1 folder)

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 Alfred T. Flint, a Madison, Wisconsin, attorney. Included is family correspondence, 1819-1949, containing accounts of journeys in New England and the West; notebooks and diaries relating to Flint's training in World War I; and notes on legal matters, 1916-1954. The collection also contains his lecture notes taken at the University of Wisconsin, 1908-1911, and Harvard Law School, 1914-1917; among these are notes for courses given by John R. Commons, Richard T. Ely, Carl Russell Fish, Felix Frankfurter, and Paul S. Reinsch. Included in the family papers are bills, receipts, diaries, and notebooks from numerous ancestors in Massachusetts and Ohio. The travel accounts, written chiefly by George and Albert S. Flint, describe trips to the White Mountains of New Hampshire (1873), California (1875-1876), Salt Lake City (1877), Mammoth Cave (1877), the coasts of Massachusetts and Maine (1879 and 1883), and the Chicago World's Fair. Ontario canoe trips, 1933 and 1937, are documented by diaries kept by companions of Alfred T. Flint. Also includes photographs of family, family home(s), canoe trips, and World War I training camp, as well as ephemera collected as a high school and college student, a film from canoeing trip(s), and a handmade children's book.

Note:

There is a restriction on access to this material; see the Administrative/Restriction Information portion of this finding aid for details.

Language: English

URL to cite for this finding aid: http://digital.library.wisc.edu/1711.dl/wiarchives.uw-whs-wis000tq

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Albert S. Flint (1853-1923) graduated with the Class of 1873 at Harvard. He became an assistant astronomer at the University of Wisconsin in 1889. He was married in 1884 to Helen Thomas and had three children, Helen, Alfred T., and Rebecca.

Alfred T. Flint, son of Albert S., attended lectures at the University of Wisconsin from 1908 to 1911. In July 1911, he began work with the Wisconsin Railroad Commission. He resigned in October 1914 to attend Harvard Law School where he received his law degree in June 1917. He was assigned to Plattsburg Barracks in New York, in April 1917 in the First Officer Training Corps, was commissioned 2nd Lieutenant on August 15, 1917, and assigned to Camp Devers on December 31, 1917. He attended Small Arms School from August 20 to September 1918 and was assigned to the 380th Infantry, 95th Division, Camp Sherman, Ohio. He was discharged on December 13, 1918, after which he took a prominent part in American Legion affairs, including a time as post commander in Madison, Wisconsin.

On February 1, 1919, Alfred T. Flint began work with Jones and Schubring of Madison. In July 1919, he took the bar examinations in Madison, passed, and was admitted in August 1919. In September 1920, he was appointed secretary to Supreme Court Justice Burr W. Jones. After this service he returned to Schubring's firm. On December 1, 1926, he assumed duties as examiner for the Wisconsin Industrial Commission.

Alfred T. Flint took many trips in Wisconsin, Canada, and Europe, some of them in canoes. He was active in the State Historical Society of Wisconsin and in the Wisconsin Archeological Society.

Boxes 1 and 2 include correspondence and miscellaneous family records, such as receipts, bills, land transfers, in the period from 1819 to 1954. Among these assorted papers are scattered letters from numerous ancestors of Alfred T. Flint in the Flint, Thomas, and Fisher families in Massachusetts and Ohio in the nineteenth century. Also included are a number of interesting descriptions of travel, written chiefly by George and Albert S. Flint: to the White Mountains of New Hampshire (1873), California (1875-1876), Salt Lake City (1877), Mammoth Cave (1877), the Atlantic Coast of Massachusetts and Maine (1879, 1883), and the Chicago World's Fair (1893). Of later dates (1933, 1937) there are typewritten carbons of journals of two Canadian canoe trips into the Ontario wilderness, written by companions of Alfred T. Flint on the trip.

Box 3 contains 25 volumes of notes and diaries by various members of the family. There are 14 volumes (Vols. 11-24) detailing the training Alfred T. Flint received as a 2nd Lieutenant during World War I. These give a good picture of the training given young college men commissioned in World War I. In addition, there are scattered diaries and notebooks of Alfred T. Flint (Vols. 7-10), Albert S. Flint (Vols. 2-6), reminiscences by Mary E. (Fisher) Thomas (Vol. 25), and a rent ledger kept in 1851 by Nathaniel Fisher (Vol. 1).

Boxes 4 and 5 contain notes made by Alfred T. Flint on lectures he attended at the University of Wisconsin, 1908-1911, and at Harvard Law School, 1914-1915. Of particular interest are his notes from John R. Commons' lectures on Labor History, 1860-1880, and on Public Utilities; from Richard T. Ely's lectures on Evolution of Industrial Society and on Land and Rent; from Carl Russell Fish's lecture on American History to 1910; from Paul S. Reinsch's lecture on Contemporary International Politics; and from Felix Frankfurter's lecture on Administrative Law.

Boxes 6-8 contain notes by Alfred T. Flint on legal matters. These are chiefly penciled notations on cases in Ohio, New York, and other areas, which he appears to have jotted down in connection with Wisconsin cases on which he worked in the 1920s and 1930s as a Madison attorney.

Visual materials include family albums; high school and university ephemera; photographs of officers' training camp activities; images of Madison, Wisconsin, including effigy mounds in Madison and other places in Wisconsin; photographs and a film about Flint's camping trips to Canada; and a booklet made by Flint's grandfather for his grandchildren.

Access Restrictions

RESTRICTED: Access to negatives requires permission of the Visual Materials Curator or the Visual Materials Archivist and three days notice.

Acquisition Information

Presented by Mrs. Rebecca Flint, Troy, New York, August 26, 1959.

Wis Mss TQ	Correspondence
Box   1	1819-1917
Box   2	1918-1949
Box   3	Notebooks and diaries Scope and Content Note: 25 volumes, 14 of which concern Alfred T. Flint's training in World War I.
	Lecture notes taken in classes at the University of Wisconsin and Harvard Law School, 1908-1911, 1911-1917
Box   4	B-K
Box   5	P-W
Box   6-8	Legal papers, relating to the law practice of Alfred T. Flint, 1916-1951 Note: These have not been put in order.
	Visual materials
PH 1946	High school and University of Wisconsin ephemera Scope and Content Note: Ephemera relating to Alfred T. Flint’s student life at Madison (Wisconsin) High School and the University of Wisconsin, and his sister Rebecca P. Flint. A small portion also relates to his student life at Harvard University. Materials include commencement and debating society programs; concert and theater programs; dance cards, dinner menus, tickets, track meet ephemera, receipts, and club materials.
Box   1 Folder   1	Banquets and dinner dances
Box   1 Folder   2	Clubs
Box   1 Folder   3	Dance cards
Box   1 Folder   4	Debate programs
Box   1 Folder   5	General
Box   1 Folder   6	Harvard University commencement, 1916
Box   1 Folder   7	Madison High School
Box   1 Folder   8	Memorial dedications and professional organizations meetings
Box   1 Folder   9-10	Plays, concerts, circuses and recitals
Box   2 Folder   1	Tickets
Box   2 Folder   2	Track meet programs and realia
Box   2 Folder   3	University of Wisconsin commencement and related
Box   2 Folder   4	University of Wisconsin realia, 1911
	Photographs
	Albums
PH 1950 Box   1	Flint family, Salem, Massachusetts Physical Description: 40 photographs  Scope and Content Note: Album of carte-de-visite photographic portraits of the Simeon Flint family of Salem, Massachusetts and members of the Salem High School class of 1871. Also included is a photograph of Salem High School and portraits of Daniel Webster and the African-American messenger at the U.S. Naval Observatory, Washington, D.C.
PH 1964	Flint and Thomas family Physical Description: 39 photographs  Scope and Content Note: Album of carte-de-visite and cabinet photographic portraits of members of the Flint and Thomas families, circa 1870-1895.
PH 1966	Tintype portraits Physical Description: 50 photographs  Scope and Content Note: Small tintype studio portraiture of individuals collected in small album.
PH 1952 Folder   1	Reserve Officers Training Corps camp activities, Plattsburg, New York, 1917 Physical Description: 56 photographs  Scope and Content Note: Images include views of the grounds, barracks, training marches, bayonet drills, and rifle practice, with annotations by Flint who was in training there at the time.
PH 1965 Folder   1	Views of Madison, Wisconsin Physical Description: 25 photographs  Scope and Content Note: A booklet entitled "University of Wisconsin Jubilee," produced in 1904, containing mounted collotype reproductions of panoramic views of Madison, Wisconsin: lake and shore views, Sherman Ave. drive, university buildings, the State Historical Society, and the Wisconsin State Capitol.
PH 1969 Folder   1	Flint residence, Madison, Wisconsin Physical Description: 5 photographs  Scope and Content Note: Photographs of the residence of Professor Albert S. Flint at 122 Bascom Place, Madison, Wisconsin, from excavation, through construction, to finished exteriors and interiors, 1922-1923. See also the corresponding negatives in WHi(F6) 25-39.
PH 1970 Box   1	Canoe trips Physical Description: 48 photographs  Scope and Content Note: Photographs made by Flint of activities while on canoe trips to the Canadian wilderness, circa 1924-1937. Included are images of canoes, the portage of goods overland, camp scenes, and Native American guides and families. See also negatives for these images in WHi(F6).
PH 2021 Folder   1	Native American effigy mounds Physical Description: 8 photographs  Scope and Content Note: Photographs made by George R. Fox, director of the Chamberlain Memorial Museum of Local Pioneer History, Three Oaks, Michigan, of Native American effigy mounds in Wisconsin, 1919. Included are images of mounds in Madison, Merrill Springs, Baraboo, and Fort Atkinson.
WHi(F6)	Negatives Physical Description: 75 glass plate and nitrate negatives  Scope and Content Note: Negatives, made primarily by Anna Monds Thomas, of the boyhood home of Flint and of Madison, Wisconsin, and vicinity, circa 1900 to 1910. Also included are negatives of activities on canoe trips to the Canadian wilderness, circa 1924 to 1937.
EA 005	Film Physical Description: 8 mm  Scope and Content Note: Film related to activities on canoe trips to the Canadian wilderness, circa 1924-1937.
PH 1961 Folder   1	Children's book Scope and Content Note: Child's book written in longhand text, with pasted animal pictures excerpted from cards, magazines, and other sources, and a crayon background, entitled "Chickie Little" and made by Alfred Thomas of Washington, D.C., for his grandchildren: Helen, Alfred Thomas, and Rebecca P. Flint of Madison, Wisconsin, in 1896. The story is that of Henny Penny and the falling sky.