The collection consists largely of incoming letters but there are occasional drafts of replies. Besides Gregory's own correspondence there are small groups of papers of three other persons: some early letters addressed to the elder Gregory in the 1850s; scattered political letters written to William E. Cramer; and, mainly around the year 1898, a number of letters to Alexander M. Thomson, a fellow journalist who was preparing a political history of Wisconsin but died before the volume was completed. All these letters have been filed in one chronological sequence. (See the partial index in the appendix to this finding aid.) However, because of their fragile condition and the fact that many of them are not dated, one group of letters written to Gregory have been placed in separate folders--those written by William Cramer and Harriet Cramer, together with a few pieces of Cramer family correspondence.
The incoming correspondence contains a quantity of letters from prominent Milwaukeeans: social notes, requests for publication of items, appreciations of newspaper notices. It is impossible to list all of these writers; their letters were, for the most part, of only passing importance. Correspondence with fellow club members is more numerous. Gregory was a member of the Milwaukee Typographical Union, the Milwaukee Press Club, the Old Settlers Club, the City Club, the Phantom Club, the Sunset Club, the Parkman Club, the Wisconsin Academy of Arts and Science, the Wisconsin Archeological Society, and the State Historical Society, and held offices in many of these organizations. His papers contain invitations, programs, brochures, and correspondence on social affairs, dedications, reunions, club meetings, conventions, and promotional work connected with these and various other social, professional, and cultural organizations.
Among the fellow club members who corresponded with Gregory were sons or close relatives of several men who had been prominent in the history of Wisconsin: S.M. Booth of Chicago, Paul D. Carpenter of a Milwaukee law firm, George H. Paul writing from various places, and George R. Peck of Chicago. There are several letters from two Americans in foreign service: Francis B. Keene of Geneva, Switzerland, and Rome, and Walter E. Gardner of Rotterdam, Netherlands. Neal Brown of Wausau, a member of the Phantom Club, expressed his views on newspaper items in two or three letters and Eugene W. Chafin, national candidate for President on the Prohibition ticket, wrote two or three brief notes.
Mrs. Cramer's patronage of the arts was no doubt instrumental in turning the attention of the Evening Sentinel to the encouragement of the study and production of art in Milwaukee. A number of artists and sculptors who produced paintings, water colors, and statuary around the turn of the century are represented in the Gregory correspondence. Mrs. Lydia Ely, remembered chiefly for her water colors, consulted with Gregory on publicity and patronage. Gaetano Trentanove, the Italian sculptor who made the statue of Father Marquette for Statuary Hall in Washington, D.C., and of other figures of historic Americans, corresponded with Gregory over a period of fifteen years, writing from his studio in Florence, Italy, and from various American cities.
From his early youth Gregory was interested in writing. In 1892 he published a slender volume of verse, A Beauty of Thebes, and throughout his life he continued to compose verses for special occasions. As newspaper editor and writer, Gregory was besieged by aspiring writers of poetry and prose seeking advice and assistance in perfecting and publishing their productions. The collection contains a few of such offerings and their accompanying letters as well as some from more competent writers, such as Bernard I. Durward. In 1895 Gregory helped found the Parkman Club, an organization devoted to research and writing on the history of the Old Northwest. His correspondence contains letters from a number of fellow members regarding their studies and publications. Among them are about a dozen from the Chicago collector and bibliophile, John Thomas Lee. An equal number, written at long intervals between 1893 and 1923, are from the popular Milwaukee novelist, General Charles King.
Throughout the entire collection there are letters from newspapermen, some of whom remained journalists and publishers all of their lives, others who branched out into allied fields. Among these writers are Zona Gale of Portage, Amos P. Wilder of Madison, John G. Pyle and Harlan P. Hall of St. Paul, Minnesota, and Frank Flower who produced promotional literature from Superior and a number of other cities. There are also letters from Peter van Vechten and his son of the same name, mainly on historical subjects, and William F. Hooker, the popular “Bill Hooker” of twentieth-century Milwaukee. Between the years 1941 and 1946, Chase S. Osborn and his adopted daughter and secretary, Stellanova, wrote some forty brief letters to Mrs. Gregory whom Osborn had known when they were both newspaper writers in Milwaukee fifty years earlier.
Although Gregory never held political office, he was deeply interested in political activities and attended a number of national party conventions. In his youth he was a Democrat (His first wife, Caroline Strong Paul who died in 1891, was a sister of George H. Paul, a leading Wisconsin Democrat.), but the newspaper Gregory edited was a stronghold of Stalwart Republican principles and in the 1890s he became a Republican. For ten years, beginning in 1894, he was a member of the Republican County Committee, representing the First Ward of the city. His papers for those years in particular, but running through most of the collection, deal with party politics: local campaigns and patronage, contributions, speeches, selection of delegates, issues, and personalities.
There are letters from a number of political leaders of state and national prominence, many of them addressed to Gregory himself, but also a number written to William E. Cramer and to Alexander M. Thomson whose Political History of Wisconsin was published posthumously in 1898.
Among the letters from political leaders are occasional ones from members of the House of Representatives: Victor Berger, John J. Esch, John Jenkins, John Fox Potter, S.S. Barney, and Joseph W. Babcock, and more numerous ones from Theodore Otjen and William H. Stafford of Milwaukee. At least five Wisconsin governors appear in the collection: C.C. Washburn, William R. Taylor, William D. Hoard, Francis E. McGovern, and George W. Peck, and the Democratic New York governor, Horatio Seymour of Utica. There is a letter to Cramer from each of the following United States Senators: Matthew H. Carpenter, Timothy O. Howe, and John Sherman, and about a dozen to Gregory between the years 1894 and 1906 from John C. Spooner.
There are several letters discussing anti-La Follette measures written by various Stalwart leaders; those from William D. Connor of Marshfield in the election years 1906 and 1908 and fairly numerous. In the early years of World War I, L.T. Crabtree of Crandon and Reinhardt Rahr of Manitowoc wrote presenting their views of the state political situation and the war.
His papers contain but slight material on his work after leaving the newspaper business. The rough draft of his unpublished Philipp biography is in the collection. There is also occasional correspondence with local writers in various sections of southern Wisconsin dealing with their preparation of material for the historical volumes he was compiling or editing, and some correspondence with the publishers, S.J. Clarke Company of Chicago.
Four bound volumes which are included in the Gregory papers are described in the contents list below.
The photograph is of members of the Milwaukee County Historical Society taken on August 30, 1940.
