The collection provides very complete documentation of the personal and business life of Sigrid Schultz, and consists of papers she generated as well as many items she collected. A large portion of the collection consists of personal and professional correspondence dating from her childhood until the day before her death in 1980. Writings, many of which were unpublished, comprise another large section of the collection. Taken together, the writings are an important source for information on her experiences in pre-war Germany and her opinions and observations of post-war events in that country.
The collection is divided into seven series: BIOGRAPHICAL MATERIAL, CHICAGO TRIBUNE MATERIAL, GENERAL CORRESPONDENCE, FINANCIAL RECORDS, GENERAL FILES, OVERSEAS PRESS CLUB MATERIAL, PERSONAL WRITINGS, COLLECTED PAPERS, FAMILY PAPERS, and VISUAL MATERIALS: ADDITIONS.
BIOGRAPHICAL MATERIAL contains documentation relating to her personal life, such as awards, Christmas card lists and addresses, menus, horoscopes, and passports and identity cards. There is also material on her house in Westport, Connecticut, and its contents. Of greater interest are notes on interviews she conducted and transcripts of interviews with her in the 1970s. (One of these concerns her recollections of the treatment of Jews in Nazi Germany, another is on the history of the Tribune, and a third is available only in recorded form.) Also listed here are numerous photographs of the Sigrid and the Schultz family, their pets, and the house in Westport, Connecticut. There are some early photographs of Hermann Schultz's studio and two albums of his portrait subjects, as well as theatrical shots of members of the Jaskewitz family, circa 1850s.
The CHICAGO TRIBUNE MATERIAL is comprised of documents generated during nearly thirty years of employment with the company. The correspondence here, 1919-1978, is especially rich, including letters from supervisors and colleagues such as Floyd Gibbons, Richard Henry Little, J. Loy Maloney, Joseph Pierson, George Seldes, and George Scharschug and numerous items to and from the Tribune's controversial owner, Col. Robert McCormick. The correspondence to the Tribune often includes detailed background information on the filing of particular stories, news concerning the activities of other employees, and her personal perspective on events. The incoming coverage from Chicago contains numerous examples of instructions concerning particular stories and information on the management of the paper in general. Available only on microfilm are scrapbooks of Schultz's stories published in the Tribune for the period 1934 to 1939. The series also includes statements by Germans for publication, 1920-1923; feature stories and fillers she mailed from Berlin, 1920-1941; World War II stories cabled to the United States in 1945; a column about the social and cultural activities of Americans in Berlin, 1925-1928; and material for the Tribune's book, History of the War, to which she contributed.
The GENERAL CORRESPONDENCE series is divided into business letters that do not concern the Tribune, personal correspondence, and general mail. (Letters to and from her immediate family are in the Schultz Family material.)
The bulk of this section is the personal correspondence, some of which is in German. Letters to and from more than forty of Sigrid Schultz's most prominent friends and colleagues are arranged alphabetically by name, while correspondence to and from other individuals is arranged chronologically under the heading of general correspondence. The personal correspondence with the Wallace and Mary Deuel family, 1948-1980, is especially extensive. Also notable are exchanges with musician Janet Fairbank, Hans V. Kaltenborn, William Laidlaw, Louis Lochner, Barney Oldfield, William L. Shirer, and Gregor Ziemer.
Much of the business correspondence is from book and magazine publishers, although there are items concerning the Mutual Broadcasting System, the New York Times, and the U.S. government. Also included are contracts and correspondence with W. Colston Leigh Inc., and Charles Pearson, the two firms that represented Schultz as a lecturer during the 1940s. Correspondence, 1934-1956, with McIntosh and Otis Inc. (her literary agent) is included here as well.
The FINANCIAL RECORDS provide excellent documentation of financial matters from 1938 to 1980. Especially useful are the daily and monthly spending logs, 1942-1964; correspondence with banks and the IRS, 1933-1976; income tax returns and attached schedules, 1941-1979; and miscellaneous information about insurance and stock holdings.
The GENERAL FILES series contains miscellaneous papers collected by Sigrid Schultz which contain some details about her activities. Included are calling cards and invitations, circa 1920-1940; lecture programs and advertisements, 1941-1963; menus from dinners she attended (with accompanying notes on the dinner speakers and her tablemates); and materials about ocean travel such as passenger lists and menus.).
The OVERSEAS PRESS CLUB MATERIAL is comprised of papers dating from 1942 to 1980, although most of her activity with the club occurred from 1957 to 1964. Much of the series is comprised of correspondence and papers (including anecdotes, recipes, reviews, and a typed manuscript) from the Cookbook (1957-1967) and correspondence and drafts of chapters pertaining to I Can Tell It Now (1964) and Newsbreak (1974). Also included are general correspondence and materials on the OPC Awards Committee and dinner programs. Unfortunately no printed copy of the OPC Cookbook is available.
The largest series in the collection, PERSONAL WRITINGS, is chiefly comprised of unpublished material. The majority of this writing took place after World War II when she primarily worked as a free-lance writer, and it generally reflects her expertise and interest in twentieth century German history and politics.
The PERSONAL WRITINGS are arranged alphabetically by genre as articles, books, book reviews, daily logs and diaries, motion picture scenarios, notes and nore as articles, books, book reviews, daily logs and diaries, motion picture scenarios, notes and notebooks, radio broadcasts, and speeches and lectures. Researchers should be advised, however, that because of the unusually disordered condition in which the papers were received and because of Schultz's penchant for reworking ideas the identification of the genre may not be correct. The designation of the memoirs genre is particularly imprecise because the majority of Schultz's post-war writing was highly personal, containing a great deal of information based on her own experiences or her particular perspective on post-war foreign affairs.
The collection contains more than one hundred articles, several written under a pseudonym and many of which are untitled. There are also chapter outlines and drafts for three unpublished books, “Triple Threat,” “New Watch on the Rhine,” and a work on the German Underground. Correspondence and reviews for her published book, Germany Will Try It Again (1944) are also included, although no manuscripts for the book were received with the papers, as these were presumably sold as part of a World War II fund drive. A published copy of this book is available in the University Library.
Especially valuable within the writings are the diaries and logs, some of which she transcribed to facilitate work on her memoirs; manuscript drafts and hundreds of loose pages and fragments from her unpublished memoir; typed and handwritten notes and notebooks; radio broadcasts, and speeches and lectures.
The COLLECTED PAPERS consist of a variety of material gathered by Schultz during the course of her career. In general these consist of research material and original documentation uncovered in her reporting work, although the connection to Schultz's work is not always apparent. The collected files are arranged as alphabetical subject files and writings by others. A large library of German books and imprints acquired for similar purposes was separated to the University of Wisconsin Library. Several categories of photographic prints and albums also collected in Germany by Schultz and her father (including photographs of Buchenwald, Hitler, the eastern front during World War I, angora rabbit raising in German concentration camps, and other topics) have been removed from the Schultz collection and separately catalogued.
The FAMILY PAPERS include material generated or collected by Hermann and Hedwig Schultz and by Mrs. Schultz's family, the Jaskewitzes. Of special note is the correspondence among the immediate family, 1884-1954, including the love letters of Hermann and Hedwig (in German) and an almost daily run of letters between Sigrid and Hedwig from the mid 1930s through the early 1940s. Also included are letters written to other relatives from her early childhood until 1917.
The papers of Hedwig Schultz include general correspondence, 1938-1960 (including a substantial number of letters from Mary Deuel and letters received upon Hedwig's death); daily logs and diaries, 1902-1959; and notebooks, 1941-1953. Material on Hermann Schultz include address books; biographical papers; daily logs and diaries, 1888-1923; photographs; and numerous sketch books (which also contain extensive notes). Jaskewitz family papers include biographical materials; correspondence, 1835-1908; and theatre programs featuring members of the family, 1836-1882.
VISUAL MATERIALS: ADDITIONS include photographs of Germany from World War I and World War II, the liberation of the Buchenwald and Ohrdruf concentration camps after World War II, as well as family photographs. Included with the World War II photographs is Nazi propaganda from the 1930s. There is also film footage of Sigrid Schultz smiling at the camera believed to be filmed in Europe.
