Introduction

Tomter's Childhood
Scope and Content Note: Tomter born at parents' homestead in Town of Pigeon, Trempealeau county, on October 3, 1923; one older sister. Parents, Edwin and Theoline (Thorson) Tomter, Lutherans of Norwegian extraction, in 1927 purchased forty acre farm one mile north of Pigeon Falls on Highway 53. Farm house had no indoor plumbing or running water; kerosene lamps used until electrification in 1941. Educated at up-to-date two-room Piegon Falls school. Tomter tended stoker for a nickel a day.

Family Suffers Financial Set Back
Scope and Content Note: Father hospitalized in La Crosse after contracting blood-poisoning while clearing debris left by April 1931 barn fire in which all livestock and machinery lost. Decision to build new barn necessitated borrowing over five thousand dollars from neighbor Clarence Kaas, later an organizer and officer of the Trempealeau County Electric Cooperative. Able to pay loan interest but not the principle during the Depression. Kaas lamented how bad it was that “money and capitalism were so powerful in our nation.” New gothic style barn included fourteen stanchions, cal pens and horse stalls and cost $1,900. Used machinery bought at auctions or from neighbors.

Illumination in House Before Electricity
Scope and Content Note: Kerosene lanterns; gas-burning mantle lanterns used when company came.

Visitors
Scope and Content Note: Much more home visiting in 1920's and 30's than in 1970's because of lack of money for other activities. Much card-playing, especially whist. By early 1930's, most people traveled by automobile.

Automobiles
Scope and Content Note: While Tomter's aunt from Coon Valley had a Buick, Tomter's father had 1923 Model-T Ford car converted to a pickup truck to haul cream for others to Pigeon Falls creamery. Retained horses for field work. Tomters rarely traveled farther than Pigeon Falls.

Description of Small, Crowded Farm House
Scope and Content Note: 18' x 24' one and one-half story house with kitchen and living room downstairs and two bedrooms upstairs. Kitchen partitioned in winter to serve also as grandfather's bedroom.

Theoline Tomter's Education
Scope and Content Note: Graduated from La Crosse Lutheran Hospital School of Nursing; never employed as professional nurse, but frequently gave medical advice to neighbors and relatives.

Description of Livestock and Crops
Scope and Content Note: Livestock usually included twelve grade cows, calves, team of horses, and three hundred laying hens; not enough corn grown to keep hogs. Milk sold to Pigeon Falls Cooperative Creamery; calves usually marketed through hixton Cooperative Livestock Shipping Association, an Equity organization; cull hens purchased by Ed Goetz of Whitehall for sale in Chicago. Eggs sold to local grocery stores; income from one hundred laying hens equivalent to that of one cow. Used horses to go to Pigeon Falls Lutheran Church, which had large barn to house horses. Usually raised ten acres each of hay, corn and grain with balance in pasture. Edwin Tomter, very conservation-minded even before strip cropping began in mid to late-1930's, refused to rotate corn to land on slopes.

End of Tape 1, Side 1

Introduction

More on Edwin Tomter Farm
Scope and Content Note: Kept large vegetable garden and fifteen to twenty tree fruit orchard. Purchase of ice box and membership in Pigeon Falls cooperative icehouse in 1930's allowed more variation in fruit, vegetable and meat preservation, earlier limited to canning and storage in farm- house basement. Eight foot deep trench around the water well, called a “pump hole,” served as milk cooler. Tobacco, occasionally grown as a cash cropk sold through Northern Wisconsin Cooperative Tobacco Pool at Westby. Absence of silo meant cows fed on hay in winter unless an unripened corn crop meant putting up a temporary snow-fence enclosure. Most farms iin area had silos, generally built from glass tile, poured concrete, 16" x 18" curved cement blocks, or wooden staves.

Tomter Visits Madison in
Scope and Content Note: Accompanied his pastor, Rev. E. M. Christopherson, a Gov. Philip La Follette appointee as University of Wisconsin-Madison regent, to Madison in 1935. Recalls energetic behavior of university students on Capitol Square after pep rally before Minnesota football game.

Describes Neighborhood Farm, Ethnic and Religious Characteristics
Scope and Content Note: Forty acre farms not rare, though average acreage higher. Family size also varied. Over ninety percent Norwegians in town of Pigeon; Norwegian language still spoken in 1930's. Most area people were Lutherans although Pigeon Falls congregation divided in 1870's after bitter dispute over church doctrine. Both churches remain active although served by same pastor.

Tomter's High School Education
Scope and Content Note: Eighty percent of Pigeon Falls eighth grade graduates continued at Whitehall High School. Tomter stayed home for one year before beginning high school because family couldn't afford three dollar per month bus charge for two children concurrently. After riding bus for one year, Tomter drove himself and other students to school until graduating in 1943.

Area Social Activity Centers Around School and Church
Scope and Content Note: School's community club and church's Luther League and Ladies' Aid organizations very active. No in-school religious training although religious education held in school buildings for a month in late-spring, replaced later by Saturday school and, even later, Sunday school.

Where Men Get Together to Talk
Scope and Content Note: Political leaders frequently spoke at area Sunday picnics; Tomter was told when he was very young, he heard Robert La Follette, Sr., speak at Pigeon Falls. Men conversed daily in restaurant while shopping in Pigeon Falls.

End of Tape 1, Side 2

Introduction

Community Social Life
Scope and Content Note: Sunday afternoons usually spent visiting relatives or watching baseball games; frequent picnics and family reunions. Pigeon Falls Memorial Day parade was, and still is, big event including flag- carrying school children. Many church and school Christmas services and programs and two weeks of nightly visits during holiday season with relatives for home-prepared lutefisk and lefsa. Also recalls butchering bees and threshing crews.

Impact of Federal Programs during 1930's
Scope and Content Note: “The 1930's were bad years...if we had had a depression and no drought we'd have been much better off.” In 1934-35 hay yields fell from forty-five loads to four or five. Drought and depression together resulted in fifty percent of area farmers taking part in federal loan and work programs. Edwin Tomter paid off federal feed loan, used to buy hay shipped from Iowa and South Dakota, by earning five dollars a day shoveling and hauling shale for federal road improvement program. More prosperous farmers participated frequently in federal soil conservation programs. Edwin Tomter had soil tested and began liming fields and growing alfalfa.

Edwin Tomter's Political Views
Scope and Content Note: Not politically involved; primary interests were church activities and the Scandinavian-American Fraternity, a life insurance and social organization that held monthly meetings and sponsored such activities as dances and card parties. Father voted for Progressive Republican candidates in state politics and thought very highly of Franklin D. Roosevelt. Recalls family and visitors listened intently to Roosevelt's fireside chats.

Progressive Republican Party Receives Strong Area Support
Scope and Content Note: Only the more affluent people, about twenty-five percent of the voters, were Stalwart Republicans; most others strongly supported Progressives. Recalls no shift away from Phil La Follette by November 1938 election.

Active Pigeon Falls Local Indicative of Farmers' Union Strength Throughout Trempealeau County
Scope and Content Note: Farmers' Union, which Edwin Tomter joined in early-1930's, promoted farm legislation, supported cooperatives, and had a strong education program designed to teach Farmers' Union Juniors the benefits of cooperative involvement. Accompanied his father to local meetings held in the Luther League Hall; long-time local president was Clarence Kaas. FU state president Kenneth Hones, a frequent guest, strongly impressed Tomter with his inspiring speeches. Tomter's neighbor, George Lewis, was active in the Pleasantville FU Local and later became Rural Electric Administration official and was elected to the state Farmers' Union board. Lewis' sister, Agnes Thorson, was secretary of the Pigeon Falls FU Local for twenty-five years. Harold Tomter became FU Junior; recalls that 4-H taught how to make a living and the Farmers' Union taught how to make fairer living.

End of Tape 2, Side 1

Introduction

Impact of the Farmers' Union in 1930's
Scope and Content Note: Trempealeau county farmers considered Farmers' Union efforts and support influential in passage of such favorable legislation as rural electrification.

Electrification on the Edwin Tomter Farm
Scope and Content Note: Though neighbors electrified beginning in 1939, Tomter until 1941 unable to afford wiring required on his farm and minimum charge of $3.50 per month for forty kilowatts. First electrification which included lights in chicken coop to increase egg production, labor-saving motors on cream separator and water pump, and convenience of house lighting, consumed approximately twenty kilowatts per month. Milking machine purchased in 1945; no refrigerator until end of World War II.

Effect of World War II on Farm Income
Scope and Content Note: Edwin Tomter paid off entire farm debt to Clarence Kaas during World War II when increased demand for farm products meant higher prices.

Harold Tomter's Activities Between 1943 and 1947
Scope and Content Note: Worked for four months as hired man on neighbor's farm at fifty-five dollars per month following high school graduation and taught six weeks in spring of 1943. Enlisted in Army Air Corps in October 1943; discharged in March 1946. Married later that year, he wanted to farm but couldn't until parents retired in April 1947.

Early Farming Years,
Scope and Content Note: Worked parents' former forty acre farm until spring of “No provision at that time for helping the young farmer get started.” Bought used Ford-Ferguson tractor for $750 in 1948 and rented twenty additional acres when land available; further expansion hampered by inability to buy additional labor-saving machinery.

Tomter Joins Farmers' Organizations
Scope and Content Note: Purchased petroleum from Farmers' Union cooperative; recruited into Wisconsin Farmers' Union in 1949 by WFU field organizer Bob Lewis. WFU membership high in the 1940's, but activities had declined since the 1930's. Liked Brannan farm plan. Also approached by the Farm Bureau, Tomter did not join because “even at that time I didn't agree with all the thinking of that farm organization.” Believed Farm Bureau “more for hampering than helping” less successful farmers.

Describes Two Hundred Acre Rented Farm
Scope and Content Note: One hundred and fifty acres tillable land included numerous hills of clay soil and sandy loam on flat land. Buildings included a barn with twenty-five stanchions and a well-constructed ten-bedroom house built in 1917.

End of Tape 2, Side 2

Introduction

Operating the Two Hundred Acre Rented Farm
Scope and Content Note: Began with twenty-five cows: brought ten from parents' farm and paid an average of $465 each for fifteen good cows at previous renter's auction. Tomter and farm-owner Oscar Sletteland, president of Pigeon Falls and Mondovi banks, “had a real good working relationship.” Cost of nearly all inputs shared with owner in return for splitting profits equally. Tomter often “had to be a salesman” to bring farm improvements. If convinced that an equipment expenditure would bring economic advantage to both owner and renter, as well as save labor, Sletteland paid at least half the expense. Day-to-day operation left in Tomter's hands.

Price Trends of the Early-1950's
Scope and Content Note: Tomter milked Holsteins, a few of which were pure bred; marketed Grade A milk through the Pigeon Falls Cooperative Creamery, which in turn shipped all Grade A milk to Wisconsin Dairies Cooperative at Menomonie. 1953 through 1957 were hard years financially; end of Korean War in 1952 cut demand and milk support price dropped from five dollars to about $2.85 per hundredweight in one year.

Cropping Patterns Promote Soil Conservation
Scope and Content Note: Tomter planted hay and legumes on hills to prevent soil erosion, and practiced contour plowing and strip cropping in cooperation with Soil Conservation Service (SCS). Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) had done much soil and water conservation work on the property in the 1930's.

Extensive Farm Improvements Undertaken to Counter Financial Problems
Scope and Content Note: For first five years “the expenditures were too great for the income.” In 1957, Tomter told Sletteland he would quit farming unless improvements were made. Improvement and expansion began: barn remodeled to include thirteen more stanchions, barn cleaner installed, cow yard cemented, two new silos with augers built, new milk-house with bulk tank constructed, more calf-pens added, as well as a free-stall shed for thirty more cows. Sletteland also purchased neighboring 117 acre farm and entire dairy operation grew from twenty-five to seventy-two milk cows, not including young stock. Improved feeding increased milk production and for several years Tomter and his two sons marketed over a million pounds of milk.

Tomter and Sletteland Observe Farm Innovations
Scope and Content Note: Tomter and Sletteland toured southern Wisconsin to look at “progressive” farms and to talk with other farmers.

Farmers' Union in Pigeon Falls and Trempealeau County Becomes More Active in 1953
Scope and Content Note: As Tomter and many other neighbors became financially depressed in 1953, local Farmers' Union rejuvenated after John McKay of the Farmers' Union Central Exchange and Kenneth Hones, president of Wisconsin Farmers' Union, spoke at a Chippewa Falls meeting and inspired Tomter and other area farmers. Tomter elected local president and served for ten years, devoting considerable time to Union programs. Local very successful and active throughout the 1950's. Tomter also served as Trempealeau County Farmers' Union president for thirteen years (1953-1966), and as director of WBI Farmers' Union cooperative in Whitehall for twelve years (1958-1970).

Other Leadership Positions
Scope and Content Note: President of the Pigeon Falls Parent-Teachers Association (PTA); congregation president of his church, the Pigeon Creek Lutheran Church.

End of Tape 3, Side 1
Note: There is no Tape 3, Side 2.

Introduction

Rejuvenation of Pigeon Falls Farmers' Union
Scope and Content Note: Tomter and other active members planned and held well-attended, interesting monthly meetings; circulated petitions to support various state and federal legislation. Tomter sold memberships, stressing economic benefits of Farmer's Union cooperatives and the need for united action in behalf of beneficial legislation. Some farmers declined to join due to membership fees, apathy, or disagreement with Farmer's Union philosophy on farmer-government relationship.

Farm Bureau Membership in Trempealeau County
Scope and Content Note: Perhaps as many as one hundred Trempealeau County farmers held joint memberships in Farmers' Union and Farm Bureau. Does not recall Farm Bureau's major “Operation Northwest” membership drive in 1950's.

Kenneth Hones' Effect on Building FU Membership
Scope and Content Note: Hones, president of Wisconsin Farmers' Union, strongly opinionated and perhaps had some adverse effect on building membership. “People who are perfectionists in their field sometimes are disliked.”

Illustration of Difficulty Dairy Farmer Has in Participating Actively in Organizations

Farmers' Union Alliance with Organized Labor
Scope and Content Note: Labor leaders occasionally spoke at Farmers' Union meetings; recalls John Schmitt of the Wisconsin State AFL-CIO addressing a county convention in Osseo. Alliance between farmers and labor “very necessary” to lend one another support. Sees no apparent conflict in farmers' interest in high farm prices and urban laborers' desire for cheap food.

Tomter's Reaction to Federal Government Price Supports for Milk and Dairy Products
Scope and Content Note: High supports necessary for farm price stability. Tomter joined other Farmers' Union members in favoring production controls in return for 90 to 100 percent parity.

Efforts to Establish a Statewide Dairy Marketing Organization
Scope and Content Note: Farmers' Union and Wisconsin Association of Cooperatives attempt to promote state legislation for a statewide dairy marketing cooperative had little impact.

Farmers' Union Opposition to a State Sales Tax
Scope and Content Note: Members considered the four percent sales tax regressive and unfavorable when enacted in early-1960's, but have “learned to like it.” Personal property tax not considered especially burdensome at that time.

Tomter Favors Daylight Savings Time
Scope and Content Note: Although he personally opposed it on the very first day it went into effect.

Impact of National Farmers' Organization (NFO) in Trempealeau County
Scope and Content Note: NFO important in West Central region, but not too effective in Trempealeau county. Strongest support from “maverick” farmers; estimates only ten to fifteen percent of county Farmers' Union members joined NFO. Farmers' Union opposed NFO milk and beef withholding actions which led to threats and violence reminiscent of the 1930's strikes supported by Farmers' Union. “We could actually say we've been through it and it didn't work.” Recalls incidents during NFO strike of bulk milk tanks being drained and debris thrown into fields to disable machinery.

End of Tape 4, Side 1

Introduction

Farmers' Union Position on School Consolidation in Trempealeau County
Scope and Content Note: School consolidation in 1950's considered by Farmers' Union to be “decree” from state legislature. Organization avoided a stand on the issue, controversial among individual members. Consolidation remained a hot issue in 1978: “effects of school consolidation, I think, will live on for another generation yet.”

Redistricting and Reapportionment in Trempealeau County
Scope and Content Note: County farmers lost some political power when Trempealeau was divided into three congressional districts in the 1950's and 1960's. Tomter believes reapportionment a “painful necessity” resulting from adherence to the principle of equal representation. Milwaukee area has bulk of population but also most of the problems.

Population Trends in the Pigeon Falls Area
Scope and Content Note: Number of farms from 1952 to 1968 diminished as farm units became larger and population remained static. Population growth since 1968 as more young families from Chicago and other urban areas have relocated to live and work in a rural setting.

Tomter Leaves Farming in 1968
Scope and Content Note: In fall of 1966, Sletteland offered favorable land contract terms after Tomter revealed plans to discontinue farming in spring of 1967. Tentative agreement fell through when other Sletteland family members, whose interests also part of trust, resulted in overly-restrictive contract clauses. Tomter made plans to hold auction in spring of 1968.

Employment Options Open to Tomter
Scope and Content Note: Worked as carpenter from 1968 to 1970; elected Trempealeau County clerk in 1970 after encouragement and support from county Democratic party.

Auction Day Produces Conflicting Emotions
Scope and Content Note: “It's a very sad day...you're caught between the emotion of wanting to get rid of every bit and piece that you own, to wanting to save and keep with you a considerable amount.”

Current Tax System Encourages Trend Toward Larger Farms
Scope and Content Note: Farmers “have a, weakness for large machinery”; under current tax schedules “it pays you to be in debt.”

Soaring Land Prices Affect Family Farming
Scope and Content Note: Active Farmers' Home Administration (FHA) has provided financing for young farmers in a way not available to Tomter when he started farming. Farms now selling for too much money; speculates that “foreigners” may dominate area and American farming operations in the future.

End of Tape 4, Side 2

Introduction

Location of Sletteland Farm
Scope and Content Note: In the Town of Pigeon, one mile east of Pigeon Falls off Highway 121, just west of Jackson county boundary.

Connection Between Rejuvenation of the Farmers' Union and Rise of the Modern Democratic Party in Trempealeau County
Scope and Content Note: Renewed activity in the Farmers' Union and the rise of the Democratic Party closely associated. Farmers' Union members sought affiliation with a like-minded political organization. Emphasizes that Democratic success related to 1953 farm depression which succeeded relatively prosperous period between 1946-1952.

Background of Tomter's Interest in Politics
Scope and Content Note: Attended Badger Boys State in 1942. No active political interest as early as William Sanderson's 1950 U. S. senate primary campaign, but Tomter, encouraged by his wife came to believe that “farm organization work and politics go hand-in-hand.” Strongly supported Democrat Lester R. Johnson, who “knew out plight,” in 1953 special congressional election to fill vacancy left by Merlin Hull's death. Tomter became Democratic party member in this period.

Farmers' Union Members Cooperate with Area Businessmen
Scope and Content Note: Pigeon Falls Farmers' Union sponsored Farmer-Businessman banquets to discuss mutual problems. Recalls such banquet speakers as Norman Clapp and Estes Kefauver.

Trempealeau County Supports Republican U.S. Senators Alexander Wiley and Joseph R. Mccarthy,
Scope and Content Note: Wiley had “a lot of appeal;” got support of Republicans and fence-riders; Tomter very impressed by his speeches. People were “hoodwinked” by McCarthy's red-baiting; “Wisconsin would just as soon forget about Joe McCarthy.

Trempealeau County Voting Patterns, Early 1950's-1970
Scope and Content Note: Southern Trempealeau county and villages tended to vote Republican; rural areas tended to vote Democrat. Earlier, heavily German communities tended to support Stalwart Republicans but no longer any well-defined correlation between ethnicity and party affiliation.

Tomter's Involvement in Trempealeau County Democratic Party
Scope and Content Note: Tomter, although on Democratic party's county executive board, is a supporter rather than a leader; believes an elected official should not be extremely active in partisan politics.

Evolution of Democratic Party in Trempealeau County Between the 1950's - 1970's
Scope and Content Note: In the 1950's not many people in Trempealeau County would have admitted to Democratic party membership but “things have changed.”

End of Interview