Scope and Content Note

The Jackson-Morris-Stevens Papers document several families who settled in Madison, Wisconsin, during the 1850s and who subsequently became connected by friendship and marriage: the Hobbins, Jackson, Morris, and Stevens families. In addition there are papers of several collateral lines including the Farmer, Grannis and Watrous families. The Hobbins and Jacksons were prominent physicians; W.A.P. Morris and Breese J. Stevens were prominent attorneys. The title of the collection is based on the marriage of Helen Elizabeth Stevens, a daughter of Breese Stevens, to Dr. Reginald H. Jackson Sr. and the marriage of Julia Morris, the daughter of W.A.P. Morris, to Reginald's brother, Joseph W. Jackson Sr.

The papers include extensive correspondence between family and friends, business records, personal financial papers, subject files, and photographs. The collection covers a wide range of subjects, not only documenting life in Madison, but also in such diverse places as western New York; Williston, North Dakota; and Gloucester, England. Topics range from aviation, an interest of Reginald Jackson Jr., to financial investing, which was painstakingly documented by Joseph Jackson Sr., and from musky fishing to travel to Europe and Japan. Madison's Frank Lloyd Wright-designed auditorium is also a prominent subject. Papers regarding military history concern the Revolutionary War service of General Michael Jackson II, the Civil War service of Charles and Martin Grannis, and the World War I service of Colonel Joseph W. Jackson Sr., in the Remount Service and Victor Morris, an army engineer. The military papers of Dr. Reginald Jackson Jr., concern the Wisconsin Wing of the Civil Air Patrol immediately following World War II. A few letters of Joseph W. Jackson III date from the Vietnam War period. Unfortunately, given the families' influence, except for the papers of Joseph W. Jackson Sr., the collection provides little coverage of the families' impact on Madison civic life.

The papers are arranged alphabetically by surname, with the women arranged by their married name. Because of the complex family inter-relationships, the papers have been arranged by the name of the family member who wrote the letter, rather than by the recipient. In this way, information about a particular member of the family can be more easily identified. However, correspondence from friends and unrelated individuals is arranged by the recipient. Two books in the collection, Three Hundred Years American by Alice and Bettina Jackson (in Box 6) and a Morris Family genealogy compiled by Kathryn Morris Wilkinson in Box 19A contain helpful genealogical information. Photographs comprise a separate series, although the arrangement is by personal name, thus mirroring the arrangement of the papers.

The Hobbins Family is documented primarily through correspondence relating to Syndonia Josephine Hobbins, the daughter of Dr. Joseph Hobbins Jr., who married Dr. James A. Jackson Sr., the patriarch of the Jackson Family in Madison. Together they became the parents of eight children. The papers also include some medical records thought to have been created by Dr. William Hobbins, Joseph's brother, with whom James Jackson began his medical practice. In Three Hundred Years American, the Jackson sisters cite several early manuscript sources pertaining to the Hobbins Family which were not donated to the Archives: a large notebook of writings by Dr. Joseph Hobbins Jr., (in the possession of Dr. Reginald Jackson Jr., when their book was written) and three diaries (1839-1861) of Sarah Badger Jackson Hobbins, the wife of Joseph Hobbins, then in the sisters' possession.

The Grannis Family materials document Julya Wheat Grannis of Fredonia, New York, and her children Harriet Persis Grannis Morris, who married W.A.P. Morris of Madison; Sarah “Kitty” Grannis Seaton; Charles DeWitt Grannis; and Marcius (or Martin) Simonds Grannis. Harriet Grannis Morris is the focus for much of this family's correspondence. Both Grannis brothers served in the Civil War and they wrote frequently to their mother and sisters, who lived together in Madison during the war. Charles Grannis served in the 44th New York Infantry. He was captured in 1862 and imprisoned at Libby Prison, and the collection includes several letters written from prison as well as a reminiscence of those events. Martin served in the artillery, and for much of his service he was posted at Fort McHenry with the 12th U.S. Artillery. Both brothers survived the war and continued to correspond with their sister. Notable in Martin's post-war letters are references to the onset of his mental illness. There is also extensive correspondence from Kitty Grannis Seaton, who lived with the Morris family in Madison during the Civil War and who eventually settled in Owatonna, Minnesota, with her husband Chauncey E. Seaton. Kitty died from tuberculosis in 1869, and the collection describes her declining health in emotional detail.

The Jackson Family consists of James A. Jackson Sr., and his wife, Syndonia Josephine Hobbins Jackson, and their eight children: Alice, Arnold, Bettina, James Jr., Joseph W. Sr., Reginald Sr., Russell, and Sidney. Alice; Bettina; Joseph Sr., and his family; and Reginald Sr., and his family figure prominently in the collection. Other members of the family are sparsely documented.

The papers of Alice and Bettina Jackson, neither of whom married, are arranged into individual and joint sections. Later in life, the sisters not only lived together in a house in Nakoma, but they also collaborated on several literary and interior design projects, and much of their later correspondence was carried on jointly. The sisters' love of travel, one of their mutual interests, is a highlight of the collection. This avocation is documented by correspondence, scrapbooks, photographs, and writings concerning numerous European trips. An unpublished manuscript about their 1954 trip to Japan, which they entitled “To Keep Young, Travel,” captures much of their joy about travel. This trip, which was made when they were in their 70s, was inspired by Japanese students who had boarded with them and with whom the sisters maintained a correspondence during the post-World War II years. Genealogy was another mutual interest, and the collection includes drafts of their published family history, Three Hundred Years American, photographs collected for illustration of the book, and research correspondence with members of the extended family.

Neither of the sisters sought employment outside the home, but they made careers for themselves based on their mutual interests in art, clothing, and interior design. This career is best documented in a scrapbook about their writing and public speaking. Some writings about these subjects are included, but the collection is incomplete. The culmination of their work on interior design, The Study of Interior Decoration, which was reprinted many times, is not in the collection, but it is available in the University of Wisconsin Library. There is, however, a lengthy, unpublished manuscript on the shawl as a universal article of attire, a subject for which they carried out research over many years.

Arnold Jackson, the son of Dr. James A. Jackson Sr., and the last physician in the family to head the Jackson Clinic, is documented primarily by published medical papers, several copies of the Jackson Clinic Bulletin that he edited, some information on the construction of the clinic, and an unfinished autobiography primarily concerning his professional career. Most interesting in the sparse correspondence are the letters he wrote while training at the Mayo Clinic. Dr. Jackson and his wife built a Frank Lloyd Wright-designed home in Madison, but there is nothing in the collection about this except for a photograph of the couple taken on the patio of the house.

Helen Elizabeth Breese Stevens Jackson, often referred to as Elsie, was the daughter of Breese Stevens by his second wife. She married Dr. Reginald Jackson Sr., and is the individual who provides the Jackson-Stevens link in the title of the collection. Although brief, Elsie's papers provide some indications of the privileged life she led from her extensive doll collection (now owned by the Historical Society Museum), to the list of expensive wedding gifts she received in 1908 and the photographs and correspondence documenting the Jacksons' honeymoon on the Continent. Elsie's devotion to her only child, Reginald Jr., is evident in a baby book, many photographs taken of him as a youth, and a folder entitled “Duddie's sayings.” The material labeled as “keepsakes” and memorabilia consists of similar items that Elsie's mother, Mary Elizabeth Farmer Stevens, saved from Elsie's own childhood. Much of the remainder of the collection consists of financial papers pertaining to the complicated management of the Reginald Sr., estate and other Jackson family interests.

Joseph W. Jackson Sr., sometimes referred to as Colonel Jackson because of his World War I service, or as “Bud,” is the most extensively documented individual in the papers. Despite this, many aspects of his colorful career are under represented. There is, for example, virtually no documentation of his position as business manager of the Jackson Clinic, a position which he assumed after World War I. The absence of some documentation may be explained by the fact that Jackson repeatedly reviewed his papers, discarding items that he considered of no value. Later files in the collection, although clearly labeled by him as of no value managed to survive for transfer to the Archives through the intercession of Jackson's friend Clifford Lord, director of the Historical Society. The absence of documentation is partially compensated for by a lengthy memoir.

Further impeding access to information about Joseph Jackson is the fact that his handwriting is difficult to read. Before his marriage at the turn of the century, Jackson lived in Williston, North Dakota and his fiancée, Julia Morris, lived in Madison. They corresponded frequently. After their marriage they settled in North Dakota and during the pre-World War I years they continued to correspond with relatives in Madison. The letters written by Joe and Julia contain valuable information about their life on the ranch in North Dakota, although reading their handwriting requires a persistent researcher. Jackson's post-World War I correspondence in the collection consists of carbons of outgoing business letters and infrequent personal letters. Business correspondence from this period is incomplete. About 1950, the year in which Jackson retired and presumably lost the services of a secretary, the outgoing carbons virtually disappear from the collection. They are replaced by small, handwritten sheets of paper. Thereafter Jackson used this format not only for correspondence drafts, but also for notes, memoranda about conversations and telephone calls, lists, reminders of things to do, and drafts of speeches and formal presentations. Although he is known to have hired a secretary to type his correspondence, few carbons dating after 1950 exist. Furthermore, although Jackson typically dated and numbered these slips of paper, he repeatedly reorganized them to suit more current needs, thereby losing much contextual information. As a result, Jackson's papers arrived in the Archives in disorder. This condition is a particular impediment to the documentation concerning Jackson's determined and longstanding opposition to the Frank Lloyd Wright-designed Madison auditorium. While the auditorium papers are difficult to decipher and only roughly arranged, they are extensive and include some very detailed information on personal conversations, telephone calls, and meetings. They also touch on Madison politics. In addition to papers dating from the 1950s and 1960s, the auditorium files also include research on civic auditoriums Jackson carried out during the 1930s as an officer of the Madison Association of Commerce and the Madison and Wisconsin Foundation, as well as records of the Madison War Memorial Association, an auditorium idea that he supported during the late 1940s and early 1950s. The war memorial files are actually those of Joe Rothschild, the head of the memorial association.

Other important topics in the Joseph Jackson papers include the development of the University Arboretum and Hoyt Park, his leadership of the Madison and Wisconsin Foundation and Rotary International, and his dedication to the University of Wisconsin. His papers about the Madison and Wisconsin Foundation, of which he became the first director, are not the official records of that organization, but there are some scattered files of an official nature. Copies of the foundation's informative bulletin, which Jackson edited, are available in the Historical Society Library.

Jackson's files also include extensive personal financial and investment records from the later years of his life. Because of the absence of summary tax information, detailed income and expenditure records have been retained in the form of check stubs and deposit slips. The files also include weeded mailings received from companies in which he held stock, notes on investments, and letters he wrote to corporate officers. The deposit tickets contain detailed information about dividends from individual holdings. The most extensive investment information concerns the Robert W. Baird Company of Milwaukee. Also pertaining to personal finances is a large record book in which Jackson intermittently recorded information on the status of his land holdings and investments. Together, these papers document the actions of an active investor, as well as the history of a prominent Wisconsin brokerage firm.

Documentation of Jackson's land holdings appears in files about Williston and Williams County, North Dakota. Although the information about his early real estate investments is fragmentary, after the discovery of oil in the late 1940s, Williston began to grow rapidly and the complex management of his North Dakota property created more extensive records. These properties necessitated correspondence with editor Harry Polk, local attorneys, and other North Dakotans. Taken together, these files provide excellent documentation of a local response to the modern North Dakota oil boom.

Also of interest is the correspondence about Jackson's ownership of “Smokin' 'em Out,” a painting given to him by Charles Russell during World War I. This correspondence, which includes a number of prominent Russell collectors, dates from Jackson's efforts to regain custody of the painting from the government after World War I to its eventual sale in 1955. Jackson's connection with the American West is also reflected in the files on his World War I service with the Remount Service at Camp Lewis, Washington, and in France. In addition to his personal service records and correspondence, the collection includes official reports about this little known aspect of World War I military history.

Speeches and writings are a major form of historical documentation in the Joseph Jackson papers, as Jackson was a frequent public speaker. Unfortunately he most often spoke from outlines and notes. After retiring from the Madison and Wisconsin Foundation, Jackson completed a book-length biography of Alexander McKenzie, a colorful North Dakota politician, that he entitled “Big Alec.” Unfortunately, Jackson failed to prepare footnotes or a bibliography to document the sources of his information. The McKenzie files include drafts, copies of a small number of historical documents, research correspondence, and a sample of his work process. Jackson worked on the McKenzie biography over many years, but virtually all of the research carried out before 1948 has been lost. In 1949 Jackson resolved to complete the project, and extensive correspondence during subsequent years documents this period. This correspondence includes a number of individuals who provided first hand information. Among them are McKenzie relatives and Dakota politicians Usher L. Burdick, Andrew Miller, and Willard B. Overson. Occasionally, only Jackson's chatty half of the research correspondence is included. The correspondence in this section is documented by typed carbons.

An earlier historical work written by Jackson concerned African-American soldiers during World War I. Although he corresponded widely to uncover stories, the final product consisted largely of anecdotes rather than authentic accounts of observed events. Like “Big Alec,” this manuscript was never published. Jackson experienced better luck with a small, self-published book on musky fishing, another of his passions. This work is documented by a manuscript draft and correspondence with publishers.

The papers of Julia Morris Jackson, Mrs. Joseph W. Jackson, consist almost entirely of handwritten letters to her husband and her parents and siblings written from about the turn of the century until World War I. Except for several diaries, she has no other papers in the collection.

General Michael Jackson II, who served in the Revolutionary War, represents a second Jackson line from which the Madison Jacksons were descended. Unlike the line that descended from James A. Jackson Sr., who came to Madison directly from England in the 1850s, General Jackson's line settled in Massachusetts in 1639. His great-granddaughter, Sarah G. Badger Jackson, met Dr. Joseph Hobbins Jr. during a trip to England. They married in 1841 and eventually settled in Madison. In Madison their daughter Syndonia Josephine Hobbins (the great-great granddaughter of Michael Jackson) married James A. Jackson Sr., thus uniting the two unrelated (or at least very distantly related) Jackson lines. General Jackson's papers, 1777-1840, consist of typed transcripts. Jackson served as an aide to George Washington and there are copies of a few letters from Washington, as well as items about provisioning troops, battles, etc. Also discussed are family and business matters. Mary Camman, who compiled the transcripts, divided the materials into three parts: Part I: 1777-1834, Michael Jackson II, Ruth Parker Jackson (his wife), and their son Ebenezer Jackson Sr.; Part II: circa 1785-1840, Ebenezer Jackson family papers and business papers regarding Port of Savannah and land interests; and Part III: circa 1796-1821, papers of Simon, Amasa, and Charles Jackson, all sons of Michael Jackson II. The guide to the letters in the collection was prepared by Claire Jackson Kemp. The current location of the original Michael Jackson family letters is unknown.

Reginald H. Jackson Sr., was one of the four sons of James A. Jackson Sr., who became physicians, and his papers document the practice of medicine in Madison during an important transition period from individual to clinic practice. The collection includes two cartons of alphabetically-arranged professional correspondence primarily with surgical patients and other physicians in southern Wisconsin, notes and drafts for presentations to medical associations and student groups, and some information on the early financial operations of the Jackson Clinic.

The papers of Reginald Jackson Jr., also a physician and the only child of Reginald H. Jackson Sr., primarily document his lifelong interest in aviation and his medical education, although not his medical practice at the Jackson Clinic. There are no papers about him in the collection later than the mid-1950s. Reginald Jackson Jr.'s educational papers consist of printed and mimeographed curriculum materials and class notes (which have been weeded) from the Northwestern University Medical School and pre-medical classes at the University of Wisconsin. Of special note among his educational files is an illustrated sanitary survey of Janesville carried out for a class in public health in 1932 and several narrative reports about his clinical experiences. The remainder is general correspondence and alphabetical subject files.

Aviation dominates the subject files. Included are records about day-to-day operations and expenses for his airplane during the 1930s when it was hangared at Howard Morey's Royal Airport in Madison, information on the development of Madison Municipal Airport, and seaplanes in Wisconsin. Beginning with World War II, Jackson's interest in aviation focused on the Civil Air Patrol (CAP) of which he was commander for the Madison Group and, from 1953 to 1955, the commander of the Wisconsin Wing. The CAP records include official correspondence, reports, and printed orders issued by Wing headquarters. Orders from the period when the headquarters were located in Milwaukee and Racine are substantial, but those issued from Madison by Jackson are disappointingly incomplete. The collection also documents Jackson's related interest in radio communication which developed from his youthful participation in the American Radio Relay League. The inventive bent evident in the radio files is reflected in information on other ideas Jackson developed such as airplane heaters and de-icer equipment. For the latter, the collection includes correspondence with the Burgess Battery Company of Madison. Jackson's youth and his love of the outdoors, something he seems to have shared with all male members of his family, are well documented by the photographs in the collection.

The Morris Family is linked to this collection through Julia Morris Jackson, the daughter of Harriet Grannis Morris and Madison attorney William A. Pringle Morris, who became the wife of Joseph W. Jackson Jr. Primarily documented are W.A.P. Morris; his parents; his sons, Howard and Charles; and Howard's son Victor.

General Jacob Morris, who served in the Revolutionary War, and Sophia Pringle Morris were the parents of W.A.P. Morris. The collection includes Sophia's letters to and from W.A.P. Morris, as well as correspondence concerning her attempt to collect her husband's military pension. General Morris' file consists of originals and transcripts of a few letters. W.A.P. Morris' personal correspondence includes material dating from as early as his studies at Hamilton College in the 1850s. Of special interest are post cards from Reuben Gold Thwaites, superintendent of the Historical Society, sent during his travels. Both Howard and Charles Morris became attorneys for Wisconsin railroads, and although they are both represented here only by personal letters to their parents, there are references in these letters to their work, investments, and legal cases. Howard's son Victor was an engineer during World War I, and his papers consist entirely of wartime letters and photographs.

The Stevens Family documents Amelia Stevens, Breese Stevens, and Stevens' second wife, Mary Elizabeth Farmer Stevens. The papers of Amelia Fuller Stevens, the daughter of Breese Stevens and Emma Fuller Stevens, primarily concern the management of the Stevens estate, the chief exception being mail from German World War II refugees who were aided, apparently as a result of her leadership, by the Altar Guild of Grace Episcopal Church in Madison. Miss Stevens' investments were managed by several brokerage firms, and the collection contains detailed information on their representation of her interests. From the Milwaukee office of Loomis Sayles & Company there are extended narrative reports, 1939-1950, about the national financial outlook as well as specific suggestions regarding her financial position. From other firms, there are receipts documenting the purchase and sale of individual stocks. Somewhat like the Joseph Jackson investment files, these records provide a useful case study of one woman's investment history. Also of interest is information about the management of the New York estate of her aunt, Helen Stevens Sanford, by her cousin Augustus C. Stevens and the management and sale of Miss Stevens' Picnic Point property.

The papers of Breese J. Stevens constitute one of the largest parts of the collection. Unfortunately, they offer incomplete coverage of his important career in business and public life. Approximately three cartons consist of handwritten correspondence dating from his years as a Hamilton College student during the early 1850s to his life in Madison during the late 1870s. This correspondence is almost entirely comprised of letters received. The content is primarily personal letters from friends and relatives, although references to business or legal matters appear in some letters. Stevens' list of prominent correspondents includes Horatio Seymour, a distant relative, Lucius Fairchild, and A. Scott Sloan. Draft letters from Stevens appear for only a few individuals, primarily the young women that he referred to as his “lady correspondents.” Also filed here are courtship letters to his second wife.

The letterbooks in which Stevens presumably recorded and bound his important business and professional correspondence were not received. Some records in the collection do document business affairs, but it is likely these records were created after Stevens' death by Henry Kessenich, the executor of his estate, in order to facilitate its management. Kessenich's files contain detailed information on property taxes and other information about Stevens' land holdings. The sole financial volume clearly dating from Stevens' lifetime is a cash book dating from 1880 to 1883, in which is recorded detailed information about personal expenditures. Two additional estate ledgers, 1916-1926, document the household of his widow, as was required of Stevens' will.

The Wright Family is a collateral line related to the Hobbins Family. Henry Wright, who is documented by a microfilmed diary, married Elizabeth Hobbins, the sister of Joseph and William Hobbins. The Wright and Hobbins families settled in Madison together, but the Wrights returned to England in 1859. Henry Wright's diary covers their residence both in Madison and later in Gloucester, England. Other members of the Wright Family are documented in correspondence exchanged with Alice and Bettina Jackson.

PHOTOGRAPHS, which comprise a separate series, are a disparate assortment of portraits, snapshots, photo albums, negatives, and lantern slides that generally parallel the manuscript papers both in content and arrangement. The majority of the collection consists of family portraits and snapshots of activities, particularly travel to Europe and Alaska; interests in aviation and Madison architecture; houses in Madison, North Dakota and New York; and the military service of Joseph W. Jackson and Victor Morris during World War I. Snapshots and candid photographs are best for the families of Reginald Jackson Sr., and Joseph Jackson Sr. Cased portraits of Breese Stevens as a young man and his Stevens and Breese family relatives are of high quality and include Major Samuel S. Forman, a veteran of the Revolutionary War. They are stored with the Historical Society's Cased Image Collection. The lantern slides, which concern Alaska, the Canadian Pacific Railroad, and the West were collected by Joseph W. Jackson probably for oral presentations; these talks are not otherwise documented in the collection. Because he copied many of the slides from other sources, they have been weeded. Exceptions are the lantern slides of Methodist Hospital, which were taken shortly after its construction. They have not been weeded.

All the FILMS are 16 mm, without sound and a combination of color and black and white dating from circa 1920s through the 1950s. The majority of the footage documents four broad subject areas including boating, aviation, European vacations, and medical procedures. The films also include footage of family members on vacation, sailing, and hunting; and various Madison locations, including the Lake Mendota shoreline, aerial views of the Capitol and Isthmus, and the Royal Airport. Also of interest is footage documenting Charles Lindbergh's visit to Madison in 1927; an ice boating regatta; and a ski jump possibly at Blackhawk.