MHS finding aid format: Fruin
Joan Anderson Growe was born September 28, 1935 in Minneapolis, Minnesota, the daughter of Arthur F. and Lucile M. (Brown) Anderson, and was raised in Buffalo, Minnesota, where her father served as the city's mayor from 1954 to 1963.
Like many women of her era Growe alternated between working as a teacher and working as a homemaker raising her children. She attended St. Cloud State College and earned a teaching degree in 1956. Following college she taught elementary classes in the Bloomington Public Schools for two years before marrying and raising the first of her four children. In 1964, after a divorce from her first husband, she attended courses at the University of Minnesota and earned a special education certification. The following year she taught special education classes for Christ Child School for Exceptional Children in St. Paul and then taught in the St. Anthony Public Schools during the 1965-1966 school year.
Activated by the political unrest over American involvement in Vietnam and the growing feminist movement Growe had become a member in the League of Women Voters during the latter part of the 1960s and attended her first party precinct caucus in 1968. By this time she had married for a second time and was living in the Minneapolis suburb of Minnetonka, a political district that had a long tradition of Republican support. In 1972 a legislative seat in that district opened and when Gwen Luhta, president of the Minnetonka League of Women Voters, failed to receive the Republican endorsement friends persuaded Growe to seek the DFL endorsement. In a drive skeptics dubbed the "Housewives' Campaign," Growe not only won the DFL endorsement--she won the vote of all six precincts in her district. At the opening of the 1973 legislative session Growe was one of five new women who joined six-term incumbent Helen McMillan as representatives in the state House.
During her term as a representative Growe served on the Crime Prevention and Corrections Committee, the Education Committee where she chaired a subcommittee on accountability, the Judiciary Committee, and the Metropolitan and Urban Affairs Committee. She also drafted an open meeting bill that became the state's first sunshine legislation.
Motivated by election reforms passed by the Democratically controlled legislature and convinced of the opposition to those reforms by then secretary of state Arlen Erdahl, Growe decided to seek DFL endorsement as a candidate for the office of secretary of state. Again she won both the endorsement and the election. Although Virginia Holm had been appointed to complete her husband's term as secretary of state following his death in 1952 and although Holm had been elected to a subsequent two-year term, no woman had been elected to a statewide office on the basis of her own credentials prior to Growe. Growe subsequently served six terms as Minnesota's secretary of state, being reelected in 1978, 1982, 1986, 1990 and 1994. In 1984 in a highly contested primary campaign, Growe received the DFL endorsement as their U.S. senatorial candidate but was defeated by the Republican incumbent Rudy Boschwitz.
A biographical sketch issued by the Office of the Secretary of State in April 1990 characterized Growe as a "leader in government reform, openness, economic growth, education, and environment." Growe was tireless in her advocacy of voter participation and for the majority of her tenure, Minnesota led the nation in voter turnout. As a member of the state's Board of Investment and in support of the anti-apartheid movement, Growe led a call in 1984 for the divestment of state funds from South African companies. Under her leadership Minnesota was the first state in the nation to computerize both its voter registration and uniform commercial code systems. Growe also encouraged the passage of motor vehicle-voter registration legislation that became national law in 1993.
Throughout her political career Growe remained an ardent supporter of the philosophy that good government depends on the active and effective participation of its citizens. Her commitment to this democratic ideal was first cultivated by her father's civic influence, first enacted by her involvement in the League of Women Voters, further engendered by her role as Secretary of State, and culminated in the 1990s by her participation as an international election observer in Romania, South Africa, and Azerbaijan. Growe retired as secretary of state at the end of her sixth term in 1998 and was succceeded by Mary Kiffmeyer, a Republican from Big Lake.
Biographical information was taken from the collection.
Correspondence (1973-1998), campaign files (1973-1994), speech and event files (1973-1998), subject files (1981-1998), newspaper clippings (1974-1998), and audio and video recordings of a DFL state representative from District 40A (1973-1974), long-time Minnesota Secretary of State (1975-1998), and candidate for the U.S. Senate (1984).
The majority of the collection consists of campaign and speech files that document Growe's rise from a homemaker to a national leader in election reform during a time when few women held elected offices. The primary subjects include women in politics, women in state government, state constitutional concerns, electioneering, election reform, voter participation, and international election observer missions as well as Growe's political campaigns including her highly contested race for the U.S. Senate.
A portion of the subject files document a project sponsored by the National Association of Secretaries of State to renew and strengthen citizen involvement in American politics and elections. Additional files include topical information concerning the Minnesota Women's Meeting (1977), a tour of war-torn Central American countries (1983), a Minneapolis support program for students with epilepsy (1987-1988), and a Minneapolis-based transitional residential program for women recovering from chemically dependencies (1986-1989).
Records of Growe's service as secretary of state can be found in the Minnesota State Archives.
Barbara Stuhler's history and analysis of the women's fund raising
network behind Growe's 1984 senatorial campaign,
Access to records less than 25 years old requires written permission. News releases, newspaper clippings, photographs, commonly available publications, and like material of a public nature are excluded from this restriction. Please consult the reference staff for more information.
Quotation or publication, beyond the fair use provisions of the copyright law, from records less than 25 years old requires written permission. News releases, newspaper clippings, photographs, commonly available publications, and like material of a public nature are excluded from this restriction. For more information concerning copyright status and/or permission to publish, please consult the reference staff.
Accession number: 12,848; 13,564; 14,481; 14,670; 15,448; 15,605.
Processed by: Bonnie Beatson Palmquist, June 1981, October 1985, October 1991, March 1993; Monica Manny Ralston, July 2001
Catalog ID number: 09-00027967
Copies of Growe's annual outgoing holiday greetings.
Contains campaign literature, promotional fund raising materials, correspondence, press releases, speech texts, sound clips, and news clippings.
Correspondence regarding a draft for Stuhler's book on the women's fund raising network that called itself Minnesota Groweing.
The file contains a draft brief prepared by the National Voting Rights Institute and a copy of a letter forwarded to Growe authorizing her addition as one of the amici named in the brief.
The brief was written to represent the views of secretaries of
state and chief elections officers who advocated election reform including
campaign spending limits in support of a petition brought by the Ohio Supreme
Court before the U.S. Supreme Court for review of the Sixth Circuit Court's
opinion in the case of
A 10-day study trip taken by Growe with 13 of her friends and advisors between November 27 and December 6, 1983. The trip included stops in El Salvador, Honduras, and Nicaragua and gave Growe the opportunity to observe conditions in Central America for her senatorial campaign. She met with government personnel, military leaders, U.S. embassy personnel, counter-revolutionaries, religious leaders, and ordinary citizens and used the information to develop campaign statements about human rights, economic growth, political self-determination, and U.S. military assistance.
The files contain intineraries and maps, background briefing materials, study questions, souvenir pamphlets and literature, Growe's handwritten notes and observations, a campaign policy statement, and the text of a press conference and speeches given upon Growe's return.
Through an invitation by the Chinese Association for International Understanding, Growe led a 5-member delegation of Minnesota DFL party members on a two-week trip to China. The delegation included Roger Moe, Elaine and Gordon Voss, Willis Eken, and Ching Yuan Yu who served as the delegation's interpreter. The file includes correspondence regarding trip logistics and the text of a speech Growe gave while in China.
Growe led a delegation from Minnesota to the Soviet Union as part of a People to People exchange in October 1989. The file contains a printed directory of delegate members.
Through an invitation by Walter Mondale of the National Democratic Institute for International Affairs Growe was one of 60 international delegates who observed the May 20, 1990 national election in Romania following its 1989 revolution against the Communist government headed by Nicolae Ceausescu. Delegation materials include correspondence and memoranda, a briefing notebook, agendas and related information, and a draft assessment report. Growe's personal materials include handwritten notes and observations as well as a transcript of sound recordings she made while in Romania, radio sound clips, a press release issued by the Secretary of State's office, and clippings of a newspaper article authored by Growe.
Growe returned to Romania as an observer representing the National Democratic Institute for International Affairs during the 1992 presidential and parlimentary election. Her files include delegation trip materials, a briefing book, her handwritten notes and observations, and the text of comments she made upon her return.
In 1994 Growe served as a member of the United Nations Observer Mission during the elections held in South Africa. Her files include application and briefing materials, a sample copy of the election ballot, correspondence, radio sound clips, handwritten notes and observations, and news clippings.
Includes memoranda, correspondence, meeting minutes, and additional materials related to Growe's service on the Program's Board of Directors.
A campaign poster promoting Viena P. Johnson as the endorsed Farmer Labor Association candidate for the 57th district in the 1936 state senatorial election. The poster bears the undated inscription, "To Joan Growe, with all good wishes, Viena Johnson Hendrickson."
Includes correspondence, press statements, news clippings, and additional materials related to Growe's co-chairmanship of the Minnesota Draft Kennedy Movement.
Includes memoranda, minutes, reports, and additional materials pertaining to Growe's service on the Association's Board of Directors.
Growe was a member of the National Commission for the Renewal of American Democracy that was established by the National Association of Secretaries of State in 1992 in response to a decline in voter participation. According to a March 1, 1993 press release issued by Growe's office, Project Democracy was created by the Commission as a two-year plan "to discover the causes as to why people feel disconnected from their governments, and then to find solutions to put people and government back together again." The Commission held public hearings across the country in 1993, including one in Minneapolis, in order to assess citizen perceptions and to develop a responsive plan of action.
Materials documenting Growe's involvement with the project include background information, correpondence, meeting materials, press relations, briefing materials for the Minneapolis hearing, and a variety of printed materials.
Consists of the Commissions' first report and an executive summary to that report.
Growe served as one of the judges for the volunteer activist award sponsored by the Voluntary Action Centers of Minneapolis and Saint Paul, the Minneapolis branch of the American Association of University of Women, and Daytons. The file includes completed nomination forms for the organizational and individual award categories.
Includes announcements intended for radio and television broadcast that featured Joan Growe.
Wayside House is a Minneapolis-based transitional residential program for recovering chemically dependent women. The program was established in 1955 and was the first women's halfway house in the United States. Growe was elected to the program's Board of Directors in July 1987 and served until March 1989.
Board materials include minutes, financial data, and program operations information, as well as statistical and demographic information concerning client referrals, admissions, discharges, and post-treatment performance.
Includes clippings about Growe's work in the legislature, her political campaigns particularly the 1984 senatorial campaign, her speaking engagements, the activities and initiatives of the Secretary of State's office, changes in election laws and procedures, changes in district apportionment, the activities of the Minnesota Board of Investment on which Growe served as secretary of state, Growe's role as presiding officer of the House of Representatives during the 1978-1979 period when representation was evenly divided between the Republican and Democratic parties, Growe's support of Ted Kennedy in the 1980 presidential campaigns, and her voter turn-out predictions. The clippings also include public interest stories about Growe's personal life and her retirement.