Manuscripts Collection
Chronology was taken from Deborah K. Neubeck's
Information taken from the collection.
John Lind's papers consist of correspondence, subject and legal files, speeches, newspaper clippings, and scrapbooks which contain information on Minnesota politics, the Democratic and Populist parties, the St. Lawrence Seaway, Lind's activities as president of the University of Minnesota board of regents, and his involvement in the business ventures of his sons Norman and John, Jr. Also included are Lind's accounts as receiver of the land office at Tracy (1884-1886), Lind's records as quartermaster of the 12th Minnesota Volunteer Infantry during the Spanish-American War, minutes of the Public Safety Commission of Minnesota (1917-1918), the transcript of a hearing before the state House Committee on Labor and Labor Legislation regarding labor agitation in the northern Minnesota Iron Range (January 30, 1917), and minutes of an advisory council to the United States Secretary of Labor, on which Lind served as chairman (1918).
Norman Lind's papers consist primarily of correspondence and business files that document his various business speculations. Also included are a schoolbook he kept during his sixth year of public school at New Ulm (1892) and essays written while he was a student at the University of Minnesota (undated and 1897-1902).
The papers are arranged into two groups: those for John Lind and those for Norman Lind.
Additional records documenting John Lind's 1899-1901 gubernatoral term are available in the Minnesota State Archives.
Papers relating to John Lind's diplomatic mission to Mexico in 1913-1914 were microfilmed by the Minnesota Historical Society in 1971 as the Mexican Mission Papers of John Lind. They consist of all items from the John Lind papers for the years 1913-1916 and selected items from 1917-1933 that relate to Mexico that were received by the Minnesota Historical Society prior to 1994. The originals were then removed from the main body of the Lind papers and closed to general use. See the catalog for the location of the microfilm edition and its accompanying pamphlet guide.
Shortly after the Society acquired the majority of the John Lind Papers, George M.
Stephenson described their importance to Minnesota political history, particulary
the history of third parties, in a speech to the executive council of the Minnesota
Historical Society on April 13, 1936. See George M. Stephenson, "The John Lind
Papers,"
Accession number: 1773E12; 1778B25; 4136; 8491; 8997; 9132; 9166; 10,937; 11,273; 13,182; 15,134; 15,596; 15,944
Processed by: Kathryn A. Johnson, 1960; Lydia Lucas and Deborah Neubeck, 1971-1972; additions by Monica Manny Ralston, March 1997, December 2001; addition by Christopher G. Welter, March 2010.
The entirety of the collection was acquired by the Minnesota Historical Society from several different sources at several different times. The earliest portion, comprising Lind's records as quartermaster of the 12th Minnesota Volunteer Infantry, was presented to the Society by John Lind in 1900. Portions of the collection evidence damage due to dirt, mold, and rodents; some portions were lost due to the extent of this damage.
Catalog ID number: 001733835
The papers from 1883 to 1886 consist largely of reports, accounts, and correspondence regarding Lind's work as United States land commissioner at Tracy, Minnesota. There are also a few business papers, Lind's Goodhue County teaching certificate (1870), a statement by Lind on the loss of his hand (1874), and a letter from Richard C. Shepard discussing Lind's marriage to his daughter (1879).
Two letterpress copybooks (volumes 1 and 2) contain Lind's outgoing correspondence for 1881-1887, which mainly concerns his work as land commissioner, his law practice, and his 1886 campaign for U.S. representative that include many comments on the protective tariff.
Letters from 1889 to 1892, during Lind's tenure as United States Representative are primarily from his constituents and other politicians. Many ask advice, favors, or aid in obtaining relief, pension allowances, or government appointments. Other reflect Lind's interest in the consolidation of land offices in Southern Minnesota, Indian affairs, public lands, postal service, and foreign trade.
Also discussed are Lind's 1888 campaign, the senatorial contest between William D. Washburn and Dwight M. Sabin (December 1888-January 1889), local politics, management of Lind's property and his financial affairs, Minnesota elections in 1890, a proposal to require religious teaching in public schools (1889), and uniform grade standards for agricultural products (1891).
Newspaper clippings on Lind's campaign and election to Congress in 1886 are found in scrapbook volume 1 covering 1886-1888.
The few papers for 1894-1987 pertain largely to politics and include Lind's 1896 campaign for governor of Minnesota.
Papers covering the 1898-1901 period pertain to Lind's election and service as governor of Minnesota, particularly his decision to join the 12th Minnesota Volunteers; his nomination by the Democrats, the Silver Republicans, and the People's Party and the campaign conducted on his behalf; and his campaign of 1900. Lind's personal letterpress copybook as governor of Minnesota (volume 5) discusses appointments, requests for assistance, land claims and titles, Lind's personal finances and properties, railroad regulation, politics, and other topics. An earlier letterpress copybook (volume 4) contains Lind's outgoing letters for November and December 1898 as governor-elect concerning appointments. The remainder of that copybook was used by Henry N. Somsen, Lind's New Ulm law partner, for his outgoing letters concerning their Lind & Somsen practice and his personal letters concerning land acquisitions.
Volume 2 of the scrapbooks contains newspaper clippings on his 1898 gubernatorial campaign.
The relatively few incoming papers from the period of his governorship
contain information on state boards of control, the state drainage system,
procedures of the Grain Inspection Department, railroad taxation and
shipping rates, Minnesota's swamp land grant, and the state prison's twine
manufacturing plant. Letters in January 1901 commend Lind for thrashing St.
Paul
A bound report by Jacob V. Brower on the construction of the Lind Saddle Trail in Itasca State Park includes an 1892 chart illustrating the park's hydrology and topography as well as photographs depicting the trail and its surrounds.
Quartermaster's records for the 12th Minnesota contain bills, reports, vouchers, invoices, abstracts, returns, schedules, and other records of equipment, food, clothing, and supplies purchsed and issued.
Letters for 1902-1904 are again mainly written to Lind as United States Representative and pertain to military and government appointments; postal service; public, Indian, and swamp lands; timber, tariffs and trade reciprocity; pensions; and nutritional investigations of wheat, starch, and rice. There are a few letters on Shepard geneology, Lind's financial affairs and land-holdings, and the 1904 presidential and gubernatorial campaigns; bills and reports in Congress relating to Alaska; and letters from Norman Lind regarding his lumber business in Everett, Washington.
Scrapbook volume 3 contains newspaper clippings on Lind's 1902 congressional campaign.
Papers for 1905-1907 consist of a few miscellaneous and family letters, and some telegrams against granting rate-making powers to the Interstate Commerce Commission.
The papers for this period are mainly concerned with Lind's work as regent of the University of Minnesota. These papers are found both in the correspondence and miscellaneous papers and among the subject and legal files.
Many of the papers are concerned with campus development and construction projects, the University's real estate holdings and land claims cases; the work and growth of the College of Agriculture and the College of Medicine and Surgery, scholarships, and the selection of instructors and other personnel. The choice of a president for the University is discussed during 1909 and 1910. There are letters and blueprints from Cass Gilbert, who worked for a time on a campus development plan; reports and blueprints of construction for the College of Agriculture and its substations; and reports and blueprints for other proposed projects. Other letters discuss teacher training, hog cholera, university finances and the embezzlement of funds by a former treasurer, and railroad tracks on university property. Minutes of a few regents' meetings and financial statements are also included.
The few non-university items relate to Minneapolis water-power facilities, agricultural development and capitalization in Minnesota, freight rates, the 1910 gubernatorial campaign, the 1912 presidential campaign, endowment of Gustavus Adolphus College, and proposed mapping of Minnesota.
Papers for 1913 to 1918 include comments on the world war, the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) and miners' strikes in northern Minnesota, bread standards and prices, government contracts and defense-related jobs, farm labor, regulation of liquor traffic in Minnesota, and trade union activities and stikes in the Twin Cities. After 1916 the papers are more varied and relate to defense jobs, peacetime readjustment, Lind's finances and investments, politics, grading standards for wheat, labor-management relations in war industries, Norman Lind's business affairs, use of the German language in schools, and the case of the State of Minnesota v. Eric Olson for unlawful assembly in support of Charles A. Lindbergh, Sr. and the Non-Partisan League (1918). There is also a letter from Woodrow Wilson (October 5, 1918) with an enclosure from the U.S. Secretary of State regarding Lind's proposal to send propagandists to Finland.
Most of these papers stem from Lind's service on the Minnesota Commission of Public Safety and on the National Labor Advisory Council. Minutes of Commission meetings (April 1917-February 1918), as well as minutes, reports, and correspondence of the Advisory Council to the Secretary of Labor (January-March 1918) are also included within the subject and legal files.
Transcripts of hearings (January 30, 1917) by the Minnesota House of Representatives Committee on Labor and Labor Legislation relating to IWW-led labor unrest in northern Minnesota are filed within the subject and legal files.
The papers for this period are extremely diverse, including family letters
and comments on politics and Minnesota campaigns, international shipping,
Sweden, and logging in northern Minnesota and on the Red Lake Indian
Reservation. There are comments by Lind on capital and labor (1919), the
patriotism of German-Americans from New Ulm who fought in the World War
against Germany (1921), world government (1923, 1926), the St. Lawrence
Seaway (1924), Minnesota politics and political history (1923, 1924), and
forest reserves (1926-1928). Other items of interest include correspondence
and Captain John Sweeney's statement concerning the East Coast
Transportation Company's claims against Germany for their submarine attack
and sinking of the schooner
Many of the papers concern the Lind Navigation Corporation and were originally addressed to Norman Lind but were transmitted to John Lind either in his capacity as the corporation's legal agent or as one of its executive officers and stockholders. Topics discussed within the correspondence and miscellaneous papers comment upon the shipping business, shipping contracts, investments, Pacific Coast steamship lines, and business in general. Subject and legal files regarding the Corporation include several lawsuits filed against other businesses such as the Independent Steamship Company or the Insurance Company of North America, as well as a suit filed against the United States for its requisition of Corporation vessels by the U.S. Shipping Corporation's Emergency Fleet Board in 1917. Other items include specifications, deck plans, hull lines, table offsets, and an engine outline for a lumber carrying steamer designed in 1916.
A set of correspondence between John Lind and his youngest son, John Lind, Jr., concern the son's oil and gas exploration in Texas in partnership with Fred H. Wilcox and financed in part by John Lind.
Two letters addressed to George M. Stephenson in May of 1933 by Alexander P. Anderson and Henrik Shipstead relate to Stephenson's biography of Lind. Anderson's letter comments on the Lind family's migration to Minnesota and the hunting accident that led to the amputation of Lind's hand.
A file of newspaper clippings contains information on Lind's career, foreign trade, politics, government extravagance and scandals, Indian affairs, labor unions, regulation of corporations, education, the University of Minnesota, agricultural and monetary policy, and other topics of interest to Lind. Speech files contain Lind's comments on many of these topics.
Also included within the subject and legal files is a 44-page paper by
Charles Fremont Taylor, Philadelphia editor of
Notable correspondents within the collection include the following:
Anderson, Alexander Pierce, 1862-1943
Baker, Newton Diehl, 1871-1937.
Brower, Jacob Vradenberg, 1844-1905.
Bryan, William Jennings, 1860-1925.
Burnquist, Joseph Alfred Arner, 1879-1961.
Busch, Joseph Francis, 1866-1953.
Butler, Pierce, 1866-1939.
Chamberlain, Clark Wells, 1870-1948.
Christianson, Theodore, 1883-1984.
Coffman, Lotus Delta, 1875-1938.
Conger, Edwin Hurd, 1843-1907.
Craig, Charles Patton, 1858-1935.
Daniels, Josephus, 1862-1948.
Davis, Cushman Kellogg, 1838-1900.
Day, Frank Arah, 1855-1928.
Dewey, George, 1837-1917.
Eberhart, Adolph Olson, 1870-1944.
Edgar, William Crowell, 1856-1932.
Emmons, William Harvey, 1876-1948.
Folwell, William Watts, 1833-1929.
Gallaudet, Edward Miner, 1837-1917.
Gilbert, Cass, 1859-1934.
Graham, Clarence E., 1841-1904.
Gray, John Henry, 1859-1946.
Gregory, Thomas Watt, 1861-1933.
Hall, Darwin Scott, 1844-1919.
Haugen, Nils Pederson, 1849-1931.
Hay, John, 1838-1905.
Hays, Willet Martin, 1859-1928.
Healy, Frank, 1854-1924.
Hill, Albert Ross, 1869-1943.
Hill, James Jerome, 1838-1916.
Hoag, William Ricketson, 1859-1953.
Iverson, Samuel Gilbert, 1859-1928.
Johnson, John Albert, 1861-1909.
Johnston, Clarence Howard, 1859-1936.
Jordan, David Starr, 1851-1931.
Kellogg, Frank Billings, 1856-1937.
Lansing, Robert, 1864-1928.
LeSueur Arthur, 1869-1950.
Lind, Jenny.
Lind, John, Jr.
Lind, Norman George, 1882-1932.
Lindbergh, Charles August, 1860-1924.
Lynch, Frederick Bicknell, 1866- .
McAdoo, William Gibbs, 1863-1941.
McGee, John Franklin, 1861-1925.
McVey, Frank LeRond, 1869-1953.
Martin, George Riley, 1864-1938.
Mattson, Hans, 1832-1893.
Mayo, William James, 1861-1939.
Meagher, John Ford, 1836-1897.
Merriam, William Rush, 1849-1931.
Nelson, Knute, 1843-1923.
Newton, Walter Hughes, 1880-1941.
Oberholtzer, Ernest Carl, 1884-1977.
O'Brien, Thomas Dillon, 1859-1935.
Olson, Eric.
Payne, John Barton, 1855-1935.
Reed, Axel Hayford, 1835-1917.
Rhoads, Charles James, 1872-1954.
Richards, William, Alford, 1849-1912.
Rockwood, Chelsea Joseph, 1855-1935.
Rosing, Leonard August, 1861-1909.
Sabin, Dwight May, 1844-1902.
Sebenius, John Uno, 1862-1932.
Shipstead, Henrik, 1881-1960.
Söderblom, Nathan, Archbishop of Uppsala.
Stevens, Frederick Clement, 1861-1923.
Strait, Horace Burton, 1835-1894.
Swingle, Walter T.
Tawney, James Albertus, 1855-1919.
Taylor, Charles Fremont, 1856-1919.
Tighe, Ambrose, 1859-1928.
Towne, Charles Arnette, 1858-1928.
Vincent, George Edgar, 1864-1941.
Volstead, Andrew John, 1860-1947.
Wakefield, James Beach, 1825-1910.
Walcott, Charles Doolittle, 1850-1927.
Washburn, William Drew, 1831-1912.
Wefald, Knud, 1869-1936.
Werner, Nils Olson, 1848-1910.
Wesbrook, Frank Fairchild, 1868-1918.
Weyerhaeuser, Frederick Edward, 1872-1945.
Whitney, Charles Colby, 1846-1913.
Williams, John Sharp, 1854-1932.
Willis, John Willey, 1854-1935.
Wilson, William Bauchop, 1862-1934.
Wilson, Woodrow, 1856-1924.
Copies of law partnership Lind & Somsen's outgoing correspondence.
Copies of Lind's outgoing letters as governor-elect (November 14-December 12, 1898), of Henry N. Somsen's outgoing letters on behalf of Lind & Somsen, and of Somsen's personal correspondence (March 8-October 22, 1900).
Copies of Somsen's outgoing personal correspondence.
Pertains to the Lind & Somsen law partnership.
One of 1,800 bonds issued for the refunding of the Minnesota State Railroad Adjustment Bonds.
Norman Lind's papers consist of school work, correspondence, and business files.
The school work includes a school book kept by Norman while in his sixth year of public school at New Ulm (1892) and essays dating from his college coursework at the University of Minnesota (1897-1902).
Norman Lind's correspondence is arranged in two sets: a chronological set kept from 1913-1932 and an alphabetical set kept while Lind was employed with the Tacoma Oriental Steamship Company between 1929 and 1932. The majority of the correspondence is concerned with Lind's business and financial affairs and includes many letters exchanged between Lind and his father. John Lind often acted as an investor, executive officer, or legal agent in Norman Lind's business ventures. Consequently, the correspondence between these two men is rich with details about the family and about Norman's affairs, particularly his lumber and shipping businesses. Both Norman and John Lind's sets of papers should be reviewed to explore the depth of any particular subject. For example, documents evident in Norman Lind's papers reveal that Norman Lind and A. E. Nelson entered into an agreement with R. Lawrence Smith for the construction of a wooden steamer that was subsequently requisitioned by the United States Emergency Fleet Corporation in 1917 for World War I service. John Lind presented Norman's case for financial adjustment before the Shipping Board; however, Norman's papers contain only a few pieces of correspondence dating from 1919 regarding these actions. To obtain a fuller record, the papers of both men must be examined.
Other correspondents include John Uno Sebenius, family friend and mining engineer for the Oliver Iron Mining Company, who frequently invested in Lind's business endeavors, and J. J. Waddell, a real estate agent who managed Lind's property in Yuma County, Arizona. Specific details include discussion of financial assets, incorporation matters, trade speculations, labor, and equipment. Other topics included within the correspondence cover Lind's Arizona ranch property, proposals for vegetable oil production, mining interests, his brother John's geological survey work in the southwestern states and later oil business in Hutchinson, Minnesota, and his father's estate.
Business files pertaining to the Tacoma Oriental Steamship Company, which was primarily concerned with Pacific Coast shipping and Asian hardwoods trade, includes an agreement with the States Steamship Company for the management and operation of Tacoma line steamships, monthly financial statements for part of 1930, and vessel voyage and operation reports for 1929-1931. An additional file contains estimated profit and loss statements for the Western Stevedore Company (1930-1931), a company used by the Tacoma line for cargo loading and unloading.
Lind left the employment of the Tacoma Oriental Steamship Company in the late fall of 1931 and returned to his mother's home in Minneapolis. Correspondence after this time reflects Lind's search for new business opportunities in a variety of fields and includes many comments about business and the state of the American economy. Lind died shortly thereafter of appendicitis while in Denver, Colorado.