Archive for October, 2020
The Garland Homestead in Wisconsin ~ A Hamlin Garland Memorial – Part 2
Posted by: | CommentsHermon MacNeil’s life and works developed around a community of artists and sculptors. Many of them met and worked together during the Chicago Worlds Fair of 1893.
Hamlin Garland was one of those people —
- author, explorer, friend of Native Americans,
- advisor and friend of President Teddy Roosevelt,
- winner of the Pulitzer Prize in 1922,
- a proud son of Wisconsin, as well as, South Dakota and Illinois, and New York, too!
Therefore, his HOME has become a National Historic Landmark !

In 1973 the Interior Department designated the Hamlin Garland Homestead a National Historic Landmark. The house was purchased by the West Salem Historical Society and restoration was started in 1975.
In 1973 the Interior Department designated the Homestead of Hamlin Garland as a National Historic Landmark.
“At dedication ceremonies that fall a large stone and plaque noting its historic values were placed in front of the house. The house was purchased by the West Salem Historical Society late in 1973, but restoration did not actually begin until 1975.” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamlin_Garland_House
Wisconsin is proud of their historic connection to this friend of Hermon A. MacNeil. This State has also has designated a Heritage Highway, namely the …
NOTE: The previous post showed South Dakota’s historic pride for Garland as TEN miles of Brown County Highway 11 near Aberdeen in South Dakota similarly bears the name of Hamlin Garland. They call it “Hamlin Garland Memorial Highway.”~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
In Wisconsin, the
West Salem Historical Society
tells their story as follows: 
Hamlin Garland
West Salem (WI) Historical Society
Named after Hannibal Hamlin, the vice president (from 1861-1865) under Abraham Lincoln, Hamlin Garland was born on a farm near West Salem, WI on September 14, 1860. His early years were spent in the mid-west (Wisconsin, Iowa and Dakota), where he managed to acquire an education and graduating with honors from a western seminary.
His early success in writing enabled him to purchase this house and 4 acres in West Salem as a homestead for his parents.
The home was in poor condition and Garland spent much of October 1893 repairing and renovating; he eventually installed indoor plumbing, making it the first home in the area with that innovation.[7] He originally named it Mapleshade because of the three large maples on the property.[8] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamlin_Garland_House After Garland prepared the house and his parents moved back from the Dakota Territory in time to celebrate Thanksgiving.
In 1893,[7] Hamlin moved to Chicago, where he lived at 6427 South Greenwood Avenue in the Woodlawn neighborhood. He is considered “a significant figure in the Chicago Literary Movement” and “one of Chicago’s most important authors”.[8] Moccasin Ranch Park, located near [this] address, is named in his honor.[8] SOURCE: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamlin_Garland#cite_note-MoccasinRanchPark-8
In Illinois in November 1899, Garland married Zulime Taft, the sister of sculptor Lorado Taft, and began working as a teacher and a lecturer.[9] In his literary career, Hamlin was an author of 52 novels, several poems and short stories. He received the Pulitzer Prize for Daughter of the Middle Border (sequel to Son of the Middle Border) in 1922.
This Garland Homestead commemorates the three-generation Family home of Hamlin Garland.
A prolific writer, Garland continued to publish novels, short fiction, and essays. In 1917, he published his autobiography, A Son of the Middle Border. The book’s success prompted a sequel, A Daughter of the Middle Border, for which Garland won the 1922 Pulitzer Prize for Biography. After two more volumes, Garland began a second series of memoirs based on his diary. Garland naturally became quite well known during his lifetime and had many friends in literary circles.[10] He was made a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters in 1918.[4]
After moving to Hollywood, California, in 1929, he devoted his remaining years to investigating psychic phenomena, an enthusiasm he first undertook in 1891. In his final book, The Mystery of the Buried Crosses (1939), he tried to defend such phenomena and prove the legitimacy of psychic mediums. [ SOURCE: Wikipedia ]
Hamlin Died in 1940, at the age of 79 in Hollywood, California. He was cremated, and his ashes were returned to West Salem for burial in Neshonoc Cemetery two miles north of West Salem where his wife, children and parents are buried.
VISIT the Hamlin Garland HOMESTEAD:

The Garland Homestead in 1971. [Source: Hamlin_Garlin_House_West_Salem_La_Crosse_County_Wisconsin.jpg ]
Address: 357 West Garland Street, West Salem Wi 54669. Free Will Donations Accepted
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For MORE on Hamlin Garland check these links:
The Hamlin Garland Memorial Highway ~
Brown County, South Dakota

Hamlin Garland https://mypoeticside.com/wp-content/uploads/gallery-images/e6845fc.jpeg
In June 1936, the Brown County Commissioners named a section of Brown County Highway 11, for a total of 10 miles, the “Hamlin Garland Memorial Highway.” This section travels past the homestead of Garland’s father, Richard, who homesteaded in 1881. In 1998, new signs were placed along this stretch of paved road noting the name of the highway.
[ Hamlin Garland Society of Aberdeen, SD http://www.garlandsociety.org/ ]
GARLAND TOWNSHIP–This township was named after Hamlin Garland, a novelist, who lived in this area with his pioneer parents, Mr. and Mrs. Richard Garland. The land south and west of Columbia [and Ordway] was immortalized by this writer in “Among the Corn Rows,” and “A Son of the Middle Border.”
Garland information on the web:

In 1895 HAMLIN GARLAND led Hermon MacNeil and Francis Brown to the four corners area (AZ, NM, CO, UT) to witness the Native American people and culture there.
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Hamlin Garland Highway in South Dakota. [SOURCE: Information courtesy of Gene Aisenbrey ~ Hamlin Garland Society of Aberdeen, SD ~ Contact: garlandsociety@gmail.com Copyright © 2015 ]
- Hamlin Garland Biography (Wisconsin Authors and Their Works)
- A Biography of three pages
- One of Garland’s Grant Interviews with Julia Dent Grant (1826-1902) widow of General U. S. Grant
- SD Historical Society: “Hamlin Garland’s South Dakota: History and Story” https://www.sdhspress.com/journal/south-dakota-history-9-3/hamlin-garlands-dakota-history-and-story/vol-09-no-3-hamlin-garlands-dakota.pdf
- A brief Garland bio (Al Filreis)
~ A Poem by Hamlin Garland ~
“Do you fear the force of the wind,
The slash of the rain?
Go face them and fight them,
Be savage again.
Go hungry and cold like the wolf,
Go wade like the crane:
The palms of your hands will thicken,
The skin of your cheek will tan,
You’ll grow ragged and weary and swarthy,
But you’ll walk like a man!”
Their adventure in 1895 led into Native settlements in Colorado, Arizona (Moqui, Navajo), New Mexico, and Utah:
- Hamlin Garland, led the tour to the southwest in the summer of 1895. MacNeil & Browne wanted to gain direct experience of American Indians to inform their art. What the trio found reflected in their respective painting, sculpture and writing.
- MacNeil sculpted a cement statue of Chief Manuelito for trader C. N. Cotton under a tent in the dessert. His subsequent sculptures of Native Americans after that summer of 1895 continued his cultural interest. That fascination began with his friendship and sculpting of Black Pipe, the Sioux warrior. He first met Black Pipe at the Buffalo Bill Wild West Show at the Chicago World’s Fair in 1893. The Sioux modeled for MacNeil and later worked in his studio for over a year before MacNeil’s trip with Garland.
- Charles Francis Browne was a painter and friend (his room mate in Paris) who accompanied Hermon MacNeil and the author.
- Edward Everett Ayers was an art patron to both MacNeil and Browne. He had been a Civil War Calvary officer stationed in the southwestern United States. He became a lumberman who made a fortune selling railroad ties and telephone poles. He urged MacNeil to travel to see the vanishing West of the American Indian. He became an arts benefactor whose art collections are now housed by the Art Institute of Chicago, as well as, the Newberry Library. His copy of MacNeil’s “Moqui Runner” still graces the Newberry Library.
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Dave Wiegers captures another “Lincoln Lawyer”
Posted by: | CommentsLincoln buff and talented amateur photographer David B. Wiegers sent us a photo of an additional “Lincoln Lawyer” bust by Hermon A. MacNeil.
This one makes its home in the Law Library at Pennsylvania University. Dave snapped these shots there recently.
The piece resides at the Law Library of the University of Pennsylvania. It is new to this website.
Eight of these busts were cast in about 1911 from a standing Lincoln piece that MacNeil sculpted in 1911.
Wiegers pairs (1.) his love of photography with (2.) a quest to travel to every Lincoln statue and monument in the 35 states he has visited in the last 15 years.
- See his story at: https://dbwiegers.zenfolio.com/about.html
- And view over 500 photos of his Lincoln Collection on the front end of his website: https://dbwiegers.zenfolio.com/
Not pictured on his website is his Boston Terrier, named “Lincoln.”
© Dave Wiegers Photography
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The Penn Law Journal describes their “Lincoln Lawyer Bust” this way:
Opposite the front entrance, in full view straight ahead on the massive staircase leading up to the library from the Great Hall, stands a statue of Abraham Lincoln. Lincoln, who led the most massive legal and political reform the United States has ever known, is a superb example of legal greatness as Lewis Hall has memorialized it-of revolution in the interest of tradition. For Lincoln avowedly fought to realize the ideals of the Declaration of Independence, even as he essentially restructured the legal landscape in the interests of fundamental justice.
The statue of Abraham Lincoln in the Great Hall, which faces the original entrance to the Law School, was immediately visible upon passing through the massive twin doors on 34th Street. The symbolic power of the statue, the role of Lincoln as martyr to resurrection of the righteousness of the American republic, gave students a tangible focus for legal greatness, a sense that lawyerly skills were integral to the discernment and sense of justice of the most heroic of all American presidents.
The Penn Law Journal of 2014 [Vol. 31, Iss. 2 [2014], Art. 1 ]
“Uncle Hermon would be Proud too.” dnl