Godofredo Meráz, decades at tanneries and foundries, currently at Brady Corp.

 

From the project "Shadows of Industrialization" 

 

Anthony Rainey, 23 years at Master Lock, 13 years with the UAW

From the project, "Shadows of Industrialization"

Bill Lietzke, Ron Suminski and Nicholas Romano, each more than 30 years in the auto industry

From the project "Shadows of Industrialization"

Sue Silverstein, Kearney and Trecker, and Allen Bradley for eight years

From the project "Shadows of Industrialization"

Laurie Drake, Briggs & Stratton for 25 years

From the project "Shadows of Industrialization"

Jesse Barnes, 30 years in the auto industry

 

From the project "Shadows of Industrialization"

Frank Shansky, Allis Chalmers for more than 12 years

From the project "Shadows of Industrialization" 

Shansky was one of the workers on hand when the last tractor rolled off the Allis Chalmers assembly line on Dec. 6, 1985.

Susan Lunsford, Allis Chalmers and A.O. Smith for 15 years

 

From the project "Shadows of Industrialization"

Earl Ingram, Jr., 34 years at A.O. Smith

From the project "Shadows of Industrialization"

2821 N. 33rd Street: The story of a home, a neighborhood, a city.

The following was published in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel on Sunday, Sept. 25, 2022. 

On a summer’s day in 2021, I was driving home after taking photos at the former Briggs & Stratton manufacturing complex on Center Street in Milwaukee’s central city. Once a major manufacturing site, the complex had become an example of urban abandonment, its windows covered with plywood and “for sale or rent” signs. It was also an era when COVID and protests over police brutality dominated our lives. Tensions were high.

So I was curious when, driving past an abandoned home at 2821 N. 33rd St., I saw a message of hope painted on the porch steps: “I have decided to stick with love. Hate is too great a burden to bear.” —Martin Luther King Jr. Who, and why, I wondered, had painted the message on a home that, like the Briggs factory, was more fitting as a symbol of disorder and despair?

The months went on and other priorities consumed my life. But I couldn’t shake my interest in that abandoned home and its message. After visits to dingy, COVID-restricted offices of Milwaukee County and the City of Milwaukee, I slowly learned more of the home’s past. I came to realize that, in many ways, 2821 N. ¬¬33rd Street tells the history not only of a home, but of a community and a city. 

In particular, the home reflects an essential contemporary story — the rise and fall of industrial union jobs in Milwaukee, and the particularly devastating effect of deindustrialization on Milwaukee’s African-American community. 

People often wonder why Milwaukee fell from one of the best to one of the worst cities in the country to raise an African-American family. Much of that answer can be found in the neighborhood surrounding 2821 N. 33rd Street. 

Like all of Milwaukee, the home rests on once-indigenous lands sold-to-stolen-by the federal government in the 1830s, opening the area to real estate speculators and white settlers. In 

those early decades of the 19th Century, it remained a far-away outpost of the city. By the end of the 19th Century, that had changed. Plots were bought and sold, and then subdivided for home-building. In 1906, the home at 2821 N. 33rd St., was built and, like many Milwaukee homes, it was a spacious duplex. That same year, 1906, the manufacturing powerhouse Briggs & Stratton built a seven-acre, six-building complex a few blocks away. (Two years earlier, in 1904, A.O. Smith had incorporated in Milwaukee. At their peak, in the 1960s and 1970s, the nearby A.O. Smith factories employed 10,000 people.)

 

After the 33rd Street home was built, owners came and went until Louis Hirsch bought the duplex in 1912. There were lean years in the 1930s, and city taxes went unpaid. But by the time Hirsch died in 1945, at that point living on Milwaukee’s east side, he owned the 33rd Street home and four others. 

 

From 1949 to 1976, the home was its most stable. In that period, it was owned and lived in by Albert and Agatha Praniewicz who, like many in Milwaukee, were of Polish descent. In a pattern that persists to this day, the couple had moved west and north (in their case, from 19th and Clybourn Street) in search of a more desirable neighborhood. Like many of that era, Albert Praniewicz was a blue-collar worker, and he ended his career as an assembly inspector at American Motors. The City of Milwaukee directories do not list Agatha’s occupation, although most likely she would have been called a “housewife.”

 

The years 1949-1976 were also ­the economic apex of 20th Century Milwaukee. The city emerged from World War 2 to become a manufacturing powerhouse and gained a reputation as an up-and-coming city with a strong middle class and an abundance of family-supporting, unionized jobs. As a result, Milwaukee became a beacon for African-Americans who were part of the Great Migration from the south to the north.

 

In 1976, the Praniewicz’s sold the duplex to Alvin Jones, described as “a single man.” In subsequent years the Praniewicz’s were no longer listed in the city directory, and they apparently became part of that era’s great white migration out of Milwaukee to the suburbs or rural areas. (Anceestry.com notes that an Albert A Praniewicz, born in Milwaukee in 1923, died in 1999 in Neshkoro, Wisconsin, which is about 50 miles west of Oshkosh.) In coming decades, that white-flight migration was followed by the industrial abandonment of Milwaukee, as once powerful companies such as A.O Smith, Briggs & Stratton, and Allis Chalmers shipped jobs to non-union strongholds in the south and, later, overseas.

 

Jones, listed in the city directory as a custodial worker for Milwaukee County Buildings and Grounds, lived at the 33rd Street home for several decades as what was once a neighborhood dominated by European immigrants became home to the city’s African-American population. Around the turn of the century, Alvin moved north and west, and was listed as living near 59th and Wright Steet, although he still owned the home on 33rd Street.

 

The 21st Century has been cruel to Milwaukee’s central city, including the 33rd Street home. Not only had jobs disappeared, but the city’s low-income neighborhoods bore the brunt of the sub-prime mortgage and foreclosure crisis that dominated the U.S. economic system from 2007-2010. Jones received a notice of foreclosure in 2010, based on a 2007 mortgage, and the following year the Sheriff’s Department foreclosed on the home.

 

After the foreclosure, the home spiraled downward as a shifting group of finance companies and absentee landlords took ownership. By 2017, the city deemed the home “dangerous, unsafe, unsanitary, unfit for human habitation and unreasonable to repair.” It was ordered to be razed and removed. In the summer of 2022, the home — and its graffiti message of peace and love — was still standing.

 

The home’s future, or, more accurately, the future of the land, is unclear. 

 

Two blocks away, the once-deserted Briggs complex is being refurbished as the “Community Within the Corridor” development of apartments and commercial and community space, including a gym and daycare facilities. Rentals began in the summer of 2022.

I’ve lived in Milwaukee long enough, however, to know that a single real estate development rarely transforms a community. Tellingly, the nearby and much-larger A.O. Smith complex remains a symbol of abandonment and joblessness, and many homes and businesses throughout the neighborhood are unoccupied and/or in disrepair. Clearly, the future is yet to be written. 

 

— This essay is based on a project for a class on Artists’ Books at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Peck School of the Arts. Click here for a digital version of the book.

 

My mother's raisin bread: COVID lessons from the 1950s.

 Following is the transcript from an audio essay on WUWM, the NPR affiliate in Milwaukee, WI, on Oct. 5, 2020. 

It wasn’t until late-September that I realized why, back in March, I was obsessed with making my mother’s oatmeal-raisin bread. It wasn’t the actual bread I craved. Rather, the bread was an attempt to create a safe, 1950s bubble. Just like my mother tried, more than half a century ago.

 

My mother's raisen bread recipe

I have spent much of my life rejecting the 1950s. But in this era of COVID-19, I am trying to understand that decade.

 

After I graduated from high school in 1969, I ran away as far and as fast as I could from all that the 1950s demanded of me: Behave. Conform. Strive no higher as a woman than nurse or teacher. Criticize but learn to co-exist with Jim Crow racism. And of course, don’t become one of those hippies protesting the Vietnam War. 

 

But COVID-19 has given me a fresh perspective on the 1950s — no, not the decade’s cultural, political and racial straightjackets, but its attempt to bury a painful past.

 

In the early weeks of COVID-19, I succumbed to the consumer frenzy that took hold across the country. I bought way too much toilet paper, Lysol, and hand-sanitizer. But when I tried to buy flour at Metro Market, the shelves were empty. I was in a near panic, saved only by over-priced, organic flour at another store.

 

I look back on those early weeks and laugh at my hoarding. But I don’t laugh when I think about the future. It is still too uncertain.

 

Mostly, I worry for my children, especially since they live more than a thousand miles away, and I don’t know when I will see them again. I want to magically conjure up a perfect world for them, just like my mother tried, more than half a century ago.

 

COVID-19 has given me a new admiration for my parents. They were both born in 1918, the year of the Spanish flu. At an age when they should have been planning their future, the country was in the grip of the Great Depression, followed by six years of a World War. They grew up surrounded by uncertainty, poverty, and death.

My parents rarely talked of those difficult years. Their focus was on the future. When that World War ended, and when it was clear the Great Depression would stay in the 1930s, all they wanted to do was create a wonderful bubble, a vaccine of sorts. They wanted a home, financial security, good schools for their children.

 

Looking back, it’s clear that the Civil Rights Movement was not only long overdue, but inevitable. African Americans, having fought and died for their country during World War 2, rightfully demanded their place in the American Dream.

 

In the initial months of COVID-19, I focused on getting through the summer. I now fantasize about a post-COVID future. And my dreams are not that different from those of my parents in the 1950s. I want my children and grandchildren to be healthy, to be safe, to have a future. And I want to make them oatmeal-raisin bread.

 

Looking at my mother’s recipe, I am struck by its simplicity. It has eight simple ingredients, with equally simple final instructions: “When lukewarm, combine all ingredients. Shape into three loaves.” There’s nothing about letting the bread rise, or how long it should bake. My mother knew that, give or take a bit, 375 degrees and 45 minutes was about right. 

 

Whenever I make my mother’s oatmeal-raisin bread, at some point I am transported back to my childhood. I can all but smell and see the warm bread, waiting on the kitchen table as I come home from school. My mom, knowing children pretty well—she had six—made sure we each had a small, individual loaf, baked in a used chicken-pot-pie tin.

I don’t know when the era of COVID-19 will end, any more than my mother knew when World War Two would end. But I long for the day when I can make oatmeal-raisin bread for my children and grandchildren, served fresh out of the oven. Like my mother did, in the 1950s.

 

 

 

 

 

 

George Washington's Dentures: Teeth from Enslaved People?

“George Washington's Dentures: Teeth From Enslaved People?” is an 8x.11 photo on fine art paper. The background is taken from a 1784 Mount Vernon ledger noting payments of cash for 9 teeth of unidentified "Negroes." The teeth are a photo of one of the surviving sets of our first President’s dentures. 

The Mount Vernon transaction is unclear whether the teeth from the enslaved people were for Washington himself, or whether his dentist wanted the teeth for other patients What is certain is that George Washington’s dentures were not wooden, as is the common belief.  “They were made from a variety of materials, including human teeth,” according to Kathryn Gehred, a research specialist with “The Washington Papers” at the University of Virginia. 

It was not uncommon in the 18th century for rich people to pay for teeth to be pulled from poor men, women and children. Enslaved people, needless to say, had little control over how their bodies were treated. 

Gehred’s argues that without further documentation, it is impossible to state with certainty that Washington’s dentures include teeth from enslaved people. But, she continues, as a slaveholder, Washington followed “the standards of his time. He condoned and even encouraged violence as a way to keep enslaved people subservient.” And, as the Mount Vernon ledger notes, he did sell teeth from 9 unidentified enslaved people to his dentist.

 

Other historians are less unequivocable in their interpretations. Henry Wiencek, in his 2003 book “An Imperfect God: George Washington,” writes: “It has long been known to specialists that some of Washington’s false teeth came from the mouths of his slaves, but this inherently invidious tidbit of fact has not been widely circulated…because it is impossible to rationalize it completely. Better not to know.”

 

Buying the Glock Was Easy. Getting Rid of It is the Hard Part.

 Following is the transcript from an audio essay on WUWM, the NPR affiliate in Milwaukee, WI. 

I’m sitting at my desk, staring at my Glock semi-automatic 9 mm handgun. I am scared of the gun. But it also mesmerizes me. I admire its beauty, its sleek design. I want to pick it up, feel its heft, enjoy the authority it bestows.

And then I remember. There’s no reason to own a Glock unless you intend to shoot people.

My 9 mm semi-automatic Glock.

I bought the gun in May 2007, shortly after a Glock was used during the murder of 32 people at Virginia Tech. At the time, it was the deadliest mass shooting in modern U.S. history.

I struggled to understand the Virginia Tech shootings, and I wondered. How easy is it to get a Glock in Milwaukee? It seemed a possible opinion piece, and the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel was interested.

I found out, unfortunately, that it is absurdly easy to buy a Glock, easier than buying penicillin at Walgreen’s. The more difficult question, is how to get rid of it.

When I bought my Glock at a local gun shop, I brought along a friend to help ease my nerves. The sales rep mentioned that if I had children in the home, I should keep the Glock’s clip separate from the gun. Other than that, he didn’t say much about safety precautions. Nor did he ask me why I wanted a Glock. The background check was instantaneous and, it seemed to me, almost a joke.

Before we left, my friend and I shot at few rounds at the firing range in the back of the store. I loaded the bullets into the clip, put in earplugs, and shot 13 rounds at a mock human being. Unexpectedly, I hit the chest or head on all but a couple of shots. I was immediately smitten by the excitement of owning and shooting a gun.

When I got home, my husband brought me back to reality. I showed him the bullet-riddled target and he responded, “Oh great. You killed somebody.”

For the last 14 years, the Glock has been in a locked box, hidden deep in my closet. But the time has come to make a decision.

In a few weeks, our two grandchildren are visiting. The oldest is now 4 — both curious and smart enough to get into unexpected trouble. My daughter has made it clear: get that Glock out of the house.

But how does one get rid of a Glock? It’s not like I can throw the gun into a Goodwill box, next to old dishes and outdated sports equipment.

And I don’t want to sell the Glock and then have it used in a violent crime.

I could turn it in to the police. But I’ve watched too many Law and Order episodes where guns and drugs mysteriously disappear.

I think back to when I bought the gun, when the Virginia Tech shootings shocked the entire world. Today, that mass shooting is almost forgotten. It’s been overtaken by the 49 people killed at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando in 2016 and, in what remains the worst mass shooting, 58 people killed in 2017 at a concert in Nevada.

Then, as now, there were calls to end America’s love affair with guns. But not much has happened. In fact, there are more guns and more gun deaths in Milwaukee than ever before. And with Wisconsin’s passage of concealed carry in 2011, gun control is even-more elusive.

In 2007, when I bought my Glock, there were 105 homicides in Milwaukee, the overwhelming majority by guns. In 2020, here were 193 homicides, making it the deadliest year in Milwaukee’s history. This year, we are on target to surpass that number.

Once again, I am confronted with my dilemma. What to do with my Glock?

Most recently, I’ve thought about throwing the gun into the middle of Lake Michigan. Or finding a welder who can turn the Glock into an anti-gun art project. For now, however, I am taking the easy way out. Tomorrow, the Glock goes off to my friend’s house for safe storage, my final decision delayed.

Clearly, it would have been best if I had never bought the gun. Or if someone, somewhere, had made it even a little bit difficult.

Free Speech, Hate Speech, Outright Lies: Definitions, resources and credits

Credits:

Design: Barbara J. Miner

P. 1. Photo and prints by Barbara J. Miner.

P. 2. Top: Chang W. Lee/New York Times. Center left: Josh Galemore/Arizona Daily Star, via Associated Press. Center right: Anadolu Agency/Getty Images 

p. 3. Mark Zuckerberg collage by Barbara Miner

p. 4. Photo by Barbara J. Miner

DEFINITIONS

Free SpeechThe First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution guarantees freedoms concerning religion, expression, assembly, and the right to petition. It states: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”

The First Amendment is not absolute, however. The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that the government may ban fighting words or threats. Punishments may be enhanced for violent crimes prompted by race hate. And private institutions including universities and employers are not subject to the First Amendment, which restricts only government activities. 

 

Hate Speech: Much of what would qualify as hate speech in other Western countries might legally be considered free speech under the First Amendment. The European Court of Human Rights, for instance, has ruled that as a matter of principle it may be necessary in certain democratic societies to sanction or even prevent all forms of expression which spread, incite, promote or justify hatred based on intolerance “provided that any ‘formalities’, ‘conditions’, ‘restrictions’ or ‘penalties’ imposed are proportionate to the legitimate aim purposed.” More than 30 European countries place restrictions on racist speech. 

 

In the United States, speech can be punished as workplace harassment if it is “severe or pervasive” enough to create a “hostile or abusive work environment” based on race, religion, sex, national origin, age, disability, veteran status or in some jurisdictions, sexual orientation, political affiliation, citizenship status, marital status or personal appearance for the plaintiff and or a reasonable person. 

 

In addition, the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and related legislation prohibit discrimination, including in housing, employment and education, on the basis of race, color, national origin, sex [including sexual orientation or gender identity] and religion.

 

Outright Lies: Statements that present a false or misleading impression, or are made with the intent to deceive. Closely related to “outright lies” are disinformation campaigns, often spread via social media by people unaware that the information is part of a concerted campaign. Research has shown that lies go viral more quickly than true statements.

 

RESOURCES FOR FURTHER INFORMATION

Free Speech:

The American Civil Liberties Union has a range of resources on free speech.

In addition, the ACLU has a fact sheet on the rights of protesters. 

 

The Student Press Law Center provides information focusing on issues often faced by high school student journalists.

In a victory for free speech rights of students, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled 8-1 on June 23, 2021 that a Pennsylvania school district violated the First Amendment for punishing a high school student who posted “vulgar” messages on Snapchat when she did not make the cheerleading squad. It was the first time in more than 50 years that a high school student won a free-speech case before the court, with the justices skeptical of efforts to constrain speech off school grounds. In a precedent-setting decision in 1969, in what is known as the “Tinker” decision, the Court ruled that students were allowed to wear black armbands to protest the Vietnam war. The justices noted that students do not “shed their constitutional rights to freedom of 

speech of expression at the school  hours gate.” 

Several articles in the summer of 2021 have noted the tension within the ACLU and similar organizations over issues of free speech versus hate speech. See: “Once a Bastion of Free Speech, the ACLU Faces an Identity Crisis,” in The New York Times June 6, 2021

Letters in response, June 19, 2021.

 

Several other articles take up this theme of Free Speech versus Hate Speech:  

• Washington Post Opinion: “Why America needs a hate speech law.”

• Critical Race Theory, Hate Speech and Free Speech, article in “The First Amendment Encyclopedia.”

• NBC News Opinion, “Is the First Amendment Too Broad?”  

Hate Speech:

The Southern Poverty Law Center has developed a “Hatewatch” program that includes blogs, podcasts and information sheets.

Workplace Harassment:

The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission outlines the right to work free of discrimination and harassment.

 

School-based harassment:

The organization Stop Bullying has a range of resources on federal laws prohibiting discriminatory harassment. Schools are also subject to federal civil rights law such as the Civil Rights Act of 1964, Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972, and various laws protecting the rights of students with disabilities.

 

In addition to federal protections, the Wisconsin Pupil Nondiscrimination Laws prohibit discrimination on the basis of sex, race, religion, national origin, ancestry, creed, pregnancy, parental status, marital status, sexual orientation, physical, mental, emotional or learning disability.

Outright Lies:

The Columbia Journalism Review has a number of articles investigating the growing problem of “disinformation.” 

“The First Amendment in the age of disinformation,” New York Times Magazine, Oct. 13, 2020.