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UWM Archives’ new Black History Month pop-up exhibit highlights the more than half-century of organizing for integrated public schools in one of the most segregated cities in the United States.  

The exhibit traces the fortunes of public education in Milwaukee from the early, militant organizing of Lloyd Barbee’s Milwaukee United School Integration Committee (MUSIC) through a stagnating desegregation program and flashpoints over school closings in the 1980s, to the rise of voucher schools and privatization since the 1990s. The exhibit also highlights how organizing to “Defend Democracy” and “Protect Our Public Schools” from takeovers since the 2010s sit within a longer activist vision of “Freedom and Independence” and “true equality of educational opportunities.”  

📸: MUSIC calls on Milwaukee parents to “Keep Your Children Out of School” and send them to a Freedom Day School instead. Call Number: MUSIC Records, Milwaukee Mss 5.

📸: A “Freedom School Certificate” certifies that a student “took an active part in this historic battle for equal education and human dignity.” Call Number: MUSIC Records, Milwaukee Mss 5.

📸: A flier from Blacks for Two-Way Integration shows how organizers kept up the pressure even after the adoption of a formal desegregation plan, protesting that the burden of integration rested primarily on students and families of color. Agitating for integration that was “two-way or no-way,” students, families, and community organizations defended neighborhood schools, autonomy, and the freedom to choose for students and families of color. Call Number: Metropolitan Integration Research Center Records, UWM Mss 332.

Drawing on Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s “I Have a Dream” speech, we also invite visitors to respond to the exhibit by sharing their hopes for the future of public education in Milwaukee.

The third Saturday of July is National Ice Cream Day and to mark such a sweet occasion we're sharing an exterior of Ted's Ice Cream from our postcard collection. Grab a scoop or two, which you can still do at Ted's.

Greetings from Milwaukee Digital Collection

In honor of Native American Heritage Month, we offer this selection of materials from our collections that begin to illustrate Native American presence and power at UWM.

📸: Sandra Harris Tran tables for the Native American Student Movement (NASM) at UWM, circa 1980. The NASM has been a key vehicle for Native student organizing, support, and expression since the late 1960s. NASM is now known as the American Indian Student Association. Call Number: UWM Photographs Collection, UWM AC 6, Box 18.

📸: A Milwaukee Sentinel clipping pictures American Indian students organizing for a dedicated academic program outside Chapman Hall in 1971. Call Number: UWM University Communications & Media Relations Records, UWM AC 134, Box 2.

📸: The cover to a 1974 catalog shows the fruits of Native student organizing in the form of the UWM Native American Studies Program (now American Indian Studies). Call Number: UWM Office of the Chancellor Records, UWM AC 46, Box 54.

📸: The UWM Native American Studies Program announces the pilot of the Wisconsin Native American Languages Project (WNALP) in 1974. This announcement is from "Anishinaabe News: UW-Milwaukee American Indian News," a newsletter of the Native American Studies Program and NASM. Call Number: UWM Office of the Chancellor Records, UWM AC 46, Box 54.

📸: Margaret Richmond offers language instruction to a class of Native "youngsters" as a Menominee Language Resource Consultant for the WNALP in 1976. Call Number: UWM Photographs Collection, UWM AC 6, Box 18. The earlier Native American Studies Program WNALP announcement anticipates an appropriate caption: "We've a lot to learn from our elders!"

Boy Plays Horn at Halloween Party from the Roman B.J. Kwasniewski Photograph collection.

Couple in Costume from the James Blair Murdoch Photograph Collection.

Group Portrait of Attendees at Halloween Party from Roman B.J. Kwasniewski Photograph collection.

Woman in Costume Riding a Costume Horse from the James Blair Murdoch Photograph Collection.

UWM Archives’ Latine Heritage Month pop-up exhibit, “The Art of Organizing in Latinx Milwaukee,” is featured in Gallery Night MKE tomorrow, Friday, October 18, from 4-7 p.m.! Stop by our exhibit space and explore the visual culture of protest through art from Voces de la Frontera and earlier generations of Latinx activists. 

As exhibit selections featured here show, the 1960s, 70s, and 80s were witness to increasing visibility and recognition for local Latinx artists, who spearheaded a variety of innovative arts programming initiatives. Organizations like Latino Arts continue this work today, and artists represented in the Union Art Gallery’s “Colors of Our Communidad” exhibition, also featured in Gallery Night, testify to the persistence of this vital tradition of artistic achievement in our present.

📸: Juan Alvarez Cuauhtémoc, co-founder of the La Guardia community newspaper, is pictured at an exhibition of his paintings at the Charles Allis Art Museum in Milwaukee in 1969. Juan Alvarez Cuauhtémoc Photographic Collection of El Movimiento in Milwaukee’s Latino Community, UWM Mss 222, Archives Department, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Libraries.

📸: An exhibition catalog introduces “Hispanic Artists in Wisconsin,” also held at the Charles Allis. Roberto Hernandez Center Records, UWM AC 116, Archives Department, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Libraries.

📸: A flier advertises “Hispanic Arts in the Park” programming. Call Number: UWM AC 116.

Happy Thanksgiving! They just don’t do it like they used to. From the WTMJ News Archive, the turkey gets the seat of honor at this Milwaukee family's 1969 Thanksgiving celebration.

The WTMJ News Archive is the largest surviving body of television news footage in Wisconsin and an indispensable resource for midcentury Milwaukee history, with thousands of hours of entertaining and informative footage like this. 

You can watch the full clip, including the rescue operation, and browse the WTMJ News Archive online at your leisure:

This Week: Latine Heritage Month Programming Continues at UWM Archives!

Join us on Thursday, October 10 for our talk with Sergio González about his new book, Strangers No Longer: Latino Belonging and Faith in Twentieth Century Wisconsin! Drawing on a rich array of sources from UWM Archives and elsewhere, González re-frames Latinx history in Wisconsin across pivotal junctures including the farmworkers’ movement and Civil Rights-era labor organizing.

If you come for the talk, be sure to check out our Latine Heritage Month pop-up exhibit, “The Art of Organizing in Latinx Milwaukee,” which explores similar terrain! John Fleissner originals grace the cover of González’s book as well as our exhibit.

Featured here is footage of Jesús Salas and migrant farmworkers on a march to Madison in protest of farmworkers' working and living conditions in 1966, from the WTMJ News Archive. González explores the conditions and organizing of migrant farmworkers in Wisconsin through the lens of faith, belonging, and hospitality. WTMJ footage is also featured in the recently released Milwaukee PBS documentary, Roots and Legacy, based on Salas’ recent memoir Obreros Unidos.

Click the link below to watch the full clip with audio from the WTMJ News Archive.

Jesus Salas marches with migrant farmworkers, August 17, 1966, Milwaukee Journal Stations Records, Milw Mss 203, Archives Department, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Libraries.

Milwaukee Meets Washington

Next week, political enthusiasts from all over the country will flock to Milwaukee to take part in the Republican National Convention.

In honor of this upcoming exercise in democracy, UWM Archives has put together a digital exhibit highlighting notable Milwaukee visits from presidents, presidential candidates and political figures.