Fort McCoy ArtiFACT: Historic ephemera of early military life at Camp McCoy

Photo By Scott Sturkol | This is a photo taken April 5, 2024, at Fort McCoy, Wis., of an album of old photos that include historical images of Fort McCoy as it looked more than a century ago plus with other photos from as late as the Operation Desert Storm era of the 1990s. An amateur Wisconsin historian was antique hunting in a northern Wisconsin antique store and stumbled across a photo album marked “Fort McCoy-Military.” He noticed the photos included in the album were old and thought the photos might be important, so he purchased the album for $20. He then donated all of it to Fort McCoy to have for historical archives. (U.S. Army Photo by Scott T. Sturkol, Public Affairs Office, Fort McCoy, Wis.)  

FORT MCCOY, WISCONSIN, UNITED STATES

05.23.2024

Courtesy Story

Fort McCoy Public Affairs Office           

If you’ve followed this series of articles known as Fort McCoy ArtiFACTs for a while now you know that Fort McCoy archaeologists frequently recover artifacts from the ancient Native American, 1800s homesteads, and early military past of the installation.

Typically, these artifacts take the form of stone tools, historic glass or pottery, or historic military insignia and uniform pieces. But not all “artifacts” that tell us about the history of Fort McCoy are dug out of the ground. Many are “dug” out of the library, deed office, or in this unique case … the local antique store.

“Historical ephemera” is the term historians give to everyday items or records that were made in the past, but were never designed to be preserved for very long. These include period letters, postcards, photographs, historic maps, event handouts, and similar “disposable” items.

Recently, an amateur Wisconsin historian was antique hunting in a northwoods antique store and stumbled across a photo album marked “Fort McCoy-Military.” He noticed the photos included in the album were old and thought the photos might be important, so he purchased the album for $20.

He then donated and mailed the album to his colleague Archaeologist Ryan Howell, Fort McCoy’s cultural resource manager with the Fort McCoy Directorate of Public Works Environmental Division Natural Resources Branch, to see if the album contained any previously unknown photos that the installation might want for its historic records.

The album turned out to be a treasure trove of early 1910s-1940s picture-postcards, photographs and other “ephemera” related to the earliest periods of the installation, when the post was called Camp Emory Upton/Camp Robinson (1909-1926) or Camp McCoy (1926-1974).

While the Fort McCoy Commemorative Area and the Cultural Resource Office keep a library of hundreds of early photographs from the early eras of Fort McCoy, roughly 30 to 40 percent of the photographs in this newly discovered album were new images showing new aspects of early military life at Fort McCoy, such as back when horse cavalry and wagons were the primary equipment used on the base.

Highlights of the new photos include a series of photos of “march camps” at towns like Mauston, New Lisbon, and Portage, Wis., showing the early Wisconsin National Guard marching to Camp Robinson to do summer training from Camp Randall in Madison on what the troops referred to on the backs of the photos as their “Summer Sparta Hike” in 1915.

Of even greater interest are the series of picture-postcards taken by the troops in the 1910s-1920s. It was fairly common to take film from early cameras of the day to a local professional photographer in a town like Sparta to develop the film onto post-card stock that could then be mailed home. These candid, personal images taken by Soldiers of 120 years ago and the text sent home to families and friends provides an intimate glimpse into the life of the average Soldier at early Fort McCoy.

Look for some of these new photos and art to be shared in future Fort McCoy social media postings and newspaper articles.

All archaeological work conducted at Fort McCoy is sponsored by the Directorate of Public Works Environmental Division Natural Resources Branch.

Visitors and employees are reminded they should not collect artifacts on Fort McCoy or other government lands and leave the digging to the professionals.

Any individual who excavates, removes, damages, or otherwise alters or defaces any post-contact or pre-contact site, artifact, or object of antiquity on Fort McCoy violates federal law.

The discovery of any archaeological artifact should be reported to the Directorate of Public Works Environmental Division Natural Resources Branch at 608-388-8214.

(Article prepared by the Fort McCoy Archaeological Team.)

• Date Taken: 05.23.2024
• Date Posted: 05.24.2024 00:21
• Story ID: 472209
• Location: FORT MCCOY, WISCONSIN, US