This program
is brought to you
by the combined resources
of the Wisconsin Historical
Society
and Wisconsin Public Television.
>> On "Wisconsin
Hometown Stories"
a city founded on a bend
in the Rock River,
sustained by rich farmland,
driven by water power;
built-up by bold entrepreneurs
and changed
by strong-minded women.
A city transformed
by heavy industry
that spread business, music
and new ideas around the world.
On "Wisconsin Hometown Stories
Janesville."
Bliss Communications,
the Janesville Gazette
GazetteXtra.com
and radio stations
WCLO-AM and WJVL-FM,
providing southern Wisconsin
with local and regional news,
entertainment and shopping
information since 1845.
The Alliant Energy Foundation,
supporting cultural
and educational programs,
and funding projects that
improve the quality of life
in Wisconsin
and the upper Midwest.
Alliant Energy Foundation,
available on the Web.
Additional funding provided
by J.P. Cullen and Sons, Inc.,
general contractor,
serving Janesville
and surrounding communities
since 1892.
And by these funders:
>> " Now through 'The Gazette,'
I hear of railroad arrivals
and new railroads
running into Janesville
from all parts of the state,
of telegraph dispatches,
of ponderous three-
and four-story buildings
going up, as if by magic.
And lots selling for more money
than I ever saw at one time.
Some of you citizens will
hardly credit the story that,
but little over 20 years ago,
there was but one log cabin
and one family was
the sum total of inhabitants
of the present city
of Janesville."
Henry Janes.
>> In the 1830s,
surveyors venturing into
the Janesville area found that
surrounding the hills
of the Rock River valley
were large areas
of tall grass prairie
punctuated by pockets
of woodland, a good mix
of open land for farming
and timber for building.
Only a few years before,
the Sac Indian Chief Blackhawk
launched an unsuccessful attempt
to reclaim his tribe's
ancestral hunting and
planting grounds in Illinois.
Pursued by militia groups
and the U.S. Army,
Blackhawk and his band retreated
up the Rock River valley,
stopping for a period
in what would become
the Janesville area.
The eventual defeat of Blackhawk
marked the end
of Native American control
of the land.
>> The militia and soldieries
that were pursuing Blackhawk
were coming into land
that, more than likely,
they had not seen before.
And they realized that
this was prairie land,
that it had oak openings,
that it was rich and fertile.
As they went back,
they told about the land
that they had seen,
and that it was good land
what it looked like, you know,
off of it you could make
a good living.
>> Early settlers
crossed the Rock River
at what would become
a local landmark
called "The Big Rock."
>> To the American Indians
who lived in this area
it marked the location of trails
coming from east and west,
north and south,
to a shallow place
in the river.
So, it was a major
crossing point
for the Indian trails.
For the settlers,
it just simply became
the landmark for the county.
And it is after that rock
that the county is named,
Rock County.
>> One of the first to arrive
was a settler from Virginia
named Henry Janes,
who became the founder
of the city of Janesville.
>> "If any of the wah-hoos
of Janesville who have not had
the good or bad fortune
to be acquainted with me,
desire more information,
I can inform them that I am
now in my fifty-second year,
weigh 210 pounds,
stand 6 feet 2 inches
in my socks, and have
rambled with my family over
more of the western country,
and to less purpose,
than any other man in it."
>> He described himself
as kind of a woodsman.
He mentions that he found
this particular area that
he thought was very desirous.
He blazed trees
to locate his claim
and then walked to Green Bay
to certify his claim
with the federal government.
He intended, I think,
to found a town,
because he certainly
he platted out the early village
of Janesville, which he wanted
to call Blackhawk, by the way,
but was turned down by
the United States Postal Service
for that name.
>> Early settlers petitioned
the territorial government
to grant Janes a license
to operate a ferry
across the Rock River.
>> He built a ferry
and charged people to go over.
I believe it was 12 cents,
or something like that,
for a man to cross by ferry,
25 cents for a wagon
with a horse.
The spot that he picked
became the center
ever since that time
of downtown Janesville.
It was a tavern, and was
the central meeting place
for what became
the early village of Janesville.
The first church services
were held there in the tavern.
Interestingly, they said
that the bottles of alcohol
were pushed aside
and the minister
presided over the bar.
He had a wanderlust that
caused him to leave Janesville
within a few years.
>> "On the 28th day
of August, 1839,
I bade adieu to Wisconsin,
and in the fall of '49,
the Pacific Ocean put an end
to my further progress
toward the setting sun.
And as I never varied much
to the north or south,
my wanderings are at an end."
Henry Janes.
>> In the coming decades,
settlers flocked
to the Rock prairie
to plant wheat on some of
the richest farmland
in the world.
>> Initially,
it was all about agriculture.
Of course, that was the great
emphasis for people coming west,
was to acquire their own land,
their own homestead,
>> It started out quite slow,
with just a few families.
And they seemed very scattered,
but when we
start to look at them,
there are many of them,
and they're coming
and they settle.
So really, settlement burgeons
very, very quickly.
Janesville was started
in roughly 1835
with Henry Janes.
But by 1839,
it's a small village
of 800 or 900 people.
By the 1840s, several thousand.
>> Many of Janesville's
earliest homes still stand,
a reminder of those
who provided goods and services
to area farmers, and
who built the first industries
powered by the flow
of the Rock River.
>> It's been a major,
major influence.
At first, it was a barrier
and you had to get across.
Then, as time went on,
it became a source of power
and of energy.
>> In 1844, a dam was built
to harness the power
of the nine-foot drop
of the Rock River.
Flour mills and lumber mills
soon crowded the water power
sites along the river.
Powered by the flowing water,
Janesville soon became a center
for grinding the region's wheat
into flour.
An early landmark in town
was "The Big Mill."
Four stories tall,
it turned out 300 barrels
of flour a day,
until it burned to the ground
in 1872.
>> And it was a large mill.
It was big.
It was a big mill.
(laugh)
And it was an important,
highly important business
in the community.
There are other mills,
saw mills, wood mills,
and planing mills and factories.
There were sash mills
to make window frames
and casings,
all powered with water.
>> In 1853,
Janesville became a city.
By this time,
it had almost 5,000 people.
In addition to its mills,
there were two foundries,
mechanic shops of all kinds,
dry goods, grocery
and hardware stores,
book stores, drug stores,
and several variety stores,
two banks, five hotels,
and three weekly
and one monthly newspaper.
A railroad
had just come to town,
and another was on its way.
But Janesville's early residents
had more than just commerce
on their minds.
>> This part of the state
was populated largely
by what was called
the "Yankee Exodus"
from the northeast,
everything pretty much
from New York northward.
>> Wisconsin is opened up
for settlement
just about the time
that the Erie Canal opens up
in upstate New York.
>> Good land was becoming
a premium in that area.
And so sons,
particularly younger sons,
were kind of being forced
to look for new grounds.
>> People leaving
upstate New York
would take the Erie Canal,
which shortened what had been
a trip of six weeks
to two months, easily, overland
became a trip
of a matter of a couple of weeks
on the Great Lakes by boat.
>> It is true, that in the 1830s
that this area
in upstate New York was known
as the Burned-Over District.
A great deal of religious
revivalism had taken place
in the preceding 20 or 30 years,
and out of that had come a lot
of new ideas regarding how
society should be organized.
>> In upstate New York,
what becomes called
the Burned-Over District
because of the fires
of a passion for reform
that are lit there.
There is this need to say,
It is not enough for us
to ensure that we live
a righteous life.
We, the religious,
live a righteous life,
and we shall therefore
go to heaven.
Instead, you need to
really create a heaven on earth,
where people are not
downtrodden, beaten, enslaved.
You look around and you say,
I am not really
a righteous person
if I have closed my eyes
to the suffering
of those around me.
I shall witness my faith.
I shall look
and see what I can do
to change the way life is.
As they examine it and say,
why is it that some of us
live this good life
and others don't?
And look and say,
well, there's slavery;
there's the lack
of women's rights;
there's the social customs,
which are so injurious
to women and children,
such as rampant alcoholism.
And that gets these people
religiously motivated into
founding the abolition movement
in the 1830s,
the women's movement,
women's rights movement,
from the 1840s on.
>> There was still,
to a much higher degree,
there was still the belief
in the perfectibility of man
and the idea that,
particularly in the west,
which was kind of a tabula rasa,
kind of a blank tablet
on which anything
could be written,
it was a chance to produce
this perfect society.
>> And so, as they moved
further west.
They not only acquired lands
but they brought
these new ideas with them.
>> And increasingly,
more and more reformers
are drawn to Janesville.
>> And they seemed to have
the idea that this might be
the place you could put together
a perfect society.
>> In the 1850s,
William Tallman, who migrated
from the Burned-Over District
of New York,
built one of the largest
and grandest homes in the state.
A home now maintained
as a museum by the Rock County
Historical Society.
>> William Tallman came here
from Rome, New York,
where his family
had been involved
in abolitionist activities.
Very possibly involved in some
Underground Railroad activity.
>> The house in Rome, New York,
was a station
on the Underground Railroad,
taking in escaped slaves,
providing them
with accommodations, food
and whatever they needed,
passage, money, and so forth,
and sending them on their way
within the next few days.
He himself is kind of
representative
of this whole new idea
of coming west,
the new man coming west.
>> He came to this area
as kind of a typical
western entrepreneur.
He got into land speculation.
>> Tallman saw an opportunity
in the lands that were available
in the west.
He thought it was a gamble.
And he came out here,
purchased the land
and almost immediately
upon returning home,
started to advertise it,
and advertised it
not just to make money.
His advertisements
speak about having
"actual settlers" to come.
So, he's part of that
general movement, encouraging
people to come westward
>> He became probably,
I'd say without doubt,
the richest man in Rock Country
in the 1850s.
>> A lot of his money
he plowed back into the building
of "The Finest House
in the Upper Midwest,"
as he said.
You know, a showplace.
>> He used only the best
material at the time.
Milwaukee Cream City Brick,
Italian Marble,
French Polished Mirror Glass.
And he also included
all the modern conveniences
at the time.
As you go through the house,
you'll see that
it has running water.
It has a communication system,
( bells ringing )
central heating,
and indoor privy,
which is a real hit
with the third graders
when they come through to tour.
But if there was any sort of
convenience that was available,
you name it, he put it in.
>> As an active member
of the recently-formed
Republican party,
William Tallman's
most famous houseguest
was an up-and-coming
presidential candidate
named Abraham Lincoln.
>> This is the actual room
where Lincoln slept.
And this is the bed
that he slept in.
>> Lincoln's visit
came at a time when
many in Janesville
were outraged by the efforts
of southern states
to expand slavery
into new, western territories.
>> Well, there was a great deal
of abolitionist sentiment
in Janesville.
As a matter of fact, the area
had a state-wide or area-wide
reputation for being--
They called it a hotbed
of abolitionist activity.
>> Frederick Douglass,
a freed slave and leader
of the abolitionist cause,
spoke twice in Janesville,
each time drawing large crowds.
And Lincoln, an aspiring
presidential candidate,
came to build on
his growing reputation
as an opponent
of the expansion of slavery.
>> Lincoln
was on a speaking tour,
actually invited to speak
at the Wisconsin State Fair
in 1859.
>> The Republican Club of Beloit
found out about this
and issued an invitation to him
to come and speak in Beloit.
But William Tallman
jumped in his buggy
and went to Beloit.
He buttonholed Lincoln and said,
"While you're here, would you
come and speak in Janesville?"
Lincoln, probably
not understanding the rivalry
between the two communities,
consented.
So, when he finished his speech
at Hanset Hall in Beloit,
he got into Mr. Tallman's buggy,
and Mr. Tallman brought him
north to Janesville.
He did make a very, very
positive impression.
His speech did.
His appearance didn't.
And they said that he looked
for all the world like a farmer
dressed up for circus day
in the city.
The Janesville Gazette said
"...his physiognomy
was peculiar."
(laugh)
His voice
was high-pitched and squeaky.
But the power of his arguments
against the spread of slavery
were so logical
and so down-to-earth,
that even the most simple
individual could understand them
and support them.
>> The next year,
Abraham Lincoln
won the election.
But shortly after his
inauguration, southern states
seceded from the union.
The nation, now split in two,
plunged into civil war,
and Janesville's support
for the Republican cause
was put to the test.
>> That political enthusiasm
for Republicanism was also
expressed in the number of men
who stepped forward
very early in the war.
It's always been claimed,
and I've never seen it refuted
that proportionate
to it's population,
Rock County sent more men to
the Union Army in the Civil War
than any other county
in the state.
>> Many of the houses built
in the decades after
the Civil War, show signs
of a new prosperity.
New schools now served
the waves of immigrants:
Irish, Norwegian and German,
and many smaller groups
drawn to Janesville's
growing farm-service economy.
>> This was an area
that was emerging.
It was coming into it's own,
almost like a third-world nation
that is trying to get on it's
feet and establish a viable
economic base.
There was a lot of interest.
And there was a considerable
economic and industrial
development in this area,
particularly related
to railroads.
The railroads came through
Janesville because
the Janesville citizens
raised a great amount of money
to persuade them
to locate railroads here.
>> What it did was open up
markets, the eastern markets,
particularly New York,
Boston and Philadelphia,
all along the eastern seaboard
to bring, wheat and oats
and grains, you know,
through Chicago
to the eastern seaboard.
>> During the Civil War,
Wisconsin farmers
shipped out tons of wheat
to feed the troops.
The high demand
and a labor shortage on the farm
encouraged farmers to start
using machines to speed
the planting, harvesting
and threshing of the grain.
In Janesville,
machine shops began to gear up
to meet the demand.
>> People said, "Well, if we
could manufacture our own
agricultural instruments,
we won't have to rely
on the east."
>> One of the pillars of early
Janesville manufacturing
was the Rock River Iron Works,
which cast these iron columns
for a Main Street building
in 1869.
But the company's main business
was farm implements,
including a reaper
called "The Little Champion."
>> It just bespeaks this diverse
economic situation that we have,
where agriculture is prominent
on one hand, but we have
a strong industrial base
to the economy also.
And they seem to work
hand-in-hand.
>> One of the partners in the
Iron Works was James Harris,
who formed a new company
called Harris Manufacturing
to make reapers, mowers,
and planters.
>> After a fire burned
much of the plant,
the business reorganized,
and became the Janesville
Machine Company,
which eventually grew
into the largest manufacturer
in the city.
After decades
of providing a good living,
wheat-growing ran into trouble.
Soils began to wear out,
and yields fell
with outbreaks of disease
and insects.
Searching for a new crop,
farmers found
that tobacco grew well,
and sold even better.
Tobacco production became
Wisconsin's fastest-growing
farm enterprise,
and tobacco wholesaling
soon became Janesville's
most important
commercial business.
And as farmers began making
the switch to dairy farming,
the Janesville Hay Tool Company
responded by manufacturing
the equipment needed to lift
and move huge stacks of hay
around the barn.
But many in Janesville
felt the city needed
to create new industries
that didn't depend on
the fluctuating farm economy.
>> The building behind me,
the Janesville Cotton Company,
is an example, I think,
of 19th century
attempts at diversification
to stabilize that industry.
They brought cotton up
from the South,
processed it here
and distributed it nationwide.
The building was built
by subscription,
by local Janesville citizens.
Then, in the winter of 1874,
they held a great party
in the building
for all the community to attend
before any of the machinery
for the production of cotton
was installed.
And the newspapers articles
indicate that there were
2,000 people, or more,
who partied away the evening
on the three floors of
the Janesville Cotton Company.
>> While the railroads shipped
Janesville's products out,
retailers could just as easily
bring in products from the east.
On Main Street, shopkeepers
could offer a wider variety
of goods.
At several restaurants,
Janesvillians could take part
in the nation-wide
oyster craze.
At Shurtleff and Hill,
customers could enjoy
both their local ice cream
and fresh oysters
imported from the east.
>> After the Civil War,
many of Janesville's women,
who had kept businesses
and households afloat,
and worked tirelessly
to support the troops,
now worked to continue
a women's rights movement
that began in the 1850s.
>> The rights of women,
the right to vote
was very popular
among ladies in the area.
>> Most of the activists
in Janesville were also
part of the temperance movement,
to control the growing problem
of post-Civil War alcoholism.
>> Temperance
was a very very big issue.
The White Anglo-Saxon Protestant
emphasis of the New Englanders
was countered
by the Catholic "Wets"
as they were called, the Irish
and Germans who valued
their alcoholic beverages.
A great many illegal saloons
were operating on Sunday
and that was a cause
of great consternation.
>> Interestingly, in Janesville,
I think we see the beginning
of what becomes
a nationwide movement.
There is a Janesville
group of women in 1873,
who are furious.
And they march,
literally march on City Hall,
down the streets of Janesville,
women didn't do this
sort of thing,
and demand that these aldermen
who had been elected
promising to limit
the number of tavern licenses
will live up to that promise.
Instead they got in office,
and who cares, women can't vote,
can't hurt the aldermen,
started granting licenses
right and left.
And this is the first
women's temperance crusade,
actually, that I find.
>> Lavinia Goodell,
who would go on to become
Wisconsin's first woman lawyer,
organized the demonstration,
and wrote about it in local
and national women's newspapers
>> I think that's how
it gets picked up nationwide.
Women are becoming aware of
what the Janesville women did,
why they did it, and
more important, how they did it.
This is how you do a petition.
This is how you call a meeting.
These are things that women
are not conversant with
at the time.
They are not
supposed to know these things.
In late 1873,
and most of 1874,
in every state,
in every territory, more than
150,000 women nationwide,
are marching down streets
with petitions
they've gotten women to sign.
They are singing hymns
outside taverns.
They are doing all things
that Lavinia Goodell
and her group did in Janesville.
So, this women's temperance
crusade sweeps the country,
effects a lot of change,
empowers a lot of women.
And in 1874,
they have a convention,
as the crusade is winding down.
They say, we have to continue
this work, and joined together
and found the Women's
Christian Temperance Union,
as we've called it ever since,
the WCTU.
>> Within five years, the WCTU
elected Frances Willard,
a former Janesville Resident,
to head the national
organization.
>> Under Frances Willard,
first of all, the organization
grows phenomenally.
It becomes international.
It becomes the largest women's
organization in the world.
She was born
in upstate New York,
in the area that was called
the Burned-Over District.
But when she was six or seven,
in 1846, her family took up
a farm about four miles
from Janesville.
>> As a strong-willed young
girl, Frances Willard complained
that she was not allowed
to do the same things
as her older brother.
>> And she and her sister
wanted to go to school just like
he did.
And so she really begged
to go to school.
The father finally broke down
and built the little
schoolhouse.
>> The Willard Schoolhouse
is now preserved
on the Rock County Fairgrounds,
where hundreds of school
children can take a trip
back in time.
>> The teachers who had been
interested in the history
of the little school and
Frances Willard got together.
And they decided
that they would invite
the third graders
at the end of their unit
on local history to come in
and spend half a day,
and go through lessons
the way the children did,
153 years ago.
>> Frances Willard went on
with her schooling, eventually
becoming Dean of Women
at Northwestern University.
It was there she made
the crucial decision
to devote the rest of her life
to the temperance movement.
>> And it changes the temperance
movement forever.
It changes the course of women's
history, and therefore this
nation's history forever,
because of her incredible skills
as a speaker, as a writer,
as a thinker, as a philosopher.
>> Over the years, Willard
expanded the temperance movement
to include the larger issues
of women's rights.
>> Frances Willard brings them
together.
If you became part of the WCTU,
you got increasing information
that showed you that, mainly,
women were not going to be able
to affect changes and laws,
until they had a voice
in the legal structure
of this country,
until they could vote.
>> In 2005, there was
a celebration in Janesville,
as the General Motors plant
rolled out its 16 millionth
vehicle.
A special auto show
of Janesville-made cars included
the first one made here,
a 1923 Chevrolet,
and samples of other models
over the years.
The history of Janesville's
is rooted deeply
in its agricultural past.
At the Rock River Thresheree
held each year
north of Janesville
visitors can view the vintage
tractors and other machinery
that once revolutionized
farm life.
General Motors was first drawn
to the area because of
the Janesville Machine Company,
a farm implement maker and
the city's largest manufacturer.
>> Janesville Machine Company
starts out in the late 1850s,
manufacturing reaping
and grain harvesting equipment.
Janesville gets into building
tillage equipment, planters,
plows, disks.
In plow competitions
at that time, Janesville
usually did very well.
It was really a quality
line of equipment.
>> Billy Durant, who had created
General Motors by buying up
smaller car companies,
was again on a buying spree.
During World War I, he decided
to get into the tractor business
to compete with his rival,
Henry Ford, who had great
success supplying tractors
to Britain.
>> World War I has really
shut down a lot of production
of civilian goods.
Steel is allocated
towards weapons.
You have to build
the battleships, the destroyers,
the ships
to keep feeding Britain.
The car business isn't so good.
But, Britain is starving.
Tractors are something you can
have all the steel you want for.
In 1917, 1916 the tractor market
exploded as you got
these small tractors
that most farmers could afford.
The technology finally
got to the point where it was
worthwhile to build them.
So, what happens in that
time frame is that you get
hundreds and hundreds
of companies getting into
the tractor business.
You have everybody from
some inventors in a garage
up to General Motors,
Ford Motor Company,
Allis Chalmers.
It was really a boom market.
>> Durant purchased
the Samson Tractor Company
in California for GM, and was
looking for an implement maker
to go with it.
Joseph A. Craig,
president of the
Janesville Machine Company,
found out that Durant also
wanted to move the tractor plant
to a Midwestern location.
Craig had risen through
the ranks at the Janesville
Machine Company from being
an outstanding salesman
to president of the company.
Craig somehow became aquatinted
with Durant.
And it is my understanding
that Craig persuaded him
that Janesville would be
an ideal location.
It had railroads, it had
the Janesville Machine Company,
it had a well-trained workforce.
And Durant built a new plant
for the production
of the Samson Tractor Company
and went into business.
>> He has some General Motors
engineers design the Samson
Type M here.
It's a state-of-the-art tractor
for the time,
maybe even a little bit better.
It's got a generator.
It's got a starter,
which for that time
were pretty novel stuff
for a tractor company.
That way, you could start
the tractor easier.
You didn't break your arm
cranking the tractor,
which was actually a danger.
It's actually a pretty good
quality tractor.
>> Samson also made a truck,
and a smaller tractor
called the "Iron Horse."
>> What Samson does is
a little bit different, though.
They decide to go with
a four-wheel-drive tractor.
They make it a rein drive,
with the reins
being held by the hand.
With the rein-drive tractors,
if you just let them loose,
your tractor would go forward.
You could pull back one
to go in that direction.
You could pull back harder,
the whole thing
would spin in place.
If you pulled back
both reins at once,
the tractor would reverse.
It was really
a fast control system.
It also worked well
with horse-drawn implements
because you could sit back
in a horse-drawn implement
and just have those
nice long reins,
just like you did with horses.
>> Just as Samson was struggling
to establish its position
in the tractor market,
World War I ended.
What followed
was a post-war depression.
>> Farm prices crash hard.
The tractor industry
becomes a bloodbath.
Nobody was buying.
You had those hundreds
of companies that got into
the business in 1916-17-18,
now they're going bankrupt
and getting back out
of the business.
General Motors is losing
so much money.
So, that's why Samson
gets basically liquidated.
The plant in Janesville
was a modern plant.
It was very well-built
by J.P. Cullen
out of Janesville.
A local company built it.
In 1923, as Samson
is going out of business,
the car industry
starts picking up business.
You've got the Roaring '20s
rolling.
So, General Motors
took that nice new plant,
started building Chevrolet
cars and trucks in it.
>> The first woman to sell
a million copies of a song
was another trailblazer
from Janesville
named Carrie Jacobs-Bond.
Born in 1862, on a farm
just outside of town,
she showed an early gift
for music.
>> She was a child prodigy.
From a very young age,
it was reported that she could
hear a tune once and pick it out
even at a pre-school age.
>> A touring musician came
to town named Blind Tom, who
astounded a Janesville audience
by instantly memorizing
any piece of music he heard.
When he finished, someone
prodded a young Carrie Jacobs
to go up to the piano.
>> She was trotted up
from the audience and performed.
Blind Tom played a tune
and she played it back,
much to the amazement
of everyone.
>> She had not only musical
ability, but she had
what used to be called
"a way with words."
>> After a failed early
marriage, and with few
musical opportunities,
Carrie Jacobs moved with her son
to the upper peninsula of
Michigan with her new husband,
Dr. Frank Bond.
Dr. Bond was a physician
in this iron mining community
of Iron River.
And in the 1890s, there was
a huge financial collapse
and the iron mines closed,
which left him penniless.
>> One winter night, Dr. Bond
took a fall on the ice,
and was badly injured.
When he died five days later,
Carrie Jacobs-Bond found herself
alone with her son,
and only her childhood dream
of becoming a songwriter
to support them.
>> She was 35, he was 12.
And that's when she moved
to Chicago.
>> Jacobs-Bond spent the next
seven years in poverty,
selling off her furniture,
living in one heated room,
eating only one meal a day.
Battling poor health,
she eked out a living
painting china,
while the pain and tragedy
of her life came pouring out
in song.
* All the time
* of feeling blue...
>> She wrote very
sentimental music,
some of it just oozes sentiment.
But this was a period
of sentimentality
>> She was a composer
of poem songs,
a composer of heart songs.
So many of her early songs
are indeed reminiscence
of that loss and that sadness
that permeated her life
at that time.
>> At that time,
music stores in Janesville,
like those in almost every city,
sold pianos, organs
and sheet music to customers
who made their own music.
>> Of Course, there was no
phonograph, per se.
There was no radio.
There was no TV.
Music making was primarily
a domestic activity,
it was in the home.
>> Peddling sheet music
was really a big business,
and it was a really serious
business.
>> Carrie made the tour
and the rounds
of all the publishers
trying to get them interested
in her songs, and soon realized,
if she was going to be
successful as a publisher
and get her songs out there,
she would have to do it herself.
>> Setting up something
she called The Bond Shop
in her apartment,
she sold her sheet music
and painted china, and
continued to promote her songs.
>> She was very persistent.
>> As much as she portrayed
this poor widow,
voice full of tears persona,
there was a rod of steel
through her.
>> A big break came
when she approached
Jesse Bartlett Davis, the star
of the Boston Opera Company,
who agreed to help her publish
a book called, Seven Songs.
* I love you truly
* Truly dear...
>> Sales of one of the songs,
"I Love You Truly"
began to take off.
And its popularity
as a wedding song would continue
for the next 100 years.
As her songs started to sell,
Jacobs-Bond
began touring the country.
A sunset in California
inspired her to write
her biggest-selling song.
* When you come to the end
* Of a perfect day...
>> For whatever reason, it
struck a chord with the public.
"End of a Perfect Day"
sold 25 million copies.
An extraordinary amount
for that time.
The American success story.
Pull yourself up
by the bootstraps,
succeed against all odds.
To do it as a woman,
even more remarkable.
* Truly dear...
>> In the 1880s, at the
Valentine Telegraph School
in Janesville,
a teacher named George Parker
sold pens to his telegraphy
students, but found that
he spent a lot of time
repairing them.
>> Fountain pens were
not exactly reliable
>> We'll have to
postpone our business,
the ink has dried up.
>> He went out and
bought some hand tools
and started experimenting
with ways to improve
their reliability.
He had some pens made
that incorporated
his design improvements.
And that was the beginning
of Parker Pens.
>> Parker called his new
ink feeding system
the "Lucky Curve."
As sales slowly built,
the company moved into
the upper floor of a downtown
Janesville building,
and Parker expanded
his own pen-making operation.
>> Back in those days,
the primary material
for fountain pens
was hard rubber.
And it was a very simple,
relatively speaking, process
to carve it by lathe,
maybe by hand,
and decorate it
and make it more unique.
>> As his pens developed a good
reputation across the country,
George Parker began to mix
business with pleasure,
fulfilling his childhood dream
of traveling the world,
while at the same time
opening up new markets.
>> Whenever he traveled
anywhere, whether it was
Egypt or China,
he always traveled with
a large supply of Parker Pens.
>> With the coming of WWI,
the War Department
awarded Parker a contract
for a pen to be used
by soldiers in the field,
known as the "Trench Pen."
>> He had little pills made.
Ink pills.
So you'd put the pill
in the reservoir,
and then fill it full of water.
And the water and pill would mix
and you would have ink.
And then he advertised that,
and that became very popular.
And it introduced the name
to a lot of people.
>> After the war, both of
Parker's sons became involved
in the company's management.
George groomed his oldest son,
Russell, to take over for him,
while his second son, Kenneth,
a former WWI aviator,
took charge
of the advertising department.
With sales passing $1 million
in 1918, Parker designed
a modern office
and manufacturing center
built in downtown Janesville.
And the company would remain
one of the city's largest
employers for the next 70 years.
At a time when most
fountain pens were black,
his sons convinced a reluctant
George Parker to release
their new Duofold pen
in a way that seemed outrageous
at the time.
>> Kenneth Parker
came up with an idea
for a bright mandarin red,
thick pen.
And it was totally different
from the rest of the market.
And his father said, "You're
crazy, that'll never sell."
It sold very well,
very well.
It was large.
It was in your face large.
But I believe in perfect sync
with the times.
It was flamboyant.
And the '20s were nothing
if they were not flamboyant.
It was also somewhat expensive.
And this seemed to have
the effect of making it
more desirable.
So the Duofold
was really the pen
that put Parker Pen on the map.
>> The pen that put
Parker on the world map
also put Janesville, Wisconsin
there with it.
>> There are really two names
imprinted on the side
of the pen.
The Parker name is there,
of course,
but Janesville is there, too.
It showed that George
was proud of his home.
It showed that he was proud
of the craftsmanship
and the quality
that was built into those pens.
>> In the 1930s, Parker
introduced another new pen,
the "Vacumatic,"
which featured a distinctive
arrow clip,
that remains the symbol
of Parker Pens to this day.
The pen proved to be
yet another peak
in George Parker's long career
as the world's leading
pen maker.
As he looked forward
to retirement, however,
his world began to unravel.
>> George's eldest son, Russell,
died very suddenly
in January of 1933.
It's easy for me to imagine
why George would have been
just crushed.
>> A deeply-saddened
George Parker soon withdrew
from the business
that bore his name,
and four years later, he died.
The company was now in the
hands of Kenneth Parker,
the risk-taking aviator,
who began a project
to completely redesign
the fountain pen,
from the chemistry of the ink
to the point of the nib.
>> That pen was to become
the "Parker 51."
It's considered to be,
in all likelihood,
the best fountain pen ever made.
>> At first, the sales of the 51
were slowed by World War II,
as the Parker plant retooled
to produce bomb fuses,
winning three of the military's
"E Awards" for excellence.
But Parker Pens
also held the distinction
of ending the war,
as General Eisenhower
sent two of his Parker 51s
to be used signing
the German surrender papers.
>> Victory,
with the pens of peace.
>> In the Pacific,
General MacArthur
signed the Japanese surrender
using his 20-year-old Duofold.
>> With the end of World War II
the Parker 51 exploded
in terms of sales.
Production was non-stop.
It was truly remarkable.
>> In 1947, Parker Pen
sponsored a parade to celebrate
international trade,
which eventually would account
for two-thirds of its sales.
In the 1950s,
the advent of carbon copies
had even the Janesville police
switching to a new kind
of writing instrument,
the Jotter ballpoint.
* Get the Jotter
* Made by Parker
* With the T-Ball
Where else can you buy
so much pen for $1.98?
And it's a Parker.
>> Today, at Janesville's
Rotary Gardens,
there's a memorial
to the Parker Pen Company,
which was sold during
the leveraged buyouts
of the 1980s.
>> This is the arch that
surrounded the front entrance
to Parker Pen's Court Street
offices and factory.
A lot of people
have passed under this arch,
employees, visitors
from all over the world.
And all of them
had something to do
with Parker Pen's success.
It's terrific that this arch
was preserved
so that other people
who walked through those doors
can come back here
and remember those times.
>> The arrival
of General Motors in 1918
was the first of several
watershed events
that would transform
the city of Janesville.
>> There's just a whole new
outlook on how things,
how the community itself
should operate.
>> The next year,
the Chamber of Commerce
brought noted city planner
John Nolen to Janesville.
>> Nolen brought an idea,
and it concerned the use
of the Rock River.
It was kind of the back door
of the community.
And Nolen said,
"Let's turn that around.
Let's make the river the focal
point of the community.
And let's develop parklands
for the citizens who live here."
>> Over time, thousands of acres
of parkland helped fill in
the Nolen plan.
And eventually, Janesville
became known
as "The City of Parks."
In 1920, women won the right
to vote in national elections.
In their first city elections,
Janesville's women
made an immediate impact,
pushing through a referendum
to build a state-of-the-art,
million-dollar high school.
Next, Janesville's women,
long dissatisfied with
the inefficient city government,
petitioned
for another referendum,
this time
to scrap the whole system.
>> There was this new idea
of someone who would
manage the city,
a city manager
form of government.
>> Henry Traxler, hired
as the first City Manager,
would guide Janesville
for the next 27 years with
a frugal, yet progressive hand.
Paying as he went, he developed
parks and paved roads;
began snow removal
and trash collection;
and replaced men and brooms
with street sweepers.
In 1937, workers
in Flint, Michigan, occupied
a Fischer Body Plant, and
the sit-down strike soon spread
to GM plants nationwide.
>> I pulled a switch
that ran the line,
and that stopped the line.
>> Like workers at other
GM plants, Janesville workers
had no control over the speed
of the assembly line.
Also at issue were low wages,
and harsh working conditions,
such as those endured
by Fischer Body workers,
called "tack spitters,"
who nailed insulation
to wooden frames
while holding the tacks
in their mouths.
>> That was un-human almost.
You put a handful of that
in your mouth
and then spit them out.
I have one tooth
that's wore off from that.
>> In Flint, police tried to
stop the delivery of food
to strikers in the plant,
resulting in
violent confrontations.
But in Janesville,
City Manager Traxler
negotiated a deal.
The company agreed to shut down
if the strikers
would leave the plant.
>> The Chief of Police
at that time came down
and said, "There is going to be
no blood shed in Janesville.
We're going to do this
peacefully."
>> The Janesville strikers
wouldn't return
until GM finally recognized
the United Auto Workers Union,
setting the stage
for better working conditions,
and wage increases that
helped fuel a post-World War II
economic boom.
* See the USA
* In your Chevrolet
* America's asking you to call
* Drive your Chevrolet
* Through the USA...
>> The boom times and new roads
drastically altered
the way Janesville grew,
as many retail businesses
left the downtown
for more wide-open spaces.
Now, the Interstate
has replaced the river
and the railroads
as a driver
of Janesville's commerce.
But the downtown area
still remains
the city's cultural center.
And there are many efforts to
restore its links to the past.
The historic Janesville Armory
underwent extensive renovation,
creating new restaurants,
and a dinner theater.
A new Performing Arts Center
turned the old high school
auditorium, once again,
into a state-of-the-art
facility.
These and other ventures
are bringing people back
to the place where it all began,
back to the heart of the city
of Janesville.
Bliss Communications,
the Janesville Gazette
GazetteXtra.com
and radio stations
WCLO-AM and WJVL-FM,
providing southern Wisconsin
with local and regional news,
entertainment and shopping
information since 1845.
The Alliant Energy Foundation,
supporting cultural
and educational programs,
and funding projects that
improve the quality of life
in Wisconsin
and the upper Midwest.
Alliant Energy Foundation,
available on the Web.
Additional funding provided
by J.P. Cullen and Sons, Inc.,
general contractor,
serving Janesville
and surrounding communities
since 1892.