GAMBLING IN GRANT COUNTY WISCONSIN

      

Gambling in Grant County

"Reports were made to the district attorney in this city last week that several gambling dens were running wide open in Platteville.  Arrangements were immediately made by Under-sheriff Harcleroad and deputy, Kidd, to apprehend the wrong-doers.  On arriving at Platteville and the alleged "dens" were "spotted" and entered it was discovered that someone had tipped the gamblers and they had disappeared with all the "valuable" paraphernalia needed in such business... The supposition is entertained that the ministers who were behind the attempt to arrest the gamblers were too active and their appearances here in Lancaster made friends of the gamblers take notice of unusual proceedings and the Platteville parties were thus informed.”                          - -----Dubuque Telegraph Herald, September 12, 1909

 Gambling has always been a problem in Grant County.  Small taverns on back roads have often been the home of gambling machines and the devils lair that emptied working men's pockets before their wages got home to buy the children's food.  In early mining days “gambling dens” hosted such worthies as Patch Eye John, Bloody Kentuck and Bullet Neck Green who played poker and “old sledge.” Recently I have begun systematically searching the records of county Justice's of the Peace.  It is a sad record for the years spanning 1930 to 1956, and gambling is a part of that story.  Cases that appear to be a complaint of non support, disorderly conduct, or nonpayment of debts, if viewed from a higher vantage may well bear the shadow of ruinous gambling and intoxication.   

     Slot machines were common in Grant County in the 30’s, 40’s, and 50’s.  So were stories of law enforcement officers looking the other way when Bingo, raffles, lotteries, payoff pinball machines, punchboards, and slot machines popped up in churches, American Legion Halls, public bars, and hidden gambling dens.  In December of 1929 District Attorney Manfred S. Block published in various local newspapers direct warnings against the use of gambling machines, and other sorts of gambling, including "poultry raffles."  In 1935 Attorney General James E. Finnegan pointedly advised that "pin ball or whiffle ball machines which pay off in cash or in tokens (were) gambling devices and beyond the pale of the law."  These machines were "in wide use" throughout the county.  They could be found in pool halls, taverns, hotel lobbies, and even candy stores. 

     Gambling machines were a problem in other areas of the State also, particularly in the northern resorts.  The resort owners resisted, openly keeping the machines and resisting the enforcement efforts of state agents.  They believed gambling was economically necessary to draw tourists and to keep the bottom line positive.  No doubt Grant County owners of drinking and gambling establishments felt the same.  After tougher laws were passed in 1945, the Vilas County News-Review wrote an editorial saying "Let's Secede."  They said the "little fellows" would be driven out of the gambling business and "a few will become richer and more powerful and more dangerous."  Thus the involvement of criminal syndicates was conceded.

     Then there were the punchboards.  These were boards with holes that, for a price, a customer could punch through with a stick or other instrument.  Inside he found a piece of paper either showing the amount won, or words such as "try again."  These punchboards were the precursor of today’s scratch off lottery tickets.  At right is a punchboard showing advertising for the Potosi Brewing Company. 

     Gambling and moonshine went hand in glove during the prohibition years.  No doubt the slot machines were distributed by underworld syndicates.  In March of 1943, after returning from a three week vacation, Sheriff Aloys Klaas, who succeeded Joe Greer, returned to find about 100 new slot machines in operation throughout the county.  When he started removing them, he said, he was offered a bribe of $400.00 per month if he would turn his head and permit their operation.  He reported this to Governor Walter Goodland, who called Sheriff Klaas and Grant County District Attorney John E. Grindell to a meeting in Madison with, Milwaukee County District Attorney James Kerwin, and Deputy Attorney General J. Ward Rector. In September of 1943 Goodland ordered Grindell to resign or face suspension.  Grindell resigned. The specific reasons for the governor’s demand were not revealed.

     Sheriff Klaas, D.A. Grindell, and Gov. Goodland                           Milwaukee Journal Page one September 2, 1943

     Little was resolved.  In 1941 Congress passed a tax on "coin operated amusement devices" regardless of the state laws which limited or outlawed them.  In 1942, the IRS reported that 238,000 pinball and slot machines were in operation, and Wisconsin was number one in the number of slot machines registered with 7,247. 

       Gambling machines and punchcards kept creeping back into the Taverns of Grant County.  Legion halls and churches kept having lotteries, bingo games, and raffles.  In February of 1956, after a deputy sheriff was fired, Sheriff Robert Seemeyer (at right with his wife) was accused of, among other things, ignoring gambling activities, including bingo games and dice played at the annual Labor Day celebration of the Holy Ghost Church in Dickeyville (which is still held) and at a veterans rally.  Retired judge A. W. Kopp was selected to head an investigation of the accusations leveled against the sheriff.  He selected Leary Peterson of Prairie Du Chien to pursue the allegations and question witnesses at an investigative hearing.  A sheriff’s deputy who directed traffic at the Dickeyville event denied seeing bingo games in progress. Peterson went so far as to call Rev. Joseph C. Niglis of Holy Ghost Parrish to testify.  He freely admitted that bingo, which he called “homer” was played, but denied being promised immunity from prosecution by the sheriff.  Failing to find specific wrongdoing, Governor Kohler dismissed the charges against Sheriff Seemeyer.  That was not the end of the matter.

     In July of 1956 the gambling issue was again in the news.   The editor of the Grant County Independent, Norman Clap, who was seeking the Democratic congressional nomination for 3rd district, ran a story alleging that gambling activities had occurred at the American Legion Fourth of July picnic and at the Catholic parish in Kieler.  This injected the scent of politics into the whole business.  Sheriff Seemeyer was once again accused of ignoring gambling activities while he was at Hazel Green on July 4^th directing traffic.  He was quoted as saying “I was at Hazel Green to take care of traffic.  I wasn’t looking for anything else.”  He was also quoted as saying “I’m not so sure it’s up to me to enforce the antigambling laws.”

     Religion was also a factor.  Methodists and other Protestant denominations had long been opposed to any form of gambling, and advocated strongly for its eradication.   In 1954 the Protestant Grant County Fellowship of Churches pronounced “firm and active support to any and all law enforcement agencies striving to eradicate the evil within the county.”  In the spring of 1956 they sent a letter to all Grant county papers warning “We have heard of gambling by some public schools and other organizations.”  Catholic churches, on the other hand, used parish activities which included what they considered harmless games of bingo as fund raising tools.

      With the Independent coverage, District Attorney Mark Hoskins launched a John Doe hearing and eventually filed charges against 16 persons.  He was required to do so by the harsh anti-gambling laws of 1945.  Failure to pursue such allegations could lead to the District Attorney’s removal by the governor.  The individuals charged were fined an average of $35.00 apiece plus costs and released. 

    In the intervening years the law has been relaxed greatly to allow for the kinds of raffles, lotteries, and bingo games we are all familiar with.  Gambling has been expanded to the rivers and reservations all over this country, and even the state runs a lottery and advertises it widely.  Are we better off with widespread legalized gambling?  There have been articles in various papers over the years of families’ bankrupt and ruined men committing suicide.  The state that profits by it all devotes very little to the treatment of gambling addiction.

OMER KOOPMAN, KING OF THE CORN HUSKERS

Omer Koopman AND the era of CORN HUSKING CONTESTS

     It was called the most grueling sport in the world, and in the mid 1930’s it was also the fastest growing.  It drew crowds bigger than any football game, up to 160,000 rabid fans flocked to the contests from all over the country.  The event was held in a cornfield, and fans braved rain, snow, mud, and gigantic traffic jams to be there.  It was the national corn husking contest, and farmers from states all across the Corn Belt came to compete for a silver cup and as little as  $100.00 in prize money.

     It is hard to believe that a competition carried on in a cornfield in the middle of nowhere could receive much coverage, but newspaper reporters from all over the country came, and the huskers received front page coverage.  Congressmen and Governors came to shake hands and witness the spectacle.  Movie newsreel crews filmed the contests for those who could not come, and radio stations broadcast live from the field - literally.  America of the 1920's and 30's was a different place than it is now.  One quarter of all Americans lived on farms. Many more had grown up on farms, or had family members farming.  The romance and heritage of the land was still in the nation’s heart.

     The concept of organized national corn husking (also called shucking or picking) contests came from Henry A. Wallace in 1922.  Wallace, who was to become Secretary of Agriculture and Vice President of the United States under President Roosevelt, believed that these sorts of events would boost rural morale, The 20’s and 30’s were tough years for the farmer.  Prices were depressed and dust storms and drought gnawed at the spirit.  The Husking Competitions harked back to a simpler era, where men more than machines did the work, and your strength and determination had more to do with success than Markets and bankers.

     The first national contest was held in 1924.  Attendance rose steadily.  In 1930 30,000 witnessed the event.  By 1936 140,000 attended the National Corn Husking Championship competition in Licking, Ohio.  Wisconsin farmers came to the contest late.  There had been county husking competitions in Wisconsin, but no state championship event until 1936.  It wasn't until 1937 that Wisconsin counties held runoff competitions for the right to send huskers to the state competition, from which the top two place winners would qualify for the national championship. 

 

     The task in these competitions was to walk alongside a wagon with a “backboard” to stop the flying ears, and for 80 minutes pick ears off the stalks or the ground, husk them, and throw the ears against the backboard and into the wagon.  The bang, bang, bang of the hard ears hitting the backboard gave fans an idea of the speed of the competitors.  The average farmer could husk about 300 ears in 80 minutes, but the best of the competitors at the national contest could shuck as many as 2400 ears in 80 minutes (57 cubic feet).  Some attained a pace of 50 ears a minute for periods.  The four step process was to “pull, break, twist, and throw.”  A husking peg or hooked glove was used to assist in ripping the husks open.  The husker grabbed the ear, hooked it open with astounding speed, rolled off the husk and silk, broke off the ear from the stalk, and in the same motion tossed the ear against the backboard without looking.  To maximize his efficiency, the husker had to see the ears paces ahead and make the shortest and most rapid moves possible to the un-husked ears, without missing any.   Deductions were made for husks found in the corn wagon and ears missed in the field.  This required a level of speed, strength, and stamina that would have tested the best athletes in any sport.  The process often left the huskers hands bruised and bleeding, even though huskers hands often had calluses as large as a quarter.

     Omer Koopman of rural Patch Grove, and Lawrence Hauk of Cassville were the best in Grant County, and among the best in the state.  Koopman, referred to in the press as “one hundred and sixty pounds of greased lightning” won the Wisconsin Corn husking championship in 1937, and went to the national championship competition at Marshall Missouri with Dick Post the second place finisher.  Koopman was only 19 years old.  They finished near the bottom of the pack, competing with men who had had the advantage of competing against the nations best for many years.  In 1938, Koopman did not even qualify for the State contest, finishing fifth in the Grant County contest.  Hauk placed second in 1938 and went to the national championship, also known as the “Battle of the Bangboards” or the “Nubbin Derby”.  Newsreel films of the 1937 and 1938 national championship contests are available for viewing on YouTube and Omer Koopman may be seen in the 1937 film competing for the national crown.  Koopman was not finished after his poor showing in 1938.  

     Others who competed in Grant County contests were:  Dale Andrew, Clifton; Ernest Butson, Platteville; Burnell Egan, Cuba City; Earl Fuller, Bagley; Eugene Hampton, Cassville; Paul Hampton, Bloomington; Alfred Johl, Bloomington; Elmer Kaiser, Cuba City; John Kohout, Castle Rosk; Ligs Louthain, Potosi; Eugene VanNatta, Lancaster; Norbert Reiser, Glen Haven; Stanley Walker, Fennimore; Dallas Wepking, Lancaster; and Orval Wilkinson, Mt. Hope.

     The contest winners were looked up to like any other sports star.  The November 3, 1940 Wisconsin State Journal carried the news that Omer C. Koopman of Patch Grove, the 1940 state corn husking champion, had applied for a marriage license in Crawford county.  He was to marry Margaret M. O’Shaughnessy of Seneca.  County Clerk Lester Daugherty had leaked the news.  They were married on November 6, 1940 and remained married for the next 69 years, until Omer’s death on March 22, 2010, at the age of 91.      In 1939, the Bartel Rasque farm near Cuba City hosted the state corn husking contest, and between twenty and twenty-five thousand spectators came to watch.  The County Agent, W. C. Voskuil organized the committee’s and volunteers needed to run this massive event.  An admission charge of ten cents a car was charged for the county husking contest.  I have not been able to determine the admission cost for the state contest, but total receipts for the Cuba City event were listed as $785.00, so many must have snuck in.

     In 1940 the State Corn Husking Contest was held on the O. W. Gutknecht and son farm 11 miles east of Richland Center, Wisconsin.  Omer Koopman was the winner.  In 1941 it was a third championship for Koopman, and that was the end of it.  When the war started in December 1941 the national competitions were suspended for the duration of the war.  When the war was over the competitions didn’t start again.  It wasn’t until 1975 that another national championship was held, but it was in all ways a weak imitation of the massive events of the pre-war years.

    The last corn husking competition I could find occurring in Grant County was in 1944.  This was privately sponsored by the Pride Hybrid Seed Company of Glen Haven and was held on the Carl Forck farm near North Andover.  Among a field of entrants from several states, Lawrence Hauk finished second, and Omer Koopman, who was fighting an illness, finished fourth.