The Fort Atkinson-Eli Pierce Chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR) last Saturday marked its 125th anniversary with a reception, according to information released by the group. 

The Fort Atkinson-Eli Pierce DAR Chapter includes members from Fort Atkinson, Whitewater and the broader area, including, Watertown, Lake Mills, Jefferson, Milton, and Janesville, among other communities.

The Fort Atkinson chapter was organized in 1899, and, according to an earlier press release, was “one of the earliest and largest chapters in Wisconsin for many years.”

The Eli Pierce Chapter was founded in Whitewater in 1941. The two chapters merged in 1992.

Eli Pierce, for whom the Whitewater chapter was named, served during the American Revolutionary War, according to findagrave.com, as a private in the Rhode Island minutemen under Capt. Brownwell, and with the Massachusetts line under Col. Lippett, Col. Thomas Marshall and Capt. Amasa Sopper.

Last Saturday’s event was held at the Hoard Historical Museum in Fort Atkinson. 

According to the release, the local women’s organization has been involved with “promoting patriotism, founding a museum, and rescuing a rare national landmark from destruction.” 

During the event, chapter Regent Nancy Olson welcomed the group’s members and guests. Counted among them were: DAR Honorary State Regent Brenda Majewski, Milwaukee Chapter; Regent Nanci Tibbetts, John Bell Chapter, Madison; Regent Patricia Vollbrecht, Milwaukee Chapter; Marlene Lippert, Sue Tenhover and Regent Mary Parker, all of the Gov. Nelson Dewey Chapter, Madison; Regent Elizabeth Albea and Recording Secretary Vivian Albea, both of the Oconomowoc Chapter; state Rep. Scott Johnson, 33rd Assembly District, and Amanda Fuerst, senior field representative for U.S. Rep. Scott Fitzgerald, 5th Congressional District.

According to the release, Lippert brought a certificate given to her grandmother, Effie May Gleason Banks, when she joined the Fort Atkinson chapter in April of 1920.

“She started her search (for her American Revolution veteran ancestor) in the early 1900s. She came in on the Benjamin Butterfield line,” Lippert, past regent of the Governor Nelson Dewey Chapter, was quoted as saying in the release. 

Additionally, within the release, a history of the group was shared by past Regent Jane Fary, who, the release reported, has been a member of the Fort Atkinson-Eli Pierce Chapter for three decades.

Some history 

The history, as recounted within the release by Fary, follows: 

She noted that it was organized on Oct. 11, 1890, during the final term of U.S. Rep. Lucien B. Caswell of Fort Atkinson. He assisted the National Society of DAR in preparing the charter and submitting it to Congress for approval.

“Isabel Caswell Cole (his daughter) then helped organize the Fort Atkinson Chapter on Feb. 22, 1899, at the Caswell residence as one of 17 charter members: Mabel Stair Bingham, Mary Pratt Bright, organizing regent Anna

Rogers Caswell, Samaria Bartholomew Clapp, Isabel Caswell Cole, Florence Chambers Dexheimer, Jeanette Guile Greene, Luella West Hoard, Nellie Clapp Hopkins, Frances Cole Jones, Elva Davis Ogden, May Caswell Perry, Sarah Hall Pratt, Amelia Jones Rankin, May Bartholomew Rogers, Grace Rogers, and Lillian Stair Schreiner,” Fary said.

The chapter was active from early on.

It was in June of 1903 that members first discussed plans to preserve the panther intaglio on the Riverside Drive farm of George D. Telfer on Riverside Drive, Fary noted. It is the only known surviving intaglio effigy reverse mound in the United States.

“His granddaughter, Juanita Telfer Heinz, a chapter member for 73 years, often told the story of how her father, Frank, ploughed part of the panther’s tail,” Fary said. “In April 1905, Mr. Telfer agreed to a three-year lease at no charge, with the chapter to pay only $5 per year for mowing.”

However, purchasing the intaglio became the only way to save it permanently, and in 1916, the DAR chapter donated $50, raised another $200 from private individuals and received $300 from the city council to do just that.

“The dedication ceremony took place on June 5, 1920. About 2,000 people, including notable archeologists and historians, enjoyed a spectacular Indian pageant on the Rock River. The Honorable Charles B. Rogers gave the beautiful and moving ‘Indian oration’ as Great Chief Many Thunders, explaining the construction and history of the intaglio,” according to the history read by Fary.

Also in 1905, Luella West Hoard assisted Mrs. Edward Rankin and Mrs. May Perry in identifying what they believed was the approximate site of the original Fort Koshkonong stockade along East Milwaukee Avenue.  Two years later, the chapter erected a historical marker at cost of $137.32 that reads, in part: “Near this spot, General Atkinson built a stockade in the Blackhawk War of 1832.”

Fary said that the dedication of the memorial took place on June 1, 1907, on the lawn of the Eli P. May house and featured music by the Creamery City Band and speeches by Ex-Regent Elva Davis Ogden, Mayor Arthur R. Hoard, L.B. Caswell, Lillian Stair Schreiner, and Former Governor William D. Hoard.

In 1915, the chapter placed markers on the graves of the three “real daughters” who joined in the early years: Betsy Robinson Meade of Waldo, Jane A. Powers Walker of Waupun, and Helen M. Brown Whipple of Jefferson and Chicago. More than a century later, in 2022, the group did the same for the graves of the 17 charter members of the Fort Atkinson Chapter interred in Evergreen and Lakeview cemeteries.

According to Fary, membership in the Fort Atkinson Chapter peaked in 1921 with 186 members, with as many as 90 of them present at meetings. That did dip a bit during the 1930s due to the Great Depression, Lippert noted.

“In 1937, Fort Atkinson Chapter members Luella West Hoard and Mrs. John Roberts assisted Mrs. Ida Roe Whitnall in starting the Eli Pierce Chapter in Whitewater, which first met on May 20, 1941,” Fary said. “The membership of both chapters declined gradually, and the two chapters eventually merged on April 18, 1992, and became the Fort Atkinson-Eli Pierce Chapter.”

She said that total membership was 54 in 1993, 29 in 1999 and since has ranged from 25 to 38. The chapter covers all of greater Jefferson County, including Watertown, Lake Mills, Milton, Whitewater, Palmyra, Cambridge, Jefferson and Fort Atkinson.

Fary explained that in 2007, the Fort Atkinson-Eli Pierce Chapter collaborated with the Whitewater Historical Society and Wisconsin Society of the Sons of the American Revolution to erect a Wisconsin Historical Society marker at Oak Grove Cemetery in Whitewater in honor of Revolutionary War veterans Eli Pierce and Israel Ferris, who are buried there. Other donors were American Legion Post 173, Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 5470 and Carol Pierce Calkins, a descendant of Eli Pierce.

The marker was dedicated on Memorial Day, May 28, 2007

“This year, our chapter plans to clean the gravestones of Eli Pierce and Israel Ferris, followed by a wreath-laying ceremony in their honor on Sunday, Aug. 3, at the Oak Grove Cemetery in Whitewater,” Fary said.

Other chapter highlights

Additionally, the release, as enumerated by Fary, shared chapter highlights.

The release states: Continuing with other chapter highlights, Fary noted that in 1962, the Fort Atkinson chapter deposited its earliest records of meeting minutes in the Hoard Historical Museum archives.

“When I joined DAR 30 years ago, a year after the Fort Atkinson Chapter and Eli Pierce Chapter merged, I recall that former Regent Leona Utter Wandschneider said that our records should be removed from the museum so that we would have better access to them,” Fary said. “A few years after becoming regent in 2006, one of Leona’s daughters called and said she had found boxes of chapter records in the attic of Leona’s home on Riverside Drive while clearing out the house following her mother’s death.

“With great excitement, I picked up a number of cardboard boxes containing our earliest minute books and records.”

They included a scrapbook begun in 1945 and prior newspaper clippings and programs pasted into the original minute books.

“They are a real treasure,” Fary said. “After examining the books and writing our chapter history, I returned them to the museum staff, who were unaware of their fate.”

Later, more chapter records were given by Carol Pierce Calkins, who rescued them from an antique shop in East Troy, where the bank had disposed of them while clearing out the home of former Regent Betsy Hampel Griffiths when she died in 2009. They, too, now reside at the museum.

“What a joy it is to celebrate our chapter’s 125th anniversary in a place so intimately connected to our history. This is the former home of Luella West Hoard (1865-1956), who was honored as the last surviving charter member at our 50th anniversary in 1949,” Fary said. “Luella married Frank Ward Hoard, son of William Dempster Hoard, who served as governor of Wisconsin from 1889-91, promoted the national dairy industry and published the Jefferson County Union and Hoard’s Dairyman magazine.”

She noted that when the Hoard home was sold to the city to become the site of the Dwight Foster Public Library, circa 1910, Frank and Luella moved to 407 Merchants Ave., which today houses the museum.

“On Feb. 22, 1933, while serving as vice regent, Luella West Hoard hosted a tea and exhibit of heirlooms and antiques here, in her home, with other chapter members assisting,” Fary said.

She continued: “An article in the March 4, 1933, Jefferson County Union, under the headline ‘Local DAR display draws large crowd,’ read ‘Guests were met at the door by one of the members costumed as a butler of Washington’s time and were greeted in the reception hall by several ladies in Colonial costume … In the dining room, tea was served by other members of the society, also in Colonial costume, and the table decorations were in blue and white, DAR colors.’”

The chapter then organized a museum in the basement of the public library. Fary said that in 1957, after Luella West Hoard’s death, her family donated her home to the community to use as the Hoard Historical Museum.

Also in attendance 

The release notes other participants attending Saturday’s event. It reads: 

In addition to the aforementioned, also participating in Saturday’s program was chapter Chaplain Valerie Cole, who offered a prayer, and Majewski, who had the honor of cutting the first slices of cake, provided by Bon Ton Bakery of Jefferson.

In honor of the occasion, many of Saturday’s attendees wore decorative hats, just as their predecessors did for at least much of the chapter’s first eight decades.