Source: https://hannemanarchive.com/tag/hanneman/
Timestamp: 2019-04-21 14:23:38+00:00

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Video can convey meaning in a story unlike just about anything. Which is why I created a memorial video dedicated to my late mother for use at the visitation back on Jan. 5, 2019. I’ve done three of these previously and found them to be very cathartic.
One of the opening images of this video, showing Mom as a toddler in a snowsuit, was a gift from Mom. We found the photograph in her nightstand about an hour after she died. It is the first image I’ve seen of her younger than 16.
To watch the video in a larger player, see here.
Historic newspapers carried regular columns on what might be called “neighborhood news.” These items varied from who had dinner at whose house last night, to births in the family, to strange happenings like the poisoning of a farmer’s horses. We are fortunate, especially with our Hanneman and Treutel family lines, to have relatives who enjoyed reporting their comings and goings to the local paper. One of our favorites was when Donn Hanneman brought a tomato in to the offices of the Mauston Star in September 1942, showing the salad fruit seemingly had a V for victory grown into its skin. During World War II, patriotism was the order of the day.
Read more NewsBits and enjoy! We try to update the page weekly.
After more than 10 years publishing the Hanneman Archive history web site, your humble correspondent can no longer cover the operating costs involved in this enterprise. So rather than risk having to take the site down, we turn to our readers and relatives to ask for support.
Since just 2014, the Archive has drawn nearly 33,000 visitors from around the world who accessed close to 84,000 page views. Our article count has topped 185, and the site includes thousands of photographs and videos.
Let’s band together and support preservation of our shared history. Visit the GoFundMe page today!
Many years ago when I first attempted to transfer old 8mm films to digital format, I made a series of “Glimpses of the Past” DVDs with footage from the 1950s and 1960s. Over the years, with several moves and changes in computers, the source material for those was lost. But now I located one of those DVDs and ripped it to digital using Handbrake software. The result can be seen below in the Vimeo player.
Footage of my parents in the first year of their marriage.
Grandpa Carl and Grandma Ruby Hanneman at Mauston.
Mom, Dad, Grandma Ruby, Grandpa Carl and Aunt Lavonne on a trip to Arizona in 1959.
Christmas scenes with my Minneapolis cousins.
Scenes with my Grandma Margaret Mulqueen.
A priceless scene where my Aunt Lavonne has Grandpa Carl stuff oranges down his shirt and then show off to Grandma Ruby. She wasn’t amused.
My brother David’s first birthday. His birthday cake had one large tapered dinner candle on it. Also other birthdays and a Christmas at our former Michigan home.
My sister Marghi’s first birthday, with the obligatory dinner candle in the cake.
Those pictured in the video include David D. Hanneman, Mary K. (Mulqueen) Hanneman, David C. Hanneman, Joe Hanneman, Marghi Hanneman, Carl F. Hanneman, Ruby V. (Treutel) Hanneman, Jane (Hanneman) Olson, Mary (Hanneman) Cochrane, Tom Hanneman, Margaret Madonna (Dailey) Mulqueen, Tom McShane Sr., Ruth (Mulqueen) McShane, Lavonne (Hanneman) Wellman, Laura (Mulqueen) Curzon, Edward Mulqueen, Sally Schaefbauer and family, and a number of people I can’t identify. Venues include Mauston, Cudahy and Sun Prairie in Wisconsin; and Grand Rapids, Michigan.
The house was silent and the wooden bookshelves were empty, yet a small something caught my eye. In the corner of one shelf stood a tiny metal figurine: an Indian in headdress, from a cowboys and Indians play set from long ago. The man was kneeling with a rifle pointed off in the distance. The figurine was hand-painted; possibly made from lead. It was just the kind of little toy I recall seeing in the house in which my father grew up in Mauston, some 70 miles from where I now stood. There was a box in my Grandpa’s den office that contained cowboys and Indians, toy soldiers, wooden blocks and other assorted goodies that we grandkids played with.
The toy Indian figurine sat alone on the edge of the bookcase shelf.
I looked around the room, amazed that this one little item remained hidden after all of the furnishings were gone. The house I grew up in was nearly ready for market, mostly empty of content but not of memories. After days helping clean and polish the house, I found myself saying goodbye. Yet here, some 52 years after first setting foot in this place, the house was saying something to me as well.
Inside pages of the program from The Atomic Blonde, put on by the Mauston High School junior class of 1950.
This sure was a treat. The Atomic Blonde, the program read, “takes place in the lobby of Bob Nickerson’s and Skid Weiling’s hotel and and healthitorium in Silver Springs, a summer resort town in the mid-west.” On the other inside page was the cast listing for the play, “presented by the junior class of 1950.” Dad played Skid Weiling, one of the main characters. I recognized many of the cast names from when I helped Dad design a program for his 55th high school reunion in 2006. Mary Crandall, Carol Quamme, Roger Quick, Robert “Jigger” Jagoe, Clayton “Ty” Fiene, Bob Beck and others.
The Mauston Star: Jan. 12, 1950.
It appeared that my late father, who died in April 2007, was here in this empty house, reminding me there are still memories to be preserved and celebrated. So, as I did years ago when I said goodbye to my own home, I walked the three levels and tried to unearth as much as I could from 52 years of memories.
The Hanneman house was built and then occupied in 1965. It was one of the first homes in the Royal Oaks subdivision of Sun Prairie. And royal the oaks were, with 17 of them towering over the rear of the half-acre property. The house’s blueprints came from Better Homes & Gardens magazine and its signature home design for 1965. While the house was under construction, we lived in a rented home on Lake Wisconsin in Columbia County. Dad made frequent stops at the house and often found things on site not to his liking. One day he was so disgusted by the builder’s sloppiness, he redid an entire window frame. Dad complained for many years that the builder messed up the plans. One room was too big and another too small. We couldn’t tell the difference, but Dad was very exacting.
Over the years, many hundreds of people came and went through the front door, including grandparents, neighbors, school friends, card buddies, bridge club members, foster children, cousins, a couple of reigning Misses Wisconsin, doctors and, in later years, paramedics. I won’t describe here about the events surrounding Dad’s lung cancer and death, since I wrote about that extensively in my book The Journey Home.
The house in 1967, 2006 and 2017.
I was now standing in the family room, which was the heart of group activity. On one side I could see my Grandpa Carl, rocking in the mahogany recliner. On this day, he looked rather sad. It was probably 1978, not long removed from the July 1977 death of Grandma Ruby. Many a Friday we drove from Sun Prairie to Mauston to bring Grandpa back for a visit. He was so sad and lonely after losing his wife of 52 years. It always started the same way. One of us would pick up the phone on a Friday afternoon and hear a long pause before Grandpa burst into tears. He couldn’t even get the words out. “It’s OK Grandpa, we’ll come get you! Don’t be sad!” I still get a lump in my throat thinking about it. A few of those calls took on serious urgency, like the time Grandpa said he was laying on the floor and could not get up or walk. Dad quickly drove to Mauston to retrieve him, discovering Grandpa had a case of gout that needed attention. Our home became a haven for Grandpa Carl up until he fell to liver cancer in 1982.
A few feet away stands the white-brick fireplace with double mantle. What a treat it was when Dad would bring some firewood from the woodpile out back and build a roaring fire. We would lay in front of it, propping our bare feet on the lower mantle and toasting our toes. Each kid jockeyed for position to get the best “seat” for the fire. I noticed the upper mantle was decorated with greens for Christmas, interspersed with fake fruit covered in glitter. I can still see the Christmas stockings. Most of them were not hung but set on the lower mantle due to the weight of the oranges and apples always at the bottom of each. The fireplace became a critical asset one spring week in the 1970s when a massive ice storm hit Dane County. We had no heat or power for three days. Dad was gone on business and could not get back due to the icy weather. Mom kept things going. The experience was surreal, especially the creepy groans and creaks the tree branches made under weight of the ice. Then came cracks like thunder just before branches fell to the ground. We used the fireplace for heat. We took turns bailing out the basement sump pump to prevent the house from flooding.
The television set always stood under the bookcase to the left of the fireplace. I vividly recall watching one of the Apollo moon landings with the Greens, our next-door neighbors. Way back then, the television was a black-and-white console with vacuum tubes that glowed in the back of the cabinet. The TV had to “warm up” before it showed a picture. Every so often, repairman Phil Wedige came over to replace a tube or some other part. We watched countless hours of programs as a family. Among the most memorable were “Jesus of Nazareth,” the “Roots” miniseries and the four-part “Holocaust” miniseries recounting the Shoah. Dad loved his Jimmy Stewart and John Wayne westerns, and we all enjoyed Clint Eastwood in High Plains Drifter and Pale Rider.
Grandpa Carl Hanneman rests in the seat of honor in the Hanneman family room.
Televised Green Bay Packers games were always memorable, even when the Packers were forgettable. The kids sat on the floor and the adults had the real seats for the Sunday spectacle. Our usual guests for the games were Dr. and Mrs. Joseph Behrend. Dr. Joe was our family physician. I remember more groans of pain from him and Dad during those games than I ever heard at the medical clinic he founded in Sun Prairie. I was too young to really remember the Lombardi glory years, but I sure remember the painful seasons under Dan Devine, Bart Starr, Forrest Gregg and Lindy Infante. It wasn’t until 1992 that the Pack really was back, and those sad little bumper stickers we put on the car finally meant something.
white dog with black spots who liked everything … except getting a bath,” the story went. Then there was “Crictor” by Tomi Ungerer, a story about an old lady and her boa constrictor. Perhaps my favorite, though, was “Are You My Mother?” by P.D. Eastman. The charming illustrations in this book (edited by Dr. Seuss) captured my imagination. They detailed in colored pencil the adventure of a baby bird who fell out of the nest and went on a grand search for his mother. Mom read these books countless times. I never tired of the stories.
When the house was first built, it had a back patio under roof with posts that supported the overhang. Eventually, Dad framed it in and installed screen panels. That was a luxury, having a screened-in porch. It was quite a treat to dine al fresco, without Wisconsin’s state bird (the mosquito) interfering. My most vivid memory of the screened porch came in July 1975, when we hosted a reception for Grandpa Carl and Grandma Ruby for their 50th wedding anniversary. Grandpa wore a dark blue blazer, crisp white dress shirt and silver-blue patterned tie. Grandma wore a pearlescent seafoam green dress. Her corsage was a lily; his was a yellow rose. I stood at the entrance to the back porch and noticed how the late afternoon sun cast itself warmly across the happy faces of people no longer with us, such as Uncle Wilbert, the “rock hound,” and my dear Aunt Lavonne, who was taken from us just 11 years later at age 48.
Grandma Margaret Mulqueen with Mom, circa 1976.
The kitchen of course held a special place in our hearts. As I walked in on this day, I saw Grandma Mulqueen, Mom’s mother. For some reason, we never called her by her beautiful given name, Margaret Madonna. She was just Grandma Mulqueen. She rode the Greyhound bus from Cudahy to Sun Prairie to spend a few days. Her visits meant fresh bread and cinnamon rolls; her own secret recipe. She and Mom mixed up huge batches of dough in a green plastic tub, then tucked it away under the sink, where heat from the dishwasher and water pipes helped the dough to rise. Of course we couldn’t resist pulling back the dish towel that covered the green tub and taking a pinch of dough. “Don’t touch that bread or it will never rise!” came the admonition from another room. Too late.
I sat in Grandma Mulqueen’s lap and she told stories. About what I don’t recall, but I do remember her voice was kind and soothing. We begged her to make us a big pot of oatmeal, acting like Mom never fed us. At night, after Grandma retired to her guest room, we peeked into the bathroom to see if her dentures were sitting in a glass of water. They always were. We always looked. It was always gross. Such memories!
Dad plays cards with grandchildren Samantha and Stevie.
The kitchen was also the main spot for playing board games and cards. It was the site of many bitter losses in Monopoly. Bitter for us children, who were almost always bankrupted by landowner Dad. Usually you could tell the game was nearing an end when Dad said to one of us, “I’ll tell you what I’m going to do.” This was usually followed by confiscation of property, and for some players like my sisters Marghi and Amy, occasional tears. Dad laughed, but not in a mean way. It was more of an “evil but loving” thing. He was competitive like that.
Other games that graced the kitchen table included cribbage (which I regret never learning), poker and dirty clubs. It was the latter card game that was responsible for some epic battles. One night, Grandpa Carl got especially upset, slammed his cards on the table and stormed away. He then uttered words that will forever live in Hanneman lore: “Baby bullcrap! I’m walking home!” If Grandpa Carl lost that game, it was a rare letdown for the veteran card shark. He was every bit as competitive as Dad. One night in high school, I sat at that table until midnight and took an unparalleled pounding at dirty clubs. When the smoke cleared, it was Carl with 80 wins, Joe with 1. One. Win. Every time he won, Grandpa patted my hand, giggled and said, “I’m so sorry.” Ha. He enjoyed every one of those 80 wins.
One of the great features of our home was the huge backyard. At one time, there were 17 huge oak trees creating a dense canopy. It’s down to about six now. When I was a preschooler, I hauled my bedroom pillow down into the yard, lay in the grass and just looked up. The giant limbs swayed in the breeze, only occasionally letting a ray of sunlight pierce the cover to reach the ground. The high canopy provided a test to us budding athletes, too. If one of us could punt a football high enough to hit one of those high limbs, an offer from the Green Bay Packers was sure to await us. I’m still waiting.
Fewer than half of the oaks from 1965 are still there, but the back yard still has a nice canopy.
In the early days before neighboring houses were built, my brother David and I liked to make our own “snow” in the back woods. We rubbed Styrofoam on the bark of the oak trees. One time we got bawled out by some nosy lady who happened upon us. She yelled that we were going to kill the trees. Pah! Never happened. On one side of the lawn near the house, Dad built an incredible rock patio out of sandstone. It included a horseshoe-shape wall and a patio surface that was probably 10-by-20 feet. The borders between the rocks were filled with tiny pebbles, which we were forbidden to mess with. Of course we did, although quickly discovering the unpleasant duty of sweeping them back into place.
During at least a few winters, Dad poured an ice surface in the back yard. It wasn’t as smooth as the local ice rink, but heck, who else could say they had a skatable ice sheet in the back yard? In the fall, we all worked to rake up what seemed like millions of oak leaves. We never had a fancy lawn vacuum like some of the neighbors. So it was a bamboo rake, blisters and arm aches for all. Our efforts created a leaf mountain that we all jumped in, which at least partially made up for the pain of raking. The video below shows my firstborn child, Stevie, romping in the leaves on a 1990s fall afternoon at Grandma and Grandpa’s house, along with Bailey the golden retriever. Aunt Marghi was behind the camera.
Back inside the house, I continued my tour with the dining and living rooms. We usually were not allowed in either unless it was a special occasion like Thanksgiving or Christmas. Thanksgiving was a big deal in our house. I recounted in my book The Journey Home how exacting Dad was in preparing for and then carving the turkey. Those celebrations changed over the years as grandparents left us and grandchildren appeared on the scene. Eventually, the dining spread spilled onto several tables, with the grandkids assigned to the card tables. I never felt so adult as when I carved the turkey one of the first years after Dad’s death. It just wasn’t the same. The large group in a smallish space created lots of chaos, noise and stress. One of the last years we had a large Thanksgiving gathering around that table, Mom’s nerves were a bit frayed. During a particularly loud time during the meal, she snapped at my youngest daughter, Ruby, “Would you shut up and eat your dinner?” Whoa. Poor Ruby looked around the table in stunned silence, since she hadn’t said a peep.
Christmas was another chaos-inducing holiday at the Hanneman home. Everybody talked at the same time, which is evident on the video below from December 1994. When we were little, my parents made sure we had lots of things to open. I don’t know how they did it, especially when money was tight. One of my favorite Christmas gifts was a die-cast metal Batmobile with a missile launcher. It actually shot tiny plastic missiles off the back. Perhaps the most lasting, beautiful gift was an art print by Wisconsin wildlife artist Owen Gromme, which Dad exquisitely framed and signed on the back. When my son Stevie was 11 months old, my brother David taught him a disgusting skill on Christmas Day. Grandpa Dave walked in to the bathroom to discover Stevie flushing toilet paper and splashing in the water. “Don’t teach him that,” grandpa boomed. Watch below and chuckle.
Back in the 1970s, Mom and Dad decided to turn the basement into a rec room. About two-thirds of the basement was covered with a commercial-grade red carpet. Dad put wallpaper on the east wall. The pattern showed chess pieces on a board. That was OK, but the way it hung on the wall made the whole wall appear to be tilted. Even though the paper was hung with total precision. I know this bothered Dad to no end.
The pool table served as great entertainment for more than 50 years.
The centerpiece of the basement was always the pool table. I don’t know where he got it, but Dad in the 1960s put in a gorgeous full-size billiards table from the Sydney Laner & Co. of Chicago. Sydney Laner established his billiards firm in 1918. It operated in Chicago until 2010. Dad carefully laid the huge slate on the supporting beams of the table, then leveled the entire table using playing cards as shims to ensure every area of the playing surface was level. Even after 50 years, the green felt has no wear marks, and the cushions have just as much pop as the day they were installed.
Playing cards were used as shims to balance the pool table.
As was the case with cards, action on the pool table was dominated by Dad and Grandpa Carl. Both wielded the cue stick with power and precision. There was nothing like the sharp cracking sound when the cue ball hit the racked pool balls to open each game. I learned all I know about pool from them: how to line up a shot, figure angles on the bumpers, properly chalk the cue tip, etc. My skill never rose to the level of our resident pool sharks, but it was so fun to play against them. I’ve not played pool in many years. I have fond memories of my own children playing “rollin’ bowling” with the pool balls. I will miss that table.
During the early years, the basement frequently got rainwater and an occasional sewer backup. Dad got into an epic battle with Sun Prairie city hall over the drainage for the entire subdivision. One backup was awful. It burped brown sludge 3-4 inches deep across the entire basement. This was just after the new carpet was installed. Outfitted in rubber boots, gloves and masks, we used shop vacs to slurp up the mess. We each got a 2-by-4 to squeegee the filth from the carpet. Dad used Nolvasan, a surgical scrub, to help disinfect the entire basement. What a horrid mess. I vaguely recall there was litigation over the sewer backup.
Coverage by the late Bob Richards of NBC-15 television in Madison was instrumental in solving the problem of sewer backups in Sun Prairie.
Eventually, Dad contacted NBC 15 television about the drainage controversy. They sent Bob Richards, the ‘Contact 15’ consumer affairs reporter, to city hall to cover hearings on the issue. Dad, a former Sun Prairie alderman, was interviewed on TV. The publicity helped pressure the city to put in new drainage pipes and tiles at Main Street and Thompson Road. Ultimately that solved the issue for the entire subdivision. I was so impressed with the TV reporter, I went to watch him in the studio during a 6 p.m. newscast. It was a major influence in my decision to become a journalist.
The final memory I have of the basement was of the beautiful stained-glass windows that stood hidden across from the furnace for decades. Dad obtained them from St. Mary’s Hospital as the hospital demolished its old chapel in 1973. The two tall windows included four sections. When Dad was being treated for lung cancer at St. Mary’s in November 2006, he got the idea to donate the windows back to the hospital. It was providential timing, since St. Mary’s was in the midst of a $182 million expansion. The hospital not only accepted the donation, it asked the architects to incorporate the windows into the new hospital wing. Today, there are four waiting areas at St. Mary’s graced by the windows, backlit with beautiful dramatic effect. “I want these windows to come home to St. Mary’s,” Dad said at the time. And so they did. You can read more about the windows in The Journey Home and on the Hanneman Archive website.
I walked the house a final time, impressed by how many memories flooded back to me. They could fill a book. This home has ably done its duty for more than five decades. The man of the house has gone back to God, and Mom needs the sale proceeds to ensure good ongoing healthcare. How do you say goodbye to such a special place? I thought I accomplished that by quietly pulling shut the door into the garage. On second thought, no goodbyes. Only memories, written here and displayed in the photo gallery below. My hope for this place is it takes such good care of another family for many decades to come.
The Hanneman home, circa 1972.
Carl F. Hanneman in the chair of honor, circa 1980.
Grandpa Dave plays cards with grandchildren Samantha and Stevie Hanneman while Joe and David Hanneman look on.
Amy Hanneman’s birthday, circa 1978.
The house as it appeared in early September 2017.
Marghi and Amy Hanneman in the pool; Laura Mulqueen and David C. Hanneman standing.
David D. Hanneman having some Christmas fun.
Grandpa Dave teaches Stevie how to carve pumpkins.
Stevie with our beloved Bailey, circa 1996.
Thanksgiving Day: Mary, Amy, Marghi, Laura, Joe and David.
The Hanneman house in fall 2007.
Mary Hanneman serves up goodies for David (right) and Joe Hanneman.
Joe Hanneman, Mary K. Hanneman, Laura Mulqueen, David C. Hanneman and David D. Hanneman, circa 1966.
Laura Mulqueen holds her cousin, Amy Hanneman, while sister Marghi Hanneman delivers a smooch.
Laura Mulqueen and her Christmas doll.
Laura Mulqueen on the day of her First Communion.
Winter play with David C. Hanneman, circa 1968.
David C. Hanneman geared up for winter in December 1967 or January 1968.
Amy Hanneman’s annual birthday cake with jellybeans.
Birthday party: unknown girl, Marghi Hanneman, Amy Hanneman, Laura Mulqueen and Bill Fonti.
Sisters Amy and Marghi Hanneman in 1969.
Laura Mulqueen, Joe Hanneman, David C. Hanneman and Mary K. Hanneman, circa 1967.
David, Amy and Marghi Hanneman, circa 1979.
David C. Hanneman on his first day of school.
David D. Hanneman carves the Thanksgiving bird, circa 1974.
Ruby V. Hanneman sits on the rock patio under the shade of 17 oak trees.
David Hanneman opens his Hot Wheels.
Playing cards with the grandkids.
David, cousin Laura, Joe and Marghi at Amy’s birthday.
David Hanneman handles the time-honored duty of carving the Thanksgiving bird.
Grandma Ruby V. Hanneman in back; In front are Laura Mulqueen, Amy Hanneman, Mary K. Hanneman, David C. Hanneman, Joe Hanneman and Marghi Hanneman.
Ruby V. Hanneman with granddaughter Jane Hanneman on July 12, 1975, celebrating Ruby and Carl’s 50th anniversary.
Dad’s “little buddy,” Chewy in 2007.
Carl and Ruby Hanneman at the kitchen table.
Grandkids on the weekend that cousins Ruby Hanneman, Maggie Hanneman and Justin Bozza were baptized.
Stevie Hanneman explains the finer points of being a baby to Grandpa Dave.
Laura, David, Joe and Marghi.
In the rock patio: Mary K. Hanneman, Laura Mulqueen, David, Joe and Marghi Hanneman.
Marghi Hanneman on the swing set in the back yard.
Marghi Hanneman in front; David C. Hanneman, Laura Mulqueen and Joe Hanneman in back. Circa 1969.
David D. Hanneman, carving the turkey in 2005.
Back row: Marghi, Amy and Mary Hanneman. Front: David, Grandpa Carl and Joe Hanneman.
Baby Marghi lays on the warmth of the portable dishwasher.
Mr. Puggles, a visitor from Racine.
Stevie Hanneman plays under the oak canopy in 2004.
One of David D. Hanneman’s favorite hats, shown in the back seat of his car in 2007.
Carl F. Hanneman’s pharmacy glass collection sat on the shelves above the television for decades.
Dad, taking forever to unwrap a present.
A classic Christmas photo with David and Joe Hanneman.
Marghi and Amy Hanneman at the piano.
Mary Hanneman with baby daughter Amy in 1969.
Grandma Margaret Mulqueen with daughter Mary K. Hanneman.
Mary and Dave Hanneman with daughter Amy.
Marghi Hanneman. The porch in the background was once without even screens.
Grandma Mary lights a birthday candle for son Joe as granddaughter Ruby looks on.
Joe and David Hanneman with cousin Laura in 1967.
David C. Hanneman, Grandpa Dave with Stevie, and Joe Hanneman in August 1992.
Among the pets to grace the house over the years, none had such a presence as Korby.
Mary and Dave receive a grandfather clock on their 25th anniversary.
Abby and Samantha Hanneman watch Grandpa Dave play cribbage with son David.
The whole gang at the wedding of David and Lisa Hanneman in 1992.
A frail Dave Hanneman and wife Mary with one of the stained glass sections donated to St. Mary’s.
Mom at the dedication of the windows in 2007.
One section on the fourth floor of the newest wing at St. Mary’s Hospital.
First day of school. David and Joe in the back, Amy and Marghi in front.
The new sun room, circa 2006.
Laura Mulqueen holding cousin Amy Hanneman, circa 1969. The boys are Joe and David Hanneman. Marghi Hanneman and Heidi Ho-Ho Hanneman are at right.
Amy with her favorite bear.
Joe, Laura and David in back; Amy, Heidi and Marghi in front.
Samantha and Ruby Hanneman with Grandma Mary and Jake.
Grandpa Dave with Stevie and Samantha Hanneman.
A neighbor plays Santa, apparently well enough to fool young David and cousin Laura. Yikes!
Redhead Samantha Hanneman and Dad Joe play bubbles on a spring day.
Sometimes identifying the location show in old photographs is easier than others, like the giant lettering, “Cornucopia, Wis.” in this photo from around 1942. Such a small detail, but it turns out there is quite a story behind the Hanneman family’s time in this northern Wisconsin area on Lake Superior.
August 21, 1940 ad in the Wisconsin Rapids Daily Tribune.
You can’t get much farther north in Wisconsin than Cornucopia, an unincorporated hamlet on Siskwit Bay in Bayfield County. And that was just the point for Carl and Ruby Hanneman, who took my Dad to Bayfield County every summer to escape his crippling hay fever suffered around the family home at Mauston, Wisconsin. In August 1940, Ruby placed a classified ad in the Wisconsin Rapids Daily Tribune seeking a travel companion to share expenses. The older girl in the photo above is unidentified, but she is too young to be an adult’s travel companion.
David Hanneman, unidentified girl, Lavonne Hanneman and Ruby Hanneman.
It appears Ruby took my Dad and his little sister Lavonne to Bayfield County in late summer when pollen counts were especially high in Mauston. Dad’s allergies were so bad, he suffered from nonstop sneezing, runny nose and watery eyes. The hay fever was truly debilitating, so the family went far north until the seasons started changing. The area is popular with summer tourists, so the family had their pick of cottages and cabins in which to take up residence.
They treated the annual trek as a vacation, allowing siblings Donn, David and Lavonne Hanneman to see attractions such as the Apostle Islands National Lakeshore and its world-class array of lighthouses. Other destinations included the beautiful Madeline Island, accessible by car ferry or boat. One of my favorite photos of my Dad shows him digging his toes in the sand on Madeline Island (see below). I guess if you have to suffer through horrendous allergies, you might as well get some vacation out of it!
Donn G. Hanneman, David D. Hanneman, Lavonne Hanneman and their mother, Ruby V. Hanneman.
David with little sister Lavonne outside a cottage in Bayfield County, Wisconsin.
Bayfield trip, circa 1940: Lavonne Hanneman, David Hanneman, unidentified girl, and Carl F. Hanneman.
Lavonne Hanneman looks out onto Lake Superior.
Carl F. Hanneman with children Lavonne and David, in Bayfield County, circa 1942.
Ruby V. Hanneman, left; unidentified girl, David Hanneman and Lavonne Hanneman.
Lavonne and David Hanneman play on the shore of Lake Superior in Bayfield County, Wis., circa 1940.
David D. Hanneman with his toe in the sand at Madeline Island, circa 1942.
The images are grainy and slightly out of focus, but four digitized reels of old 8mm film from the late 1950 and early 1960s are like priceless time in a bottle. The films were shot on the 8mm film camera owned by Earl J. Mulqueen Sr., my maternal grandfather. They were loaned by my Aunt Joanie so we could get them scanned and made into digital video for all to enjoy.
“Look back at the joys and the sorrow.
Put them away in your mind.
Memories are time that we borrow.
Even with the technical flaws, the video is amazing. I had never seen moving pictures of my Grandpa Earl, and I had just a few seconds of video showing my Grandma Mulqueen. This batch of 8mm film fixed all of that, giving us a peek back more than 50 years at a Christmas morning, a visit to the folks house in Cudahy and times at my parents house in Grand Rapids, Michigan.
It also provides the first video I’ve seen of my Aunt Evelyn (Deutsch) Mulqueen, who died of brain cancer at age 33. That was more than a year before I was born. There are shots of Earl J. Mulqueen Jr., Evelyn and their six children. As you can read elsewhere on this blog, Earl was a war hero U.S. Marine who fought at Guadalcanal and Tarawa. He lost his leg in the West Loch Disaster in May 1944 at Pearl Harbor.
The look on Ruby V. Hanneman’s face in this classic photo says it all. “I have NO idea how to run this rig!” This image was scanned from a Kodachrome slide taken by Ruby’s husband, Carl F. Hanneman. The year is about 1958.
Ruby Hanneman does not seem quite ready to hit the fields on this Oliver 99 diesel tractor.
Judging by the other slides in the batch, the Hanneman family was attending a wedding in the Wausau or Wisconsin Rapids areas when this photo was taken.
According to a variety of equipment-collector blogs we sampled, the Oliver 99 diesel tractor was produced from 1955 to 1958. The color slide film really brings out the brilliance of the green paint. Well done, Grandma Ruby! Now get down before you hurt someone.
If you’ve spent much time sifting through collections of vintage photographs, no doubt you’ve seen samples of the hand-crafted art of photo colorization. For many decades, various techniques were used to colorize parts of all of a photographic image. When done well, the process created a rich, high-end look that stands the test of time. It is possible to digitally apply these effects to images today, but there’s something about these old photos that make them heirlooms.
As you will see in the gallery below, samples from our photo archive vary in sophistication. Some look almost like watercolor paintings, others like pastels and some appear to be airbrushed.
Marvin R. Treutel, circa 1938.
The colors used on this image are brighter than most in our collection.
Skin tones were the focus on this portrait. Pictured are Laura Mulqueen, David C. Hanneman and Joe Hanneman.
Most of this photograph of Charles F.C. Hanneman was hand tinted.
This U.S. Marine Corps portrait of Earl J. Mulqueen Jr. looks like colored pencil.
David D. Hanneman’s Boy Scouts uniform, as well as the surrounding grass, received tinting.
Lynne and Richard Hanneman, children of Wilbert G. and Irma Hanneman.
The roses in this bridal portrait of Ruby V. Hanneman were tinted. This digital restoration punched up the colors from the now-faded original from 1925.
This Hanneman family vacation portrait was somewhat clumsily done, with colors spilling onto skin and other areas. At front and center is David D. Hanneman. In the back are Donn G. Hanneman, Ruby V. Hanneman, Carl F. Hanneman and baby Lavonne M. Hanneman. Photo circa 1940.
Marquette Mystery: Where Did Carl Hanneman Study Pharmacy?
Now, more than 90 years after Hanneman’s days of youth in Milwaukee, a question has been raised about where he studied to prepare for his nearly 60-year career as a pharmacist. As The Hanneman Archive was preparing to donate Carl’s student notebooks, study guides and formulary books from his days at Marquette, staff at the university’s archives said they could not find him in an initial search of the graduate database.
Carl F. Hanneman at Solomon Juneau Park in Milwaukee in 1924.
The College of Pharmacy at Marquette was disbanded in 1918, as World War I decimated the ranks of students and faculty alike. The plan was to re-establish the pharmacy program after the war, but those plans were never realized and Marquette never again had a pharmacy degree program. So what to make of Carl’s story and his history? We can assume he did not fabricate it, since he was licensed in Wisconsin for 57 years. So, what to do when presented with a mystery? We dug into it.
Some facts in our favorite pharmacist’s story are well-established. Carl Henry Frank Hanneman was born on October 28, 1901 in Grand Rapids, Wood County, Wisconsin (the city’s name was changed to Wisconsin Rapids in 1920). He was the youngest of five children of Charles and Rosine (Osterman) Hanneman. (We related elsewhere on this site some of the confusion surrounding his birth when he sought a copy of his original birth certificate in 1946).
Charles Hanneman emigrated from Pomerania to Wisconsin in November 1882.
His father Charles, whose full name is Carl Frederick Christian Hanneman, emigrated to Wisconsin in November 1882 from county Regenwalde in the Baltic Duchy of Pomerania (now in Poland and Germany). His mother was native to Wood County, Wisconsin. The senior Hanneman toiled at manual labor. He started as a saw mill worker and later became a farm hand for his brother William at the dawn of the 20th century. Charles worked on the 1908 construction of the sewer system in Grand Rapids, earning 17.5 cents per hour. He later worked in a paper mill. Young Carl had a good role model for hard work.
Carl attended public schools, graduating from Lincoln High School in 1921. He was a smart young man, with equal talents at science and art. Shortly after high school, he began work as an apprentice at the well-known Sam Church drug store. A spark was lit. Carl felt a calling. Carl’s apprenticeship at the Church drug store lasted nearly five years. We believe the person who told Carl about Marquette University was Mark C. Whitrock, a 1913 Marquette pharmacy graduate and pharmacist at Sam Church. Nearly 10 years Carl’s senior, Whitrock was also a member of the Wisconsin Rapids city council.
Carl Hanneman studies in the mid-1920s.
Among Carl’s Marquette papers is a pharmacy course notebook originally belonging to Whitrock. It is from a theoretical pharmacy course taught by Dr. Hugh C. Russell, a physician and professor in Marquette’s College of Pharmacy. Whitrock gave the book to Carl to help him prepare to study for work as a druggist. What to do, since the pharmacy degree program at Marquette was no more? With some help from the Marquette University Archives and Carl’s own writings, we found the answer.
Marquette’s short course in pharmacy proved popular in the mid-1920s.
In 1923, Marquette began offering a “short course” in pharmacy under the auspices of the College of Dentistry. The school newspaper, the Marquette Tribune, said the course was “not part of the regular curriculum of the university.” What? The courses in chemistry, organic chemistry, pharmacy, pharmacognosy, toxicology and drug identification were rigorous. They were taught by the aforementioned Dr. Russell and Professor Frederick C. Mayer, both former deans of the Marquette College of Pharmacy. The two-semester program was designed for young men and women with pharmacy experience, in preparation to pass the state exams.
Carl studied under two former deans of the Marquette College of Pharmacy.
Carl enrolled in the pharmacy short course in the winter of 1924. We know he paid tuition (he referenced in later writings having to save before enrolling at Marquette). He lived in the 700 block of 37th Street in Milwaukee, just west of the Marquette campus. We have a number of photos of his fiancee, Ruby Treutel, visiting him at Solomon Juneau Park in Milwaukee in 1924.
The books Carl left behind contain hundreds of pages of meticulous notes on chemistry, pharmacy and related subjects. Two of the books have Marquette pennant stickers on the front. Carl’s pocket-size copy of the Guide to the Organic Drugs of the United States Pharmacopœia has a Marquette University seal on the cover. His exam book shows he scored an 82 percent on one test in 1924. The test was corrected by someone identified only as “A. Mankowski.” So far, we have not identified that person further.
Carl’s organic drugs guide from his days at Marquette University.
It seems odd that Marquette would offer such a program but not count it as official curriculum. The university offered certification programs in other subjects. We have no paper certificate or other document showing Carl matriculated from the pharmacy short course, but we will ask Marquette to check its records thoroughly. Otherwise, Carl and many others like him from the 1920s would be Marquette orphans, educated by the university but not claimed as students or course graduates.
Carl traveled to Madison on January 24, 1925 for the state Board of Pharmacy examination. He was one of 105 applicants seeking licensure as either a registered pharmacist or assistant registered pharmacist. Carl was among 76 people who passed the exam that day. On January 30, the Wisconsin State Board of Pharmacy issued him certificate No. 3252 as a registered assistant pharmacist. With his credentials in hand, he returned home to Wisconsin Rapids. Mark Whitrock hired him as a druggist for the brand new Whitrock & Wolt pharmacy on Grand Avenue.
Carl Hanneman’s graduation and first job made front-page news in Wisconsin Rapids. The newspaper got his middle initial wrong.
Six months later in nearby Vesper, Carl married his longtime sweetheart, Ruby Viola Treutel. After working at the Whitrock pharmacy much of 1925, Carl and Ruby moved to Janesville. Carl took a druggist job with the McCue & Buss Drug Co. in downtown Janesville. After about six months, Carl and his now-pregnant wife moved to Fond du Lac, where Carl started work for Fred Staeben at the Staeben Drug Co. Just weeks later, they welcomed their first child, Donn Gene Hanneman.
By Christmas 1927, the Hannemans moved back to Wisconsin Rapids. Carl became a druggist for his old employer, Sam Church. He stayed in that job for five years. In March 1933, the family welcomed another son, David Dion. Carl then left the pharmacy world for a sales job with the Consolidated Water Power & Paper Co. That assignment lasted for several years.
Longtime pharmacist Sam Church hired Carl Hanneman as an apprentice in the early 1920s, then as a druggist in 1927.
Pharmacy was his calling, so Carl looked for a chance to retake his place behind the druggist’s counter. In February 1936, Carl was hired by Dr. J. Samuel Hess Jr. to be an assistant pharmacist at the Mauston Drug Store, which was attached to the Hess Memorial Hospital in Mauston.
We wrote elsewhere on this site of Carl’s heartfelt September 1937 plea for assistance obtaining a full registered pharmacist license. He wrote to Orland S. Loomis, a well-known Mauston attorney and former state senator who was then Wisconsin’s attorney general. Carl regretted not taking the full registered pharmacist exam in 1925. At the time, he was six months short of the five years of apprentice experience required to become a registered pharmacist. Now 12 years later, lacking that higher license, he could not officially manage the Mauston Drug Store because of a quirk in state law regarding small-town pharmacies. The better license would mean better salary, something that became crucial in August 1937 with the birth of the Hannemans’ third child, daughter Lavonne Marie.
We don’t know if Loomis wrote back or helped Carl with his license issues. (Loomis became governor-elect of Wisconsin in 1942, but died before taking office. As a correspondent for the Wisconsin State Journal, Carl photographed Loomis at the Loomis home in Mauston on election eve in November 1942). Carl became a full registered pharmacist on July 12, 1944. He was among nine people issued new licenses that Wednesday in Madison. He was issued certificate No. 5598 by the Wisconsin State Board of Pharmacy. The certificate was signed by Oscar Rennebohm, a well-known Madison pharmacist who later became Wisconsin’s 32nd governor.
Carl earned his full registered pharmacist license in 1944.
So the mystery is solved. Carl Hanneman did enroll in and complete a short course in pharmacy at Marquette University in 1924. It remains to be seen if Marquette will claim him and his many colleagues who studied in the pharmacy short course in the 1920s. His class notes, study guides and other materials from that time will be donated to the Marquette University Archives later this summer.
A sample from one of Carl Hanneman’s pharmacy notebooks.
Carl’s notebooks contained meticulous notes on chemistry and other subjects.
Professor Frederick C. Mayer was one of at least two faculty who taught the pharmacy short course.
Carl earned his registered assistant pharmacist license in January 1925.
Carl F. Hanneman taking his suits to the cleaner at Janesville, Wis., on April 5, 1926. Carl and his wife, Ruby V. Hanneman, were on their way to dinner. Carl was a druggist at McCue & Buss Drug Co. at the time.
Carl F. Hanneman served as an apprentice at the Sam Church drug store (shown at right) in Wisconsin Rapids. He was later hired as an assistant pharmacist after completing his education and working at three other pharmacies.
In 1926 and 1927, Carl F. Hanneman worked for the Staeben Drug Co. in Fond du Lac, Wisconsin.
The Mauston Drug Store, circa 1930. Image courtesy of the Juneau County Historical Society.
Carl Hanneman emerges from the Mauston Drug Store, circa 1958.
Inspired by his father’s career in health science, David D. Hanneman became a drug salesman for E.R. Squibb in the 1960s.
The last pharmacist license issued to Carl F. Hanneman by the board of pharmacy. It was still in effect on the day he died in May 1982.
Hanneman, Hannemann, Treutel, Osterman, Krosch, Kühl, Ladick, Ladwig, Mulqueen, Dailey, Chase, White.
Professional writer, history sleuth and lover of family. "I don't live in the past, but it's a great place to visit."
This site is a living history project in memory of David D. Hanneman (1933-2007) and a life well lived. A great husband, Dad, Grandpa, brother, uncle and son, Dave loved family history. Many of the things featured here are family treasures he preserved and protected for many decades.
The Journey Home is the inspiring story of a father's battle with cancer, and the miraculous parting message he left for his family. Despite crippling symptoms from cancer, David Hanneman finished his life with renewed Catholic faith - and a resolve that shows us how each life's journey has an incredible destination.
Content of this blog is ©The Hanneman Archive. All Rights Reserved.

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