By Carl Eisenberg
After years of loving sailing and learning to respect the water, in 1984 I joined the Wisconsin Marine Historical Society to support its efforts. After years of attending WMHS social functions, in 2009, just after I retired, I started volunteering, and in 2016
became the Society’s president.
I am proud of the WMHS, its history, mission, board of trustees, committees, staff, volunteers, and members. The organization has its headquarters in the Central Milwaukee Public Library. Many of our online files are maintained on library servers. The WMHS is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization and an affiliate member of the Wisconsin Historical Society to which we report yearly.
Our mission statement gives the organization direction. The WMHS is dedicated to promote interest in discovering, collecting, recording, disseminating, and preserving material related to history of the Great Lakes and the St. Lawrence Seaway with a special emphasis on Lakes Michigan and Superior, and the upper Mississippi River system, as well as the rivers and lakes within Wisconsin used by all types of watercraft.
–––––––––––––––––––
Visit us on Facebook
–––––––––––––––––––
The WMHS is governed by its Board of Trustees that meets several times a year, except this year the coronavirus pandemic interrupted some of the scheduled meetings. The Society has an executive director who assists with research and administration. Several committees report to the board. The Society publishes a quarterly newsletter, Soundings, most issues of which are available from our website.
The Society is not a museum, it is rather more an archive, with collections including ship enrollments, thousands of photographs, informational files of ships, ports, lighthouses, shipwrecks, people, and happenings.
Social events are popular among the Society’s members and include the Annual Christmas Tree Ship Dinner, the Annual Meeting and Founders’ Auction, fun outings such as river boat cruises, as well as a variety of trips to maritime-related sites including shipyards. On Feb. 12, 2020, WMHS volunteers participated in History Day at the Capitol, sponsored by the Wisconsin Historical Society. We had also planned an overnight, summer trip to Door County to watch the Song of the Inland Seas at the Northern Sky Theater, but the pandemic caused the theater to cancel its season.
* * *
Our volunteers are the heartbeat of the WMHS. Volunteers have interests in Great Lakes history, diving and lighthouses. Some volunteers enter data into paper and electronic files.
The Society was awarded a mini-grant from the Wisconsin Council for Local History for a color scanner to digitize thousands of color maritime photos and passenger steamship brochures. With this scanner, the WMHS and the Milwaukee Public Library eventually will be able to make this rich history of maritime life on the Great Lakes available to the public via a digital database.
The WMHS has a variety of committees that provide opportunities for volunteers to help guide the organization. For example, the Program Committee organizes meetings and social outings and others serve on the Acquisitions and Preservation Committee. Some other committees include promotions and marketing, financial, membership, and information services. Our various projects give volunteers a sense of accomplishment. I am proud to work with such motivated people.
* * *
Of course, things do not always go smoothly. For example, we have struggled for years to get a website up and running. We started down one path with a custom-made site but had to change to a commercially available website provider. Our members provide content for our social media sites. Occasionally, feedback to some of the content has created turmoil that led the trustees to recently approve a communications policy. Here are some other continuing issues:
■ The Society faces challenges attracting new members and filling certain volunteer positions.
■ We have learned that a strategy of making one-year, free memberships available as gifts to our friends, family members, and acquaintance has been a reasonably successful approach to attract new members.
■ Developing a stable funding stream is a continuing challenge. When the Society was founded in 1959, some of the founders were wealthy civic leaders who took the WMHS on as their charity. Now, yearly dues cover only part of our costs. We get some income from our Founders’ Auction and member donations. We have approached several corporations for contributions, sadly without any recent successes.
■ Finding volunteers with interest in social media tools remains a high priority.
The Wisconsin Marine Historical Society, in cooperation with the Milwaukee Public Library and the Wisconsin Historical Society, continues to fulfill its mission with a devoted Board of Trustees, an executive director, and a cadre of enthusiastic volunteers.
Photo: Carl Eisenberg at the helm of a 70-foot Santa Cruz out of Seattle, Washington, September 2013. (Credit: Molly Eisenberg)
Carl Eisenberg is a sailor and birdwatcher, and served as president of the Wisconsin Marine Historical Society from 2016 – 2024. A retired pediatrician, he is a graduate of Duke University School of Medicine. He lives in Mequon, Wisconsin.
