FEATURED GALLERY | Highlights from over three million photographs, negatives, cartoons, lithographs and posters in our holdings

I Hold in My Hand, Photograph by United Press International Newspictures, October 27, 1952. WHS Image ID 47424

Remembering McCarthy: A Visual Biography, 1908-1957

May 2nd marks the 50th anniversary of the death of Wisconsin Senator Joseph McCarthy, who for four years in the early 1950s held the nation in his grasp with his anti-Communist rhetoric. To his enemies McCarthy was evil incarnate but to his supporters, he was an ardent champion of freedom. Elected to the U.S. Senate in 1946, Joseph McCarthy created a sensation in 1950 when he announced during a speech in Wheeling, West Virginia, that communist members of the State Department were influencing American foreign policy. At the time, communist expansion in Eastern Europe and Korea fueled Americans' anxiety that their way of life was under attack. Proclaimed just as Americans were preparing to fight in Korea, McCarthy capitalized on people's fears of encroaching communism to launch a public campaign aimed at eliminating the supposed communist infiltration of government. View the Gallery »

BROWSE THE COLLECTIONS | A selection of the nearly 28,000 digitized visual materials in our online image database

WHS Produces Digital Reproductions

The WHS Images Digital Lab produces quality giclée print reproductions made from high resolution scans of original source material from our holdings. Custom orders are printed on matte or semigloss papers using large format printers and archival pigmented inks.

Additionally, our lab will produce custom digital file reproductions for commercial publishers in traditional print, editorial and advertising as well as for new media projects like websites, CD-ROMs and podcasts. All sale proceeds directly benefit the acquisition, preservation and maintenance of the physical and online collections.

Contact business manager Lisa Marine by email at lisa.marine@wisconsinhstory.org for details.

Subject: Motorcycles

In 1903 William Harley, Art Davidson and Walt Davidson began to tinker in the shed behind the Davidson family home in Milwaukee, eventually producing a three-horsepower, two-wheeled riding machine. The Harley-Davidson Company would become a world leader in motorcycle manufacturing and set a standard for quality that still exists today. The WHS collections include a variety of images that celebrate the history of a lifestyle set to high speed.

J. Robert Taylor Photographs

John Robert Taylor began his photographic career at the Milwaukee Journal in 1909 and continued his employment at the paper until 1946. To cover Milwaukee's daily events, he lugged his heavy eight-by-ten-inch camera, glass plates and tripod aboard the city's streetcars. Years later he strapped a camera to his back and traveled the city strets by motorcycle. Taylor photographed the city for thirty-seven years until retiring at the age of seventy.

Place File: Dodgeville, Wisconsin

Over the last two years, WHS has been scanning and cataloging its collection of images of Wisconsin places. Consisting of over 10,000 items, the collection highlights main street views, prominent buildings in each community, local monuments and other features of interest. Each month our newsletter features a selection of images from a Wisconsin place. This month's featured city is Dodgeville, Wisconsin.

DISCOVER THE VISUAL MATERIALS COLLECTIONS

Currently less than 2% of our total visual materials collections are available online, but we continue to add hundreds of new images to our online image database each month. The Archives online catalog (ArCat) provides access to information about thousands of collections containing photographs and other images. Need help with your search? Drop us a line and we'll be happy to help you find the image you're looking for!

The WHS Images Update is a monthly email newsletter that features gallery exhibits drawn from the Wisconsin Historical Society's visual materials archives as well as highlighting collections in our online image database. To join our mailing list, see our newsletter sign up page. You may unsubscribe from our email updates at any time by clicking here.

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Available online | www.wisconsinhistory.org/whi/