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Detroit German-American business; scrapbooks containing a variety of printed material, photographs, handwritten accounts of sentiments and occasions, and hand-drawn ink illustrations.

The Carl E. Schmidt collection consists of sixteen volumes of scrapbooks documenting the wide scope of Schmidt's interests. These scrapbooks were compiled and numbered by Schmidt himself, although some of the explanatory text was added by a friend, Dr. Tobias Sigel, who was himself a German immigrant and prominent citizen of Detroit. The scrapbooks are filled with a variety of printed material, photographs, handwritten accounts of sentiments and occasions, and hand-drawn ink illustrations. Much of the scrapbooks' text is in German, including many clippings from German language newspapers. The illustrations in Volume II are particularly attractive. They are hand-drawn red and black ink illustrations of fanciful, legendary themes relating to Walhalla.

The following inventory is a general guide to the contents of each volume. For those scrapbooks that were paginated by Schmidt, specific sections of special interest have been noted in the inventory. Volume 2 also has its own, original index. There is one corresponding folder for each of thirteen of the volumes. These folders contain loose items removed from volumes one through eleven, thirteen, and fourteen.

As the inventory shows, Schmidt was most thorough in documenting his recreational and farming interests, and his political activity in Detroit, at the state level, and in the German-American community. There is, however, very little information about his tannery business.

Minutes of executive committee, 1874-2002 (with some gaps); minutes and proceedings of state convention, 1873-1880; financial records; and roster, 1873-1978, of lodges chartered by Michigan Grange, showing date of charter, location and other data; also records of various defunct local granges.

The records of the Michigan State Grange include minutes and proceedings of the state convention, minutes of the executive committee, financial statements; and rosters and applications for membership of individual chapters of the State Grange. Whenever a local chapter ceased operations, its records would be transferred to the State Grange office. The records of some of these defunct chapters make up the bulk of the State Grange record group. Records of local Granges may include minutes of lodge meetings, financial records and membership lists. The local records are listed in the contents list in the order in which they were received they were received from the state office. Two indexes, one by chapter name and the other by chapter number, should be used to locate the records of a particular chapter. The chapter numbers were assigned consecutively as the chapters were organized. Counties represented in these defunct chapters include Alcona, Antrim, Arenac, Charlevoix, Cheboygan, Chippewa, Crawford, Emmet, Genesee, Gogebic Hillsdale, Iosco, Jackson, Lenawee, Macomb, Marquette, Menominee, Midland, Monroe, Montmorency, Oscoda, Otsego, Sanilac, Saginaw, Schoolcraft, Shiawassee, Tuscola, Washtenaw, and Wayne.

Another portion of the record group includes materials of W. J. Brake, who was a lecturer for the National Grange and who held office for the State Grange.

Other records of the Michigan State Grange were donated to the University Archives and Historical Collections of Michigan State University. The MSU Archives holds the Grange records from the following counties: Allegan, Barry, Benzie, Berrien, Branch, Calhoun, Cass, Clare, Clinton, Eaton, Grand Traverse, Gratiot, Ingham, Ionia, Isabella, Kalamazoo, Kalkaska, Kent, Leelanau, Manistee, Mason, Mecosta, Montcalm, Muskegon, Newaygo, Oceana, Osceola, Otsego, Ottawa, Shiawassee, St. Joseph, Van Buren, and Wexford.