Announcement of the January meeting

Sue (Stratman) White shared a little background on the two Stratman brothers that settled in Dodgeville and founded the Stratman Wagon Works. She then talked a little bit about Warren Stratman-Thomas.

The focus on the day was on Helene Stratman-Thomas, who in the 1940's was the lead on the Wisconsin Folk Music Project. Helene traveled Wisconsin and recorded over 800 folk songs from various cultures.

Marie Sersch, Carolyn Meuer, Gert Peterson, Sue White, Carol Thomas, and Karen Dederich
model some clothing from the Stratman collection.

These are three additional pieces of clothing Sue brought to the meeting.

Marie, Carolyn, Carol & Karen

Stratman Wagon Works

The Stratman Wagon Works was run by Fred W. and brother Carl August.
F.W. was Helene Stratman-Thomas' grandfather.

Warren & Helene Stratman-Thomas (brother and sister)

The Stratman-Thomas Living Room

I'm sure the room was often filled with music. Helene's mother was was a piano teacher.
Helene's brother Warren wrote music.

Helene (Stratman-Thomas) Blotz

The former Stratman-Thomas joined the UW School of Music in 1930 as an instructor in music theory, history, and voice and was named an assistant professor in 1946. In the 1940's, she was a keyplayer in the Wisconsin folk song project. More than 800 songs representing the music of 20 nationalities were recorded during the project. The finished records were sent to the Archive of American Folk Songs in the music division of the Library of Congress.