Charles Wesley Pool, 1856-1930 [RG2410.AM]

HISTORY NEBRASKA MANUSCRIPT FINDING AID

RG2410.AM: Charles Wesley Pool, 1856-1930

Papers: 1898-1928
Tecumseh, Johnson County, Neb.: Realtor; editor; Nebraska Secretary of State
Size: 1.5 cu.ft.; 3 boxes

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE

Charles Wesley Pool was born in Illinois in 1856. While he was still a boy his family came to settle near Pawnee, Nebraska Territory. He wandered for several years after the death of his father, and in 1874 he became apprenticed to a printer in Illinois. In 1873 he returned to Nebraska, and the next year he became half-owner of the Johnson County Journal, which he was to edit for thirty-five years. He remained a resident of Tecumseh, where he married in 1884.

A staunch Democrat, he was elected to the Nebraska Legislature from a strongly Republican area in 1908, and was elected to be speaker of the Nebraska House. Pool led the fight for the bank guarantee law while in the legislature. In 1910 he was defeated as the Democratic and People’s Independent candidate for the office of Secretary of State, and in 1912 lost the gubernatorial race on the same ticket. In 1913 he was elected president of the Nebraska Press Association, and served until 1914 as deputy commissioner of labor. In 1914 he became the first Democratic to be elected to serve as the Secretary of State in Nebraska. He was reelected to the office in 1916, and again from 1922-1926. Pool had again filed for office when he died at Lincoln in July of 1930.

SCOPE AND CONTENT NOTE

This collection consists of three manuscript boxes of material arranged in five series: 1) Correspondence, 1893-1930; 2) Addresses; 3) Political material; 4) Manuscript; and 5) Miscellany. The bulk of this material consists of correspondence dated from 1918-1920. This correspondence relates mainly to Pool’s 1918 campaign for reelection, and to land transactions of the Pool-Smith Land Company, dealing mainly with property holdings in eastern Colorado.

Correspondents include his brothers, and business and political associates, some of whom were: Christ Anderson, 1919; Samuel Avery, 1911; William Jennings Bryan, 1910; Hugh L. Cooper, 1920; H.P. Fitzimmons, 1915; Earl B. Gaddis, 1918; Gilbert Monell Hitchcock, 1919; Moses P. Kinkaid, 1918; George L. Loomis, 1920; John Mackie, 1919-1920; Niels Mikkelsen, 1918; John H. Morehead, 1912-1920; Keith Neville, 1921; G.L. Shumway, 1918-1920; C.J. Smythe, 1898; Albert Watkins, 1912.

See the photo component [RG2410.PH] for related images. See the Nebraska History index and the Library catalog for published materials by or about Charles Pool. See the Public Records collection [RG0002] for official records of the Secretary of State.

INVENTORY

Series 1 – Correspondence, 1893-1930

Box 1
Folder

  1. 1893-1898
  2. 1910-1914
  3. 1915-1917
  4. 1918
  5. 1918
  6. 1918
  7. 1919
  8. 1919

Box 2
Folder

  1. 1919
  2. 1919
  3. 1919
  4. 1920
  5. 1920
  6. 1920

Box 3
Folder

  1. 1921
  2. 1922-1928
  3. 1930; unidentified and fragmented

Series 2 – Addresses

  1. Undated political speeches

Series 3 – Political material

  1. 1928 Democratic State Platform; election and voting figures; list of state officeholders; lists of Democratic voters
  2. Campaign clippings, not dated
  3. Election certificates, 1914 and 1916

Series 4 – Manuscript

  1. Fifteen pages, typewritten, concerning the guaranty of bank deposits

Series 5 – Miscellany

  1. Includes invitations; income tax worksheets for 1919 and 1920; receipts; land deeds; obituaries of Charles Pool

Subject headings:

Aksala Chemical Company (Chicaco, Ill.)
Anderson, Christ
Banks and banking — Nebraska
Bryan, William Jennings, 1860-1925
Cooper, Hugh L., 1853-1923
Democratic Party — Nebraska
Elections — Nebraska — 1918
Gaddis, Earl B., ?-1923
Hitchcock, Gilbert Monell, 1859-1934
Kinkaid, Moses Pierce, 1850-1922
Loomis, George Linden, 1849-1932
Mikkelson, Niels, 1876-1955
Morehead, John Henry, 1861-1942
Nebraska. Secretary of State
Neville, Keith, 1886-1959
Pool, Charles Wesley, 1856-1930
Pool-Smith Land Company (Lincoln, Neb.)
Real estate business — Colorado
Real estate business — Nebraska
Shumway, Grant Lee, 1865-1925
Smith, William H.
Watkins, Albert, 1848-1923

DAB/HEK/jlc 05-06-1966
retyped ht 04-15-1975
Encoded TMM 03-07-2011

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