AMERICAN IMMIGRATION COMPANY:

The American Immigration Company (AIC) was organized in 1906 as a joint effort of numerous lumber firms, established to pool their almost 500,000 acres of cutover lands in northern Wisconsin and sell them to potential farmers. The largest landholder in the group was the Mississippi River Logging Company; the others were the Chippewa Lumber and Boom Company; the Northwestern Lumber Company; the Laird, Norton Company; the Nebagamon Lumber Company; C. Lamb and Sons; Weyerhaeuser and Rutledge; the North Wisconsin Lumber Company; the Potlatch Timber Company; and the Chippewa Farm Land Company. The company advertised and sold land, mainly to individual farmers, built roads, and in general labored to promote settlement in the area. Initially headquartered in Chippewa Falls, Wisconsin, in 1929 the offices moved to Hayward, Wisconsin, to be nearer to the company's lands. The company continued to operate until its dissolution in 1940.

Return to top

The American Immigration Company (AIC) Records consist of correspondence, minutes, stock records, land contracts and deeds, land sale and tax records, maps and plats, financial records, and advertisements. They deal mainly with the formation and management of the company and with various aspects of the promotion and sale of its cutover lands in northern Wisconsin. There is information about land utilization, land companies, land prices, the movement of population, relations with the purchasers of the land, sale of timber from the land, the lumber and forest products industries, explorations for iron ore by E. J. Longyear, land taxation, the AIC's cooperation with other land owners in tax associations, and abandonment of land for tax delinquency. In addition to its nine constituent companies, major correspondents included the British-American Land and Investment Company, the Soo Line Catholic Colonization Company, Frederick E. Weyerhaeuser, the Wisconsin Advancement Association, and the Wisconsin Colonization Company.

Also included with the collection are the organizational and financial records of the American Colonization Company, which represented an abortive attempt in 1906-1907 of an associate company to attract foreign immigrants to AIC lands; correspondence of the Homeseekers Land Company, Chippewa Falls, Wisconsin; and miscellaneous legal papers of the Maple Farms Land Company, the British-American Land and Investment Company, and several of the AIC's nine joint owners.

Return to top

Availability:

The collection is open for research use.

Preferred Citation:

[Indicate the cited item and/or series here]. American Immigration Company (Chippewa Falls, Wis.). Corporate Records. Minnesota Historical Society.

See the Chicago Manual of Style for additional examples.

Accession Information:

Accession number: 6247a; 7188; 9066; 9753; 16,945

Processing Information:

Processed by: David B. Peterson, December 2014

Catalog ID number: 990017319600104294

Return to top

This collection is indexed under the following headings in the catalog of the Minnesota Historical Society. Researchers desiring materials about related topics, persons or places should search the catalog using these headings.

Topics:

Agricultural colonies -- Wisconsin.

Agriculture -- Wisconsin.

Land companies -- Wisconsin.

Land value taxation -- Wisconsin.

Lumbering -- Wisconsin.

Real estate business -- Wisconsin.

Real property -- Wisconsin.

Weyerhaeuser records.

Persons:

Ainsworth, E. L., author.

Albright, Henry, author.

Barber, J. T., author.

Bell, Frederic Sommers, 1859-1938, author.

Campbell, A. D., author.

Delaney, C. F., author.

Emerson, Norman, author.

Fair, J. R., author.

Gates, James L. (James Leslie), 1850-1911, author.

Idding, F. W., author.

Irvine, Thomas, 1841-1930, author.

Irvine, William, 1851-1921, author.

Kandutsch, Hugo, author.

Longyear, Edmund J. (Edmund Joseph), 1864- , author.

Mahan, J. W., author.

McKusick, Harrison J., 1855-1937, author.

McLaine, Thomas, author.

Miller, Charles J., author.

Uecke, A. C., author.

Weyerhaeuser, Frederick, 1834-1914, author.

Organizations:

American Colonization Company, author.

Bohemian-American Land and Loan Company (Phillips, Wis.), author.

British-American Land and Investment Company (Saint Paul, Minn.), author.

Catholic Colonization Society, U.S.A. (Chicago, Ill.), author.

Chippewa Farm Land Company (Chippewa Falls, Wis.), author.

Flambeau River Lumber Company (Ladysmith, Wis.), author.

Homeseekers Land Company, author.

International Endowment Association (Minneapolis, Minn.), author.

International Realty (Minneapolis, Minn.), author.

Maple Farms Land Company, author.

Mississippi River Logging Company (Davenport, Iowa), author.

Nebagamon Lumber Company (Chippewa Falls, Wis.), author.

North Western Lumber Company (Eau Claire, Wis.), author.

North Wisconsin Taxpayers Association (Park Falls, Wis.), author.

Polish-American Colonization Company (Chicago, Ill.), author.

Potlatch Timber Company, author.

Soo Line Catholic Colonization Company (Saint Paul, Minn.), author.

Weyerhaeuser and Rutledge Company (Chippewa Falls, Wis.), author.

Wisconsin Advancement Association (Milwaukee, Wis.), author.

Wisconsin Colonization Company (Eau Claire, Wis.), author.

Wisconsin Potato Growers Association (Madison, Wis.), author.

Wisconsin. Conservation Department, author.

Places:

Wisconsin -- Emigration and immigration.

Document Types:

Maps -- Wisconsin.

Return to top