UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN-MADISON ARCHIVES
ORAL HISTORY PROGRAM

Interview # 969
MARGARET BEATTIE BOGUE

BOGUE, Margaret Beattie (1924- )
Professor Emeritus, University of Wisconsin Extension and University of Wisconsin – Madison Division of Outreach and the College of Letters and Sciences Department of History
At UW:  1966-1991

Interviewed:  2008 
Interviewer:  Sandy Pfahler
Index by: Erin Dix
Length:  2 hours

Abstract:  Margaret Beattie Bogue was born in Washington, D.C., did her undergraduate work at the University of Maryland and received her M.A. and Ph.D. from Cornell University.  She started her career at Vassar College. In 1966 she joined the University of Wisconsin Extension where she was responsible for program planning for American History Outreach as well as teaching and administrative duties.  In 1983 she joined the UW-Madison Division of Outreach and later the Department of History. Her research interests include the environmental history of the Great Lakes and Midwestern agricultural and environmental history.  In 1985 she published the award-winning book, Around the Shores of Lake Michigan: A Guide to Historic Sites, and in 2007 she published the second edition of another award-winning book, Around the Shores of Lake Superior:  A Guide to Historic Sites. This interview was conducted for inclusion in the UW-Madison Oral History Program.   

First Interview Session (June 16, 2008): Digital File

Time	Keywords
00:00:00	Start of Interview/ Interviewer’s Introduction. Bogue spoke about her early life including her childhood in Virginia and Maryland, early education, as well as family history and major influences on her development as a student. She talked about the significance of her undergraduate education at University of Maryland and how it changed her political and social perspectives. She also told a story illustrating the racism she was exposed to as a child.

00:07:20	Bogue discussed her reasons for majoring in history as an undergraduate. She named some of her history professors at the University of Maryland.

00:09:37	Bogue discussed her graduate work at Cornell University. She talked about being a woman PhD candidate in a field dominated by men. She also praised her advisor, Paul Gates, for his enthusiastic acceptance of women PhD candidates. Gates’ research at the time inspired Bogue’s dissertation topic: land use and tenure in the Grand Prairie of Illinois in the late 19th century.

00:14:12	Bogue discussed coming to Wisconsin as a faculty wife. She had met Allan Bogue when he was also a student at Cornell and they married in 1950. They had spent twelve years in Iowa City, where Allan had worked as an assistant and associate professor and they had had three children. Bogue had done a bit of teaching prior to living in Iowa City, and wanted to return to it upon moving to Wisconsin. She gave an overview of her career as an instructor and professor with the University of Wisconsin Extension. 

00:20:00	Bogue talked about her work with the Extension and the UW-Madison Division of Outreach and the variety of tasks that it involved. She detailed her administrative duties, as well as the classes she taught. She taught both non-credit classes for the general adult public in addition to on-campus credit courses for the Extension and Madison campus departments.

00:25:05	Bogue detailed her experiences in teaching non-traditional adult education courses. She said that teaching these students was “a pure delight.” She offered a few examples of programs that arose from current events, including programs related to Black History and the National Bicentennial. 

00:30:12	Bogue discussed the “strong interrelationship” that developed between her credit teaching and her non-credit work.  She also talked about some of the experimental methods of delivery for her non-credit courses, including the use of WHA radio, the Educational Telephone Network (ETN), and televised lectures broadcast on local public television.

00:35:27	Bogue discussed her efforts to “broaden the appeal” of the correspondence study program with new and contemporary course offerings. This included independent reading courses for individuals interested in particular topics, which turned out to be appealing for both teachers and prisoners. She discussed her efforts to revamp the American History Survey courses.

00:41:41	Bogue talked about her research interests, and explained how she became interested in the Great Lakes as a resource.

00:44:03	Bogue offered her thoughts on significant developments in her field of study, as well as her own contributions to the field. She cites Fishing the Great Lakes: An Environmental History, 1783-1933 as her greatest contribution to the field.

00:50:27	Bogue offered her observations on the climate for women on the UW-Madison campus during her career at UW (from 1966 to 1991). She discussed what was considered by some administrators to be “the spouse problem” – or, what to do with the well-educated husbands and wives of hired faculty who are anxious to be employed themselves. She also discussed the hiring of women faculty in the UW-Madison history department.

00:55:24	Bogue detailed her involvement in various professional organizations.

00:57:12	Bogue detailed her life since retiring, including the lives and careers of her children and grandchildren. She also discussed the difficulty she had in balancing work and family. 

01:03:18	End of First Interview Session

Second Interview Session (June 16, 2008): Digital File

Time		Keywords
00:00:00	Bogue explained that the University Extension no longer offered all of the programs that she had been involved with; outreach responsibilities had been dispersed to individual campuses.

00:02:04	Question: Have you been following the Great Lakes compact, in which various states and Canada are joining together? Answer: Bogue was “delighted” that Wisconsin had just signed on. She gives historical background on attempts to reach this kind of cooperation between Canada and the Great Lakes states. 

00:07:32	Bogue talks a bit about the importance of native North Americans in reaching this cooperation. 
		
00:10:36	Question: Are you a fisher? Answer: No; she wouldn’t eat fish with mercury levels as high as they are. Question: Have you seen changes in the Minocqua area, where you have had a cabin for many years? Answer: Bogue said that the area was becoming “Dells-ified,” but that the DNR was taking good care of local water resources. She lamented that it often takes a disaster for people to realize the seriousness of environmental issues.

00:16:45	End of Second Interview Session

End of Oral History #969