William S. Lagen was the only child of Marc Lagen and Emily Schupp.
Emily was a modern dancer who took the stage name
Arranged in 7 accessions:
Correspondence, financial records, journals, ledgers, catch records, reports and blueprints primarily of three family whaling companies: Consolidated Whaling Corporation, North Pacific Sea Products and American Pacific Sea Products. Also includes family letters and photographs, diaries, memorabilia, publications and other items about whaling; related materials of the Schupp and Lagen families and their business interests; business records of William S. Lagen in Akutan, Alaska and in the Seattle area; and interviews with Lagen.
Some records are stored offsite; advance notice required for use.
Open to all users, but access to portions of the papers restricted. Contact Special Collections for more information.
Some records are stored offsite; advance notice required for use.
Consolidated Whaling Corporation operated six or seven "killer" boats along the coast of British Columbia, first at Sechart and Kyoquot. These stations operated into the 1920s, after which Consolidated's boats then whaled from stations at Rose Harbor and Naden Harbor in the Queen Charlotte Islands.
These companies were probably the last full scale whaling operations in North America. Dwindling catches, rising labor costs and poor prices paid by their primary customer, Proctor and Gamble, contributed to the decline of the companies, but World War II was the final blow. During the war, the American boats were leased to the U.S. Coast Guard and Akutan was leased to the Navy, which turned it over to the Russians. When the Russians left, they dismantled and removed the station. After the war, American Pacific attempted to recover its losses from the Navy.
Records are stored offsite; advance notice required for use.
No attempt was made in arranging the papers to separate materials of the three companies represented because of the interconnections among them. Some of the journals and ledgers begin as North Pacific and change to American Pacific in about 1926-1928. The correspondence is predominantly American Pacific, although there is a substantial interorganizational correspondence with Consolidated Whaling and a lesser amount of other correspondence of Consolidated. The financial records have been grouped by company. Some of the financial reports also contain statistics of whales caught.
In 1983 and 1984, several missing catch records were replaced with copies made by Stephen Leatherwood during his research. They were accessioned as 2292-003 and added to this accession Box 11. They are catch and production records for Sechart, Bay City, Naden Harbor, Rose Harbor, Kyuquot and Akutan stations, 1908-1923; not known if this is complete. In August 1984, the missing catch records were returned from an unknown source.
The Provincial Archives in Victoria B.C. has pilot house logs from Consolidated Whaling's Canadian stations. The last 6 pages from Consolidated Whaling Corp., Canadian Stations, 1925-39 catch records were found in Fisheries-Oceanography Library and returned to Manuscripts via National Marine Mammal Library, NOAA.
Contents of microfilms: North Pacific Sea Products, American Pacific Whaling Company and Consolidated Whaling Corporation; stations at Akutan, Port Hobron, Bay City, Kyuquot, Rose Harbor, Naden Harbor, 1924-1939; Consolidated Whaling Corporation: Canadian stations, 1925-1943; American Pacific Whaling Company and Consolidated Whaling corporation: Canadian stations, 1936-1943.
Positive microfilm copies are available in Accession No. 2292-009.
Negatives of three individual pages from log books and catch record in Accession No. 2292-001.
The papers include correspondence, in German, and photographs of Lagen's maternal antecedents (Lagen's mother's parents and maternal grandparents, in German); materials from his paternal side, as well as correspondence of both his parents. Correspondence and photographs date from the 1890s. Business records from the Schupp businesses (insurance, Pawling Manor, and the American Whaling Company) date from the early 1900s. Includes photographs of family life in the 1920s and 1930s, mostly from the Seattle-Bellevue area, but also from the Port Hobron whaling station in Alaska from the mid-1930s. Also includes memorabilia from Lagen's childhood, from his years at the United States Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland, and from his years as an officer in the United States Navy; records from Trident Foods, a business venture in Akutan, Alaska; records from Meydenbauer Bay Marina, built by Lagen's mother and stepfather, and enlarged by Lagen; blueprints, maps and navigational charts. Includes some papers and memorabilia from Lagen's years on Bellevue's city council and other civic activities.
Major figures in this accession include Lagen's maternal grandparents, Emily Victoria (Kugler) Schupp (1868-1922) and William Schupp (1864-1948), his mother Emily (Schupp) Lagen (later Grill; also stage name as dancer "Lada") (1889-1964), and his father Marc Aloysius Lagen (1882-1946).
The box numbering in this accession (Boxes 1-14) is continued in Accession No. 2292-008 (Boxes 15-22).
The oral history interview was conducted by Carolyn S. McClurkan on April 10, 2002. This accession includes the audiotape masters and a 62 page transcript of the interview.
The box numbering in this accession (Boxes 15-22) continues the sequence started in accession 2292-007 (Boxes 1-14).
Content of microfilms--Reels 1-3: North Pacific Sea Products, American Pacific Whaling Company and Consolidated Whaling Corporation; stations at Akutan, Port Hobron, Bay City, Kyuquot, Rose Harbor, Naden Harbor, 1924-1939. Content of Reel 4: Stations at Rose Harbor, Naden Harbor, Port Hobron, Akutan, Kyuquot, Bay City, 1919-1939.
Positive microfilm created by Preservation Resources from the original negative microfilm reels that form accession # 2292-004.