Helmut Knies (left), archival supervisor for the Wisconsin Historical Society, and Jonathan Nelson, collection development archivist, look at a poster for Walter Kohler's 1930s campaign for Wisconsin governor. The poster is housed at the Wisconsin Historical Society in Madison. Credit: Joe Koshollek / for the Journal Sentinel

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Remember all those brochures and fliers pretty much every Wisconsin voter received in the mail this fall?

Helmut Knies kept his. So did Jonathan Nelson.

They're not pack rats - they're archivists.

The Wisconsin Historical Society employees were busy during elections this month saving a Sportsmen for Tommy (Thompson) brochure featuring a picture of the former governor and U.S. Senate candidate with a large buck; Obama and Romney bumper stickers; a Tammy Baldwin for Senate poster; and other items.

While it may seem that archives are filled with things donated decades later when folks find their ancestor's Civil War diary or want to clean out the attic and get rid of grandma's collection of turn-of-the-century State Fair programs, actually much is collected right away. And that includes election memorabilia.

"We have a history of collecting in the moment," said Knies, archival supervisor at the Wisconsin Historical Society. "The society has a long tradition going back decades of collecting contemporary history. As best we can, we try to keep up that."

They also keep up with rapidly evolving campaign strategies. So while they collect campaign ephemera such as yard signs, posters, buttons and fliers, the historical society archivists also spend much time acquiring social media information. Saved for posterity were the official campaign websites, Facebook pages and YouTube and Twitter accounts for Wisconsin's U.S. Senate hopefuls. Once the primaries were over, the archivists visited social media and websites regularly to make screen saves.

They also save the websites of politicians on their last day in office, because once they leave, their website goes away. The archivists did that for Gov. James Doyle and Sen. Russ Feingold and will do that in a few weeks for Sen. Herb Kohl and Baldwin's House website once she moves to the U.S. Senate.

"We're finding so much comes out so quickly and it's so ephemeral and it goes away on the web. It's more important to act quickly and capture something before it changes or goes away," said Knies.

Websites and social media from Wisconsin politicians and political campaigns can be accessed at www.archive-it.org.

Nelson and Knies visited campaign offices to collect such things as posters and brochures, talking points for supporters and campaign literature hung on doorknobs. They also ask for papers and documents related to the campaign, but depending on whether the candidate is a winner or loser, it can be difficult or impossible to obtain them.

"With materials designed for promotional purposes, people are overjoyed when you say you want them for the archives," said Knies. "But then we'll have a discussion and say 'OK, are you interested in donating things from behind the scenes?' That can be difficult. It might take months or years."

Plus some candidates and their staffs don't hang onto items, or their records and memorabilia are given to another entity. The Wisconsin Historical Society asked for Fighting Bob LaFollette's papers as far back as the 1920s, but they were given to the Library of Congress. Sen. Joe McCarthy's papers were given to his alma mater, Marquette University. However, the society recently acquired decades of U.S. Rep. Dave Obey's papers.

"The reality is that some candidates, even successful candidates - even if you ask and they know you're interested - don't necessarily keep things you would want them to keep," said Nelson, election development archivist for the Wisconsin Historical Society. "That's the reality of the archival world. There are things we wish were in the historical record but for whatever reason they don't survive."

The archives are used by students, researchers, authors and anyone who has an interest in seeing and reading items saved for posterity.

Baldwin's 2012 U.S. Senate poster and Thompson's campaign brochures will join other election artifacts saved by the Wisconsin Historical Society, including former Gov. Lee Dreyfus' red vest, Joe McCarthy's campaign literature, 1860 presidential election tickets printed by Democrats and Republicans to hand out to voters - and audio interviews of John F. Kennedy when he arrived at Madison's Truax Field in 1960 to campaign in Wisconsin.