[NOTE: In the Arrangement description, the notation "folder 2-5" means box 2, folder 5.] Scope and Content

This collection consists primarily of over 250 sermons and sermon outlines by Hartman. The majority of these are individually foldered and arranged in two groups: titled and untitled. The titled sermons (folders 1-14 through 1-175) are arranged alphabetically; the untitled ones (folder 1-176 through 1-259) are arranged by Scripture text in keeping with the order of the Bible. Many sermons have dates and places of presentation jotted in the margins. In these cases, the earliest date appears on the folder. These preaching-dates are probably indicative of writing-dates, but this cannot be taken absolutely.

Sermons also appear in folders 1-4, 1-11, 1-12, and 1-13. Folder 1-11 consists of the contents of one envelope in Hartman's papers, labeled "Revival Sermons used at Pleasant Valley and Plain View." These have been kept together to illustrate the range of topics and texts which Hartman night use in any particular series of meetings. The specific rallies in question have been tentatively dated 1917, which puts them in the same year that evangelist Billy Sunday was drawing huge crowds in New York City. Folders

1-4, 1-12, and 1-13 are notebooks which contain sermons, notes and texts that for obvious reasons cannot be interfiled by title with the main run of sermons. Lists of sermons within these volumes are found in each folder.

Although peppered with allusions to the great men of the past--British monarchs, John Bunyan, the Wesleys, the Pilgrim Fathers, Benjamin Franklin, and Abraham Lincoln (an entire sermon, folder 1-100)--Hartman's sermons address themselves to contemporary issues as well. The Titanic disaster (folder 1-174), social activism under the guise of "Christian capitalism" (folder 1-13, pg. 110), patriotic celebrations such as the Fourth of July and Decoration Day (folders 1-47, 48, 70): all these find themselves the subject of Hartman's speaking. Hallmarks of his era are a racist (but not intentionally malicious) poem, "Ringing the Changes" (folder 1-10), and an anti-Mason tract and a piece of Ku Klux Klan smear-tactic literature against presidential candidate Al Smith in 1928 (both folder 1-7). One sermon of special note is "The Minister as a Prize Fighter," an example of early twentieth century analogy concerning manhood. Also of interest is a description of the more memorable events of the Hartmans' sojourn to the Dakota Territory, recorded in his essay, "Through Fire and Storm" (folder 1-2).

box 2 consists of Ira Hartman's diaries (1939-1945, 1947) and his financial ledgers (1929-1932, 1944-1954). The diaries are principally one-line, factual entries apparently filtered from news broadcasts through Hartman onto the diary pages. The supposition that Hartman relied on the radio (rather than newspapers) for his raw material is supported by his marginal notations of broadcast times and often by mention of the reporter's name: H. R. Baukhage during the war years, and Lowell Thomas and Drew Pearson in the 1947 volume. His original spellings (eg. Ugo Slavia and Isenhower) undoubtedly stem from hearing these names without seeing them in print. There is little editorializing on Hartman's part, and his opinion is seldom given. (Three examples of such personal input are January 28, 1939, which relates his fears of encroaching socialism, and January 16, 1941, and January 7, 1945, both of which tell Hartman's opinion of why World War II was being fought.)

The staples of Hartman's diary are local and national crimes and disasters, deaths of famous persons, domestic and foreign politics (especially the presidential elections of 1940, 1944, and 1948), and World War II. The war occupies over ninety percent of the diary, with news both of the warfronts and of the war effort at home. The earlier sections of the diary deal extensively with the "Townsend Plan," an old age pension scheme proposed by Francis E. Townsend, a private citizen. On March 20, 1947, Hartman notes that his and Mrs. Hartman's first pension checks arrived.

No mention is made of Hartman's evangelistic activities, which largely pre-date this diary. He often reports in detail the topics of sermons he has heard, many of which directly concern the war and patriotism, even before Pearl Harbor in December of 1941. He tells about a 1939 Thanksgiving sermon on "God and the American Way," and an October 1940 sermon on God and Americanism in general. Two evangelists' deaths are noted in short entries: Aimee Semple Mc Pherson, October 13, 1944; and Gipsy Smith, August 5, 1947.

The financial ledgers are a parallel log of income and expenses. The volume for 1929-1932 is interesting for its reflection of the economy from the months before the stock market crash to the middle of the Depression's nadir. The volume for 1951-1954 contains brief eulogies of both Rev. and Mrs. Hartman, written by members of the family.