Biography
Elmer Luchterhand, who used the name Elmer Lochner, was a Wisconsin Communist organizer, journalist and later a sociologist. Police jailed him on June 8, 1932 after he led an unemployment protest in Madison. He was transferred to the state hospital at Mendota and remained confined until June 18, when the court ordered his release. The International Labor Defense challenged the commitment, and supporters protested in Madison. In 1936 he was prosecuted with George Loh after tearing down a Nazi flag at a Milwaukee picnic. Luchterhand later served in the U.S. Army in Europe and conducted interviews with concentration-camp survivors. He became a sociology professor at Brooklyn College and continued his research after retirement.
Kranebitter (2017), pp. 216–217 and notes 5–8, cites the Dane County jail register (Series 4, volume 9) recording his and Edward Pollock's June 8, 1932 arrests for disorderly conduct and violation of the city traffic ordinance, with $200 bail paid for each. Luchterhand was then sent to Mendota for observation. The cited Mendota admission/discharge register (Series 2166, volume 10, p. 159) records release by court order June 18, 1932. The article reports a June 16 public meeting demanding his release. These archival citations corroborate the existing June 8–18 case; payment of bail did not end the subsequent hospital confinement. The psychiatric labels quoted from historical records are attributed institutional claims. Page 230, citing his daughter Erika's 2017 interview, also reports the family moved to Canada in 1953–1958 under Cold War political pressure; this does not establish judicial exile or another imprisonment. Source: https://tidsskrift.dk/Serendipities/article/download/122713/169838/257405
Kranebitter and Fleck’s introduction to the 2018 edition reproduces the June 18, 1932 Wisconsin State Journal release report and cites the Dane County jail and Mendota admission/discharge registers. It specifies transfer from jail to the psychiatric hospital on the day after the June 8 arrest, quotes the historical institutional diagnosis as a claim rather than endorsing it, and describes a June 16 release protest. It connects the Elmer Lochner name to the 1936 Milwaukee anti-Nazi picnic arrest, citing the July 28 newspaper without treating publication as the arrest day. The introduction also documents Army service from March 1943 to March 1946, completion of his Wisconsin dissertation in 1953, and his Brooklyn College appointment in 1967. These details supplement the established custody cases without adding another ten-day period. Source: https://www.newacademicpress.at/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/Leseprobe_Luchterhand.pdf#page=14; PDF pages15–17,29.
