William F. Montavon was born July 14, 1874 in Scioto County, Ohio, to John Baptist and Mary (Muller) Montavon. He attended Holy Redeemer parochial school from 1880-1887 and then moved on to St. Edward's College in Berlin, Ontario, until 1888. Montavon received his A.B. from Notre Dame University in 1893. He spent two years teaching in Watertown, Wisconsin, before going to Paris, France, to attend L'Institute de Sainte Croix from 1895-1897. Upon returning to the United States, he enrolled at The Catholic University of America as a member of the College of the Holy Cross to do graduate work in Social Science. However in April, 1901, Montavon left the Congregation of the Holy Cross and CU without obtaining a degree.
He married Mary Agnes Burrow in December of 1901 (d. 1940; m. Leocadia Kerby, 1942) and the following year became superintendent of schools in the Philippine Islands. Holding this position until 1915, he then took an appointment as U.S. Commercial attaché to Peru, Bolivia, Ecuador and Chile. Montavon stayed in South America after leaving this position in 1918, seizing the opportunity to be the executive representative for the International Petroleum Company in Peru. Deciding to leave in 1925, he obtained the directorship of the Legal Department (now Office of the General Counsel) of the National Catholic Welfare Conference (NCWC), predecessor of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB). His earlier career and knowledge of Spanish and French were especially important in preparing him for this post, as he focused the efforts of the department on the problems in the Americas, especially the turmoil in Mexico, and tried to raise awareness of the situation in Spain.
While in this post he obtained numerous accolades and appointments that were complementary to the department. In 1930, President Hoover appointed him to the Forbes Commission to Haiti. His job was to be a press correspondent to the Catholic Papers in the U.S., but he was also influential in aiding the efforts to improve conditions on the island.
Soon after, he and his good friend John J. Burke, who was the general secretary directing the Executive Department of NCWC, traveled with Archbishop Ruiz to Mexico to help alleviate the tension between the state and the Catholic Church. This trip was instrumental in the decision of the Mexican government to allow the return of the clergy and legal public worship. Following this appointment, he served the NCWC News Service in 1931 as correspondent to the Constitutional Assembly in Spain. Besides these appointments, he received an honorary doctor of laws from the University of Dayton, Ohio, in 1931, received the Catholic Action Medal in 1939, and was honored by the Holy Father with the title, Knight Commander of the Order of St. Gregory the Great in 1929.
Throughout his career, Montavon lectured and published on the subjects such as health, education and welfare. Some of his publications include: Haiti, past and present, 1930 and Insurrection in Spain, 1937, as well as additions to Catholic Action, the NCWC's newsletter. In addition, he was a member of many associations and groups, such as the Knights of Columbus, American Academy of Political and Social Science, Catholic Association for International Peace and the American Catholic Historical Association.
The Montavon papers span 1914-1954, with the majority falling between 1924 and 1952, his time as director of the Legal Department. However, the papers are not exclusive to his work at the department and constitute a mixture of both business and personal papers. The correspondence series is the largest part of the collection consisting of over half the collection. The other large series, Publications and Publicity Materials, was created out of several original groupings, now subseries, to show their interrelation. Finally, there are two small series of one folder each, Photographs and Biographical Materials.
Series 1: Correspondence, was kept under its original categories and divided into Subseries 1.1: Letters Received, 1925(1925-1951)1954, and Subseries 1.2 Letters Sent, 1925(1925-1952)1954. These subseries are each arranged chronologically with undated materials appearing at the end of the year in which they were originally placed. When received and sent correspondence were glued together, a copy of one, sent or received, was made and placed in the opposite location from the original. The majority of materials cover areas such as the problems in Mexico and Spain and legal department matters from legislative concerns to legal assistance for Catholics. Another oddity of this series is that some of the Letters Sent are not by Montavon but by his secretary or the assistant director, Eugene Butler.
Series 2: Publications and Publicity Materials, as mentioned above, is an umbrella series that was created out of several series of materials because of their similarity. Throughout all these subseries, published materials are intermingled with those in typescript and in draft format which makes it difficult to determine whether an item was published or not. In addition, it was decided that the original series would be kept to retain the original order but they would be grouped under one large series in order to show that these subseries contain a similar presentation of information that was meant in some way for public dissemination.
Subseries 2.1, Addresses and Lectures, spans 1927(1931-1945)1945 and contains a variety of addresses and lectures. A large portion are by Montavon. The few remaining are by other authors. One of Montavon's writing sets appearing in this subseries is entitled "The Second Spanish Republic and The Catholic Church."
Subseries 2.2, Articles, is comprised of both printed and typewritten materials, and roughly spans 1931-1937, focusing on the problems in Spain. It is only partially chronological, though, with three large groups of distinct materials that have been separated: Boston Evening Transcript, article series on Mexico; Filmor, a publication in Spanish that was originally placed with the articles; and a series entitled "The Truth About Spain." The last folder in this series contains miscellaneous articles arranged by date.
Subseries 2.3, News Releases, is a mixture of printed and typewritten items in both English and Spanish mostly on the situation in Spain covering the years 1924-1951. Some of these are copies of official NC NEWS press releases.
Subseries 2.4, Newspaper Clippings, is a large group of clipped articles from various papers and has been left in its original chronological arrangement from 1926-1938. The condition of this subseries is extremely poor and it was determined to be too difficult to copy due to its volume and varied size.
Subseries 2.5, Reports, is comprised of two groups of materials: Legal Department Reports and Related Materials and NCWC History and Related Materials. The Legal Department file spans 1929-1935 and contains various reports on matters pertaining to the legal department. The NCWC History material dates from 1948 and is a mix of draft histories of various departments in NCWC by the respective department and a merged final version.
Subseries 2.6, Miscellaneous Publications, is the final subseries of the Publications and Publicity Materials series. These publications are arranged chronologically by publication date and form a varied group. Items appear in English and Spanish and cover 1914(1926-1950)1950.
Series 3: Photographs, consists of only one folder with twenty-three images. The majority date from the mid to late 1930's (dating obtained from original folder - not on items) and show the ravages of war in Spain.
Series 4: Biographical Materials, existed as such under the original order of the papers and was left intact. It contains a variety of materials about Montavon and his activities including versions of his Curriculum Vitae.
The William Frederick Montavon Papers consists of four series:
There are no access restrictions.
The Special Collections of the University Libraries at The Catholic University of America:
CUA Rector's Office Files, (re: Philippine appointment), [Bx 3; F 21: Early-Evans 1891-1901]
Other Repositories:
This record series is indexed under the following controlled access subject terms.
Donated by William F. Montavon, William R. Consedine, and the NCWC Legal Department in 1951 and 1959.
Processing completed in 1998 by Jennifer E. Jukes. EAD markup completed in March 2006 by Cathey Dugan and Jordan Patty. EAD revisions in 2013 by Michael J. Dobbs.
Subseries 1.1 contains a mixture of personal and business correspondence received touching on subjects such as Spain, Mexico, Catholicism and Legal Department matters.
Subseries 1.2 contains sent correspondence. This subseries also contains some items written by Montavon's secretaries and the Assistant Director, Eugene Butler.
Subseries 2.1 contains a variety of Montavon's addresses and lectures and some by others to whom he responded. The subject matter centers mostly around Spain.
Subseries 2.2 contains articles, some written by Montavon, both published and unpublished, including a series by Montavon for the Boston Evening Transcript and one entitled "The Truth About Spain."
Subseries 2.3 contains a variety of news releases, some typewritten on onion skin, others NC NEWS printed ones, mostly covering the situation in Spain. Some releases are in Spanish.
Subseries 2.4 consists of a variety of clipped newspaper articles in both English and Spanish. No apparent arrangement besides rough dating on the original folders.
Subseries 2.5 contains Legal Department reports and materials relating to their compilation as well as a report with supporting materials on the history of NCWC.
Subseries 2.6 contains a variety of printed documents in English and Spanish arranged by publication date.
A mixture of twenty-three images, most of which are of the war in Spain.
dates 1936-1939 obtained from original folder - do not appear on items
Variety of materials about Montavon, including versions of his curriculum vitae.