Arnell Engstrom served in the Michigan House of Representatives from 1940 to 1968. The Arnell Engstrom Papers, however, only document his activities from approximately 1955 through 1970, with the papers being strongest for the years 1960 to 1968.
The papers are divided into three series: Correspondence Files, Legislative Files, and a small Personal series. This arrangement is a combination of the original arrangement of the materials (the Correspondence Files and the Legislative Files) and an artificial arrangement of some materials that document Engstrom's personal activities.
Arnell Engstrom was born June 6, 1897 at Traverse City, Michigan. A high school graduate, Engstrom married the former Mareda Heiges in 1919, with whom he had one son, Richard.
Engstrom was co-owner of the Engstrom-Hicks Insurance agency. In 1940 he was elected by the 104th Representative District (encompassing the counties of Benzie, Grand Traverse, Leelanau, Wexford and parts of Kalkaska and Missaukee) to the Michigan House of Representatives, a post to which he was subsequently reelected fourteen times. At the time of his departure from the legislature in 1968 he was the longest serving legislator in the state.
Throughout his career in the House, Engstrom established himself as a prominent Republican and representative of northern lower Michigan. Sitting on the powerful Ways and Means Committee, a committee which he chaired for the last twelve years of his career, Engstrom became one of the more influential members of the House. In addition to his chairmanship of the Ways and Means Committee, Engstrom served on several other committees, among them the Committee on Higher Education.
In addition to his career in the state legislature, Engstrom was actively involved in his Traverse City community. He served on the city's board of supervisors, the city commission and the local school board and was also a founding trustee of the Northwestern Michigan College. These activities were supplemented by his involvement with membership in the Congregational Church, as well as the local Elks, Masons and Kiwanis Clubs.
Engstrom was an active outdoorsman and conservationist who enjoyed both hunting and fishing. He usually joined several friends on a yearly hunting trip to Canada and in 1957 he traveled with a group to the African continent for a successful safari big game hunt.
