USA > Iowa > Polk County > Pioneers of Polk County, Iowa, and reminiscences of early days, Vol. II > Part 26
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October Seventh, 1906.
RICHARD T. WELLSLAGER
RICHARD T. WELLSLAGER
A N early settler of Des Moines who became actively and prom- inently identified with its business enterprises was Richard T. Wellslager.
Born in Washington County, Maryland, April Eighteenth, 1834, of German ancestry on the father's side, and Irish on that of the mother, when two years old, his parents removed to Rich- land County, Ohio, where his boyhood days were passed acquiring such an education as the common schools of that period afforded during the Winter months, and in Summer helping to fell the for- est and open up a few more acres to cultivation in that then densely timbered country.
In 1852, when eighteen years old, he began teaching school dur- ing Winters for eighteen to twenty dollars per month, and board among the patrons. In Summer, he continued farm work.
In February, 1855, he concluded Iowa was a better country, and, by railroad, came via Chicago to Davenport, thence by stage to Oskaloosa, arriving February Thirteenth, after four days' bouncing over the frozen ground-the first day to Muscatine, the second to Iowa City, the third to Fairfield, the fourth to destina- tion. He immediately secured a clerkship in the Postoffice, where he so thoroughly gained the good-will and favor of the people he served for two years as Deputy, that, regardless of politics, he was unanimously recommended for Postmaster, and in July, 1857, he received the appointment from President Buchanan. He served until April, 1861, when he resigned. While he was Postmaster, he edited and published the Oskaloosa Times one year.
Governor Kirkwood having, at the time of his resignation, called a special session of the Legislature to provide ways and means to put the state on a war footing, he, with a few friends, came to Des Moines to be in at the opening, and while he was making observations in the town one day, he was greatly surprised with a
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notification that he had been elected Assistant Secretary of the Senate, a favor entirely unexpected. He accepted, and served to the close of the session, May Twenty-ninth.
Warren Hussey, having resigned as Cashier of B. F. Allen's Bank, the place was offered to Wellslager, and accepted. Being a bachelor,, "heart whole and fancy free," with no "strings" attach- ing him to Oskaloosa, he decided to make Des Moines his future residence, and in October, 1862, he became a victim of the charms of Anna, eldest daughter of Harmon Beekman, a leading merchant and prominent citizen from 1857 to 1868, and he joined the ranks of home-builders.
In January, 1865, he resigned the cashiership and went to New York with "Deacon" S. V. White, to join the bulls and bears of Wall Street, but an experience of twelve months brought the con- viction that it was not the place for him. March First, 1866, he returned and joined Wesley Redhead in the book and stationery business in Sherman Block, on Court Avenue.
In 1867, Redhead retired from active membership in the firm, to devote his time to developing his extensive coal properties, leav- ing Wellslager and his younger brother, Marion, whom old-timers will remember as a young man of most sterling qualities, to build up the business, which continued until 1877, when Marion found that to keep step with Richard was "the pace that kills," and he withdrew, went to Kansas, where he deceased in 1894, leaving a record of highly meritorious and exemplary character.
By the exercise of vigorous enterprise and energy, the business grew, so that in 1871, to secure better facilities, it was moved to a three-story brick, erected and equipped for the business at Four Hundred and Eleven Court Avenue, near the present Postoffice.
In 1876, the firm purchased forty-four feet at Four Hundred and Seven and Four Hundred and Nine Court Avenue, where was erected and equipped the largest and best book, stationery, and wall paper house west of Chicago. Wall paper trade was made a spe- cialty, to handle which a large storage and shipping warehouse at Eleventh and Vine was required, and the firm was recognized as the third largest wall paper jobbers in the United States, their trade extending to Minnesota, South Dakota, Missouri, Nebraska,
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Kansas, Colorado, and Wyoming, necessitating the employment of thirty to forty men on the road and in the house.
As an evidence of the impetus given the jobbing trade of the city at that comparatively early day, the business of the firm, in 1866, amounted to thirty thousand dollars. In 1882, seventeen years later, it was nearly half a million dollars, the result of unre- mitting hard work. The name of Redhead & Wellslager hecame familiar throughout Iowa and adjoining states, and Des Moines gained some prestige as a trade center.
Had there been more firms in those days like that, and Mills & Company, to bend their energies in building up a jobbing trade, "manifest destiny," the pride and boast of the town in the early Sixties, would now be an accomplished fact. There would be no necessity for a "Committee of Three Hundred" to boost it out of the Slough of Despond.
In 1883, after seventeen years of strenuous effort to crowd twenty-six hours' labor into twenty-four, Wellslager found there was a limit to nerve strain and human endurance. His physician advised him to cut loose, relax, and take a rest in a climate more favorable to an indicated pulmonary diathesis, which he did, going to Florida and California during the Winter months.
The business was removed to Six Hundred and Seven and Six Hundred and Nine Locust Street, and continued under the name of Redhead, Norton, Lathrop & Company until after the decease of Mr. Redhead, in 1891, and was closed in 1894 or 1895.
In September, 1887, Mr. Wellslager having fully recuperated his physical condition, accepted the cashiership of the Des Moines National Bank, succeeding the following January to the presidency -with the deposits one hundred and sixty thousand dollars. By his sagacious management, in 1892, the bank reported to the Comp- troller of the Currency, its deposits were one million dollars, the first statement of the kind made up to that time by any bank in Des Moines, showing deposits of one million dollars.
In May, 1891, Mr. Wellslager sought and was instrumental in securing an order from the Comptroller of the Currency, making Des Moines a Reserve City for national banking associations, an acquisition of immense advantage to the city and its business activi- ties. Under the national bank statutes, every national bank is
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required to keep at all times a certain per cent of reserve, and three- fifths of such reserve may consist of balances due from banks in reserve cities. All national banks in Iowa had to keep their reserve balances in banks in Chicago, Omaha, Saint Paul, and Eastern money centers. By this change, they could keep such balances on deposit with the banks in Des Moines. It was also of great benefit to the national banks of the city, and added many thousand dollars to their deposits. It also gave Des Moines special advantages in times of money stringency, for it is then miscellaneous bank bal- ances are closely drawn and centered in cities where they can be counted as reserve.
The year 1893 was a panicky one for banks and bankers, and after safely piloting his bank through the breakers, Wellslager determined to avoid for all time a repetition of his experiences of the year, and on January Eighteenth, 1894, he resigned the presidency.
During his active business career, he helped to organize several financial institutions, among which were the Des Moines National Bank, Polk County Savings Bank, Security Loan and Trust Com- pany, German Savings Bank, Central State Bank, Cooperative Bank of Iowa, Polk County Loan and Building Association, and with the management he was prominently identified. For many years, he was a large stockholder in and until recently a Director in the State Insurance Company. During recent years, he has been less strenuous and aggressive-is more inclined to let others stand the brunt of things; but he is not on the retired list. He is closely identified with the Central State Bank, where he has private quarters, devoting his time at his ease, mainly with his personal affairs.
As a business man, integrity, strict exactness, method and relia- bility are noted features of all his business transactions. His word always is as good as his bond.
He is of nervous, sanguine temperament, positive, slow to yield convictions once fixed-in fact, his phrenological bump of firmness is pretty fully developed. He is quiet, unassuming, inclined to taciturnity, shuns notoriety, has no ambition to be "in the public eye;" yet, withal, he is affable, genial, and agreeable in contact
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RICHARD T. WELLSLAGER
and manner. He is not a member of any clubs or fraternal organizations.
A marked characteristic of him during his mercantile business career, was his strict regularity. His home was two doors from my residence, and as "rapid transit" means to his store he had a favorite pacer, and so regular and precise was his going and com- ing, the neighbors and residents along the way used to say they could set their clocks by it, and so it was at the store, where he was the first to arrive and the last to leave.
Politically, he was a War Democrat, but since he came to Des Moines has not sought nor held any political office, yet has taken an interest in political affairs, and, in a quiet, but not less effective way, has exerted a potent influence in behalf of the dominant prin- ciples of the Republican party and good civic government.
Religiously, he is not a member of any denominational church, but is broad and catholic in his views.
The stork has brought to his home but one child, a daughter, the wife of J. D. Whisenand, of the Central State Bank, a promi- nent and active citizen.
June Thirtieth, 1907.
FRANCIS GENESER
FRANCIS GENESER
A WELL-KNOWN old-timer, eligible to a place in a history of Polk County or reminiscences thereof, is Francis Geneser. Born on the Rhine, in Bavaria, Germany, he passed the years of his minority with his father, who was a stone mason and cutter, the two trades being combined in that country. He attended the common school, which corresponded with the district schools of the United States, from the age of six until he was thirteen.
A revolution having broken out in several of the provinces in 1848, and having arrived at his majority and liable to six years' Government military service, his only means of escaping it was in leaving the country. In November, 1849, with two comrades, he set sail from Havre for New York, where they landed twenty-nine days later. They looked the town over, and thought it too large a place for them, and they went to Albany, where the two comrades had friends. There he got a job on a farm at four dollars per month and board. He worked four months, and in the Spring fol- lowing went to work at his trade in the country surrounding Albany at one dollar a day and board, which he thought was good wages. A day's work was from sunrise to sundown-there were no labor unions in those days.
In May, 1856, his brother, Joseph, having preceded him, he came to Des Moines, by rail from Albany to Iowa City, where he hired a team to bring himself, wife, and three children, Mary, Joe and John, to Des Moines. Houses were scarce; the only available one was a small log cabin near Aulman's Brewery, on Elm Street, between Second and Third, in which he lived until he built a small frame house on Sherman Street, between River (now Crocker) and Mill (now School).
His first job was on the old Grout House, at Sixth and Walnut, East Side. He also worked one hundred and twenty-three days on the Hierb Brewery, in 1857, at Seventh and Center.
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In 1858, he took his first job as a contractor, and built the foun- dation walls of a drug store for G. M. Hippee, at the southeast corner of Second and Court Avenue, the first brick store building on the avenue. The stone was quarried out of the bluff along Des Moines River, on Barlow Granger's land, and was a good quality of sandstone. It was hauled in with teams.
His fidelity, fair dealing, energy and honesty soon secured for him all he could do. Among the buildings he erected was the Good Block, at Fifth and Walnut, where the Casady bank is; the Charles Hewitt wholesale grocery building, at Third and Walnut; the Judge Byron Rice building, next west of the Equitable Building, at Sixth and Locust ; St. Ambrose Church, at Sixth and High, and numerous smaller business blocks and residences. He built the abutments and piers of Court Avenue bridge more than twenty years ago, and they have withstood the pounding of floods and ice gorges without protection of ice-breakers.
In his building business, be found brick very scarce. He secured land and began making by hand what was known as sand brick, and for twenty-three years it was a large part of his business. Over three million, eight hundred thousand of his hard-burned brick were put in the new Capitol, and of their quality it is only neces- sary to say they passed the lynx-eyed scrutiny of "Bob" Finkbine, who was a holy terror to contractors for material furnished that structure. They were what is called "nigger heads," and hard as flint rock. Vitrified brick was then an unknown quantity.
He, with Conrad Youngerman, built the porticos and steps of the old Court House, which was torn down to give place to the present one. The stone was quarried at Elk Rapids, on Des Moines River, in Boone County, about thirty miles north. They would go up there and quarry a lot of stone, haul it down here with teams, and then cut and put it in place. It was a job which tried their very souls to the breaking-point, and required three months' labor.
He employed a large number of men and teams, and for more than thirty years was an important factor in the industries of the town. In 1890, he retired from the contracting business.
For comparison of the wages paid bricklayers in the early days and that at present, when building the Good Block, he paid two
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dollars and a half per day, a day's work being from seven to six o'clock-ten hours.
In 1893, he organized the German Savings Bank, was a heavy stockholder, one of the Directors, and its President until 1897, when financial reverses to some of its patrons, overdrafts, and his personal securities given to aid in developing infant industries in the town, necessitated the closure of the bank, with a total loss of seventy-two thousand, four hundred dollars, and which he had to make good to the bank, thus sweeping away the emoluments of his many years of toil.
As a business man, he was noted for his integrity, honesty and fidelity. A contract made with him required no bonds or collaterals.
Socially, he is plain. quiet, unostentatious, benevolent, has an unbounded faith in humanity, is a good neighbor and an exemplary citizen. Is not a member of any clubs or societies.
Politically, he is a Democrat, but takes no part in the game of polities.
Religonisly, he is a member of Saint Mary's Catholic Church. July Fourteenth, 1907.
VOL. II-(23)
LAMPSON P. SHERMAN
LAMPSON P. SHERMAN
O NE of the pioneers of Des Moines was Lampson P. Sherman, or Lamp., as everybody called him, who came here in 1849 -the pioneers don't admit any person to their class who came here after 1849-a Buckeye by birth, a printer by trade, hav- ing served an apprenticeship in the office of the Cincinnati Gazette. He was a brother of General William Tecumseh Sherman, John Sherman, Secretary of the Treasury under President Hayes, and Hoyt Sherman, well known to residents of the city for the past fifty years.
Soon after his arrival, the Whigs stated a movement to secure a newspaper of their own faith. Judge Curtis Bates and Barlow Granger were publishing the Star, as the organ of the Democrats. A proposition was made to Lamp. to give him a certain bonus in cash, and secure him a good list of subscribers, if he would start a newspaper. He accepted the proposition, went to Cincinnati, pur- chased presses, type and material necessary for that purpose, ship- ping it by boat to Saint Louis, thence to Keokuk, and with teams hauled it to The Fort, himself coming with it.
He was to be given one-half of the bonus on his arrival at Cin- cinnati, and the list of his subscribers on his arrival with the outfit, neither of which materialized. Nevertheless, he started the paper in one of the barrack buildings opposite the Star office, on Second Street, near Vine, and named it the Gazette, in honor of his alma mater. The first number was issued Jannary First, 1850. It was seven columns to a page, and showed the skill of a good printer, quite in contrast typographically to the Star.
The price of the paper was two dollars per year in advance, but the "advance" was what troubled him. It seldom or never came, but he gave the people a good, wide-awake paper, devoted largely to local matters, which so cut into the circulation of the Star that
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within two months Barlow quit and Judge Bates assumed control of the paper.
The great stress with the people then was to get transportation facilities. Several columns every week were given to railroad pro- jects. February First, a eall was published for a mass meeting of citizens to select a committee to go to a convention at Iowa City and defeat a scheme to have a road from Davenport to Council Bluffs eross the Des Moines River fifty miles south, and follow the old Mormon Trail to the Bluffs. The committee went, and the scheme was frustrated. The River Improvement project was vig- orously boomed, and the company severely prodded for their pro- crastination. The Loco Focos, as the Democrats were called, were bombarded with ternis hardly compatible with Twentieth Century ethics. There were only four columns of advertising. There must have been a poet in town, for several merchants extolled their wares in rhyme. E. 1. Wise & Company, "east side of Second Street, below Market," had this to say :
"LET HER RIP-SHE'S ALL OAK.
"Up rose the sun, and in majestic splendor Climbed the Eastern slope. The white frost Glittering upon her pendant grass, Reflecting back her slanting rays, Till all the broad prairie in mirrored beauty Glistened. Far in the distance, dragging slow.
Like a wounded snake, its length along, With pondrons strength, on slow-revolving wheels, Its snowy canvas shining in the sun, Is seen a mighty train of four ox teams, Loaded to the guards with a most rich freight Of dry goods, groceries and hardware."
February Twenty-second .- "In the north part of town the workmen are getting timber for a female seminary. In the west end of town the foundation of the new Presbyterian Church is laid."
That female seminary stood at the corner of Second and Locust streets, where the street ear barn now is, and for many years was used as a eooper shop and blacksmith shop. The timber for it was
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cut along the river. It was built by Father Bird, and in its Mrs. Bird taught the school. She was, indeed, a "mother in Israel" to the youth of that day. Many young men of the city in later years were proud to acknowledge her as a teacher.
Simon Casady received some of his first lessons in good behavior under her tutelage, but he could never understand why he was sent to a female seminary-he was only four years old-unless it was to keep him out of mischief.
The church stood on the lot next to the Western Union Tele- graph office, on Fourth Street. It was burned in 1867. The semi- nary and church were the two extremes of the town.
March Fifteenth .- "The first barber has opened a shop."
April Sixth .- "The ferry across Des Moines River is in good order. Ropes have been put across, and teams can now cross in good order."
April Twenty-sixth .- "The first Whig Congressional Conven- tion is called to meet at Ottumwa."
Early in April, the rush to California began. There was a con- tinnous line of wagons from east to west, as far as the eye could reach. The gold-hunters from Polk County crowded into gaps in the train, many of them never to be seen again. If a wagon broke down or a horse or ox was sick, they dropped out of the line, and the gap was quickly elosed. If a person sickened and died, withont shroud or coffin the remains were laid in a shallow hole by the way- side, a benison to the wolf and coyote. All along the route, Small- pox was scattered among the settlers, game cards strewn, fragments of glass bottles, which, emptied of their "hell broth," were dashed against a wagon wheel. The ferry here was crowded, excitement was intense, as everybody wanted to get aeross first. For the week ending April Seventeenth, six hundred and seventy-five persons and two hundred and fifty-two wagons had crossed; the next week, one hundred and ninety-nine teams and five hundred and forty men; the next week, one hundred and fifty-six teams and four hundred and fifty-nine persons ; the next week, one hundred and thirty teams and three hundred and sixty-three persons; the next week, seventy- three teams and one hundred and eighty-four persons, when there was a falling off. The total record kept was one thousand and
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forty-nine teams and two thousand, eight hundred and thirteen persons.
May Twenty-fourth .- Notice is given that because "no teams can be got to haul the paper from Keokuk, there will be no Gazette next week."
Lamp. was preeminently practical, never a star-gazer. The dila- toriness of church-going people on the Sabbath troubled him. He ascribed it mostly to the family cloek, of which many families had none at all. Some attendants would get to church barely in time to receive the "benediction." There were no church bells, and he recommended the ringing of the tavern bell to call out the people.
June Eighteenth .- "The hunters who went up 'Coon River for elk calves, returned with five calves. They captured nine, but four escaped. They say deer and elk are plenty, but no buffalo."
November Fifteenth .- Lamp. ealled vigorously for money. Said he had not received enough to pay for the white paper he had used.
December First .- He became the apostle of good seed corn, for he says. "With plenty of good seed and well cultivated, no part of the world ean beat Des Moines Valley." Thus he ante-dates "Diek" ('larkson as an apostle of seed corn.
At the expiration of six months, paying expenses with an income from only four columns of advertising, payable in store orders and elastic promises, Lamp. concluded he umust have help. A meeting of citizens was held, at which it was agreed to assume one-half the indebtedness of the establishment and furnish an outside business manager. I'nder the reorganization, the name of the paper was changed to State Journal. The patronage was small, the popula- tion of the town being less than five hundred. The Democrats held all public offices and took the spoils, but the paper was continued to August Twenty-sixth, 1832, when it was suspended, and Lamp. retired, having lost every dollar he had invested in the enterprise.
I asked him onee how he got along with a newspaper in those early days without the means and conveniences necessary to that business, to which he replied: "Very well during Summer time. but when Winter came, and the snow blew in through the eracks between the logs, filled the type with snow, froze the ink and paper 'heap' which had been dampened for printing, it was rather dis- couraging. With kettles of live coals set under the press to keep it
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thawed out, we could get out the paper, then they would come over from the Star office-they preferred to sit around the grocery fires and swap yarns than keep their own office running-borrow the 'forms' of our paper, take off the heading, put on that of the Star, and print their paper. No, they didn't take my editorials; they cut them out. The greatest trouble we had was with the mails. Sometimes we could not get an Eastern mail for two or three weeks. There were no railroads; the river was frozen; no regular stage lines ; money was scarce, and at times it was hard sledding to keep things moving. It took forty days to get news from Washington."
In 1851. the people at The Fort petitioned the County Judge for an election to determine whether or not the town should become incorporated. The petition was granted, and an election ordered to be held Septembr Twenty-third. Lamp. was named as one of the clerks of the election. The vote was forty-two for, and one against incorporation.
September Twenty-seventh, another election was held to select. three persons to form a charter for the town, and Lamp. was chosen one of the three. October Eleventh, they made return to the Judge that they had prepared a charter for the "Town of Fort Des Moines," and fixed three boundaries of the town corporation. Oeto- ber Eighteenth, another election was held, at which boundary Num- ber Two, which had been fixed by the survey made in July, 1846, and known as the "Original Town," was adopted by a vote of twenty to six. What would people now think of three city elections in one month ?
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