History, Winnebago County, Wisconsin: Its Cities, Towns, Resources, People, Part 41

Author: Publius Virgilius Lawson
Publication date: 1948
Publisher: Chicago : C.F. Cooper
Number of Pages: 773

USA > Wisconsin > Winnebago County > History, Winnebago County, Wisconsin: Its Cities, Towns, Resources, People > Part 41

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Mr. Stevens has traveled in every country on the globe, but his first return visit to Europe was not made until May, 1874. when he visited Scotland with the late IIon. Robert Shiells, two years after his invention of the roller mill. He did not visit IIungary until 1884, four years after his basic patents had been issued and three years after he had sold all interest in flour mills, and twelve years after his invention had been made. So there can be no truth in the current rumor that he found the roller mill in Hungary, and brought it home with him. By the time he reached Hungary the only roller mill ever devised in that country was a curiosity or sold for old iron. The sys- tem invented by Mr. Stevens was patented and adopted every- where in that country and no one cares for black bread now. The old black bread mills of Buda Pesth now vie with each

427

INVENTION OF ROLLER FLOUR MILL.

other in a competition for the whitest bread. The wheat saw- mill used in Hungary is described on a former page, and was not possible as a prior art defense to the Stevens non-cutting rolls. Some one has erroneously attributed Governor Wash- burn's success in milling to the introduction of the Hungarian system of gradual reduction milling. There was no such sys- tem in Hungary, only as described above, and if he had intro- duced the system in Minneapolis he would never have made a success of milling.

The annual wheat product of the United States is 700,000,000 bushels, which will make 150,000,000 barrels of flour, worth $900,000,000. The net cost of milling was reduced one-half by the inventions of Mr. Stevens. Supposing this saving in cost of production was partly, if not all, the property of the consumer, then the people of the United States save each year $40,000,000 because of this invention.

XXXIII.

WHY NEENAH IS CALLED THE PAPER CITY.

The earliest paper mill in the state was erected in Milwaukee in 1848, an enterprise of which there is nothing to be found in print; but of which the veteran librarian of the "Sentinel," Mr. Henry W. Bleyer, writes :

"I am not prepared to say that the first paper made in Wis- consin should be credited to Milwaukee, and yet we had a mill here as early as 1848, a four-story brick structure, 40x60, cost $10,000, located on the north side of the Menominee river, about a square west of West Water street bridge. This mill was built by Ludington & Garland, who set out well, though some- what hampered financially. When their mill was fairly in operation, Milwaukee newspaper publishers were supplied with its product, much to their joy, as their supplies were then sub- ject to the dangers and delays of steamboat and vessel trans- portation, which, aside from wagoning, was our only means of communication with the east.

"In March of 1849, D. E. Cameron, an attorney-at-law, suc- ceeded Ludington & Garland. By midsummer he was employ- ing ten hands on a pay roll of but $40 a week! Think it over! Paper makers working at $4 a week! He was then turning out newspaper stock at the rate of 110 reams a week, 'enough to supply the entire press of the state,' he said. As he was not supplying all the papers in Wisconsin, he had a ready mar- ket in Chicago, which so busied him that he never had spare stock in store. Later the establishment was sold to Noonan & McNab, who soon after moved the machinery to two large frame buildings, about five miles up the Milwaukee river, on the east bank of the stream. John J. Orton had a flouring mill near by, and his operations with those of Noonan & McNab settled and founded a village, which they named Humboldt. In 1864 the dam that furnished power to these mills was washed out by a freshet, and was not rebuilt. The plants remained idle for several years, and the village of Humboldt waned until it no longer had place on the local maps. There was some talk of

428

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WHY NEENAH IS THE PAPER CITY.

renewing operations, when on the night of July 6, 1869, the mills, including Orton's, were wiped out by an incendiary. Early in the 60s, owing to the scarcity of print paper and the consequent high price of the material, the civil war having crip- pled the mills, several Milwaukee publishers, headed by Je- main & Brightman, of the "Sentinel," incorporated themselves as the Wisconsin Paper Company, and built a mill on the south bank of the Milwaukee river, some distance below the dam. This establishment prospered until 1867, when, on February 20, it was blown to fragments by explosion of one of its boilers. As the paper market had by this time settled to a reasonable basis, the mill was not rebuilt. Beside these ventures in paper making, there was another, one devoted to straw paper and strawboard as specialties. This was situated along the Menom- inee river, near the Grand avenue viaduct. It was operated by Ernst Prieger & Company, for a while, and then passed into the hands of Winslow A. Nowell, later postmaster at Milwaukee. It continued in operation down to 1875, when it, too, was destroyed by fire. This is all I know about print paper manu- facture in Milwaukee. There is nothing in print concerning it, at least I could not find anything, having scoured the files for the meager data that I have at command. I may add here that the late Chief Justice Ryan made the old Ludington & Garland mills the scene of his Jenny Lind club satire."

Of the paper making experience at Whitewater, Mr. B. M. Frees, now in lumber in Chicago writes:

"Dear Sir: I am in receipt of your favor of the 19th with re- gard to the paper industry at Whitewater. I have known more or less of it since 1863, but there may be something more in de- tail that President Salisbury, of the Normal school there, could tell you. I think the mill was built somewhere between 1857 and 1860, by J. M. Crombie and associates and manufactured print paper and tea paper for ten years or more, having a capac- ity of about three and a half tons per day. Dennison & Tanner bought out Crombie some time in the 70s and rebuilt the mill, which was afterwards destroyed by fire and again rebuilt and its capacity increased, I think, to about five tons per day, and they manufactured straw wrapping paper altogether. The mill then stood idle for a number of years and finally L. A. Tanner acquired the interest of Dennison and run it a few years, when it was sold to Allen & Crombie, and they in turn were succeeded by the Whitewater Paper Company, about 1890.

430

HISTORY OF WINNEBAGO COUNTY.

The mill was then largely added to and capacity increased and manufactured for a couple of years straw wrapping, building paper and strawboard, having a capacity of about fifteen tons per day. Along about 1893 it was merged into the Columbia Straw Paper Company, who run it but a short time when it was shut down and remained closed thereafter, was finally sold under foreclosure of the blanket mortgage of the Columbia Straw Paper Company, and dismantled. It is now owned by W. L. R. Stewart, of Whitewater, and myself, but there is no machinery there, and the main buildings are in ruins, but the machine room and warehouse are in a good state of preserva- tion. The water power remains, but almost everything in the shape of machinery except the water wheel is gone. I do not know whether this will do you any good or not, but it is about all I know about it, except that my experience in the paper business cost me too large a sum of money to mention."

Mr. C. P. Richmond, associate with his brother, N. Richmond, came to Appleton in 1849, from New York state, and in 1855 built a paper mill on the upper dam, which burned in 1859. They then commenced the strawboard mill on the lower dam in 1860. Major G. M. Richmond took an active management in 1866, after the war. The mill made wrapper and manilla, about four tons daily. It was dismantled in 1890, by the Sulphite In- vestment Company who built their large paper mills on its . site. This mill was erected by Fighting Bob Evans, and in- cluded in its stockholders President Cleveland and other no- table men of national character.

Although the mills at Milwaukee, Whitewater and Appleton were built and operated and declined before Neenah got into the game, the real establishment of this great industry in Wis- consin was begun in Neenah, and from this it spread to other places, and became a leading industry until now the United States census places it fifth in its products in this country; the "Paper Trade Journal" gives it third place in number of mills and the "Paper Mill Directory" gives it second place in the United States, a country which produces many times more pa- per than any other country on the globe. The state census shows 52 firms, with a capital of $24,000,000, employing 6,000 people. who receive $3,500,000 in wages annually. They pay out each year $10.000.000 for material. There are 130 mills, and they make every grade from wrapper to the finest bond papers.

431

WHY NEENAH IS THE PAPER CITY.

The industry was begun in Neenah with the building of the old red frame mill of the Neenah Paper Company in 1865-6, the first mill in Neenah and the mill whose success, small as it was, started the great industry on its successful career. This mill was erected on the site of the old government sawmill of the mission days, and afterward occupied by the sawmill of Colonel Harvey Jones, at the foot of the race, the site of the present Neenah mill of the Kimberly-Clark Company. It was erected by a stock company, composed of Hiram Smith and his brother, Edward Smith, Nathan Cobb, Dr. N. S. Robinson, John Jamison and Moses Hooper, with a capital stock of $10,000. It was organized with Nathan Cobb president, and Iliram Smith secretary and treasurer.

The machinery and processes in this old mill will be his- torically interesting, to compare with modern mills. There is something of its processes described in the "Winnebago County Press" under date of September 24, 1870, from which, with details obtained from those who knew the mill, this description is made up. The paper stock was rags; no wood pulp was then in use nor could it be mixed to more than 5 per cent for several years, or until the invention of the cylinder printing press. The rags came from Milwaukee and Chicago, assorted at the mill by women and girls, cut and dusted by the "devil." They were bleached in "lime bleach," holding enough for one day's run. The lime liquor and stock was steam boiled for fourteen hours. This vat was the open tub bleach. It was a wooden tub or tank fourteen feet in diameter. The steam was admitted through a perforated false bottom, forcing the bleach liquors up a central tube, which ejected it over the rags in the tub, and returning down through the rags it repeated its journey up the tube and was ejected over the rags, the tube erupting as often as the steam gathered head below. The boys nicknamed it "Vesu- vius." The rotary bleach did not come into use until set up in the Winnebago mill by Mr. Whiting. The Neenah mill had two of these bleach vats to supply the night and day run of the mill. The chemicals used were chloride lime, sulphuric acid and aluminous cake. After the rags were taken from the bleach with pitch forks they were put through the "rag engine" and cut up, and the stock was dropped into "draining vats." One was filled, one emptied each day. They then passed through "beating engines" five hours and the pulp dropped into receiv- ing tubs of 400 pounds capacity, from which the pulp was

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HISTORY OF WINNEBAGO COUNTY.

pumped into "stuff chests," then over an "agitated screen" to the "former," a square oblong tub, in which revolved the "cylinder," seven feet long by thirty inches diameter, half submerged in the pulp. It was covered with a wire screen over which the pulp gathers on the surface. Another roll rested on this with a wool felt between them, to which the thin layer of pulp adhered and was passed along between other rolls to squeeze out the water, then over the five steam-heated copper drier rolls, which had superseded the charcoal heated drier. These were thirty inches diameter and fifty-four inches long, the width of the paper. There were two polishing rolls at the end of the machine. The paper was cut into squares, as all paper was in those days, and packed in bundles ready for ship- ment. This paper machine is known as the cylinder machine and stood on wooden posts. The mill made print paper from rags, which was sold at eleven and one-half (111/2) cents per pound. When it was operated by Smith & Van Ostrand they advertised that they made "print, book, tea and wrapping paper," but the first real book paper was made by Mr. George A. Whiting in the Winnebago mill next door in 1878.

The old red Neenah mill made 2,500 to 3,000 pounds of paper each day, running twenty-four hours. They claimed the mill could make 3,500 pounds a day. This production seems small in the light of productions of ninety tons made in some Wis- consin mills today, and yet it was the wealth made in paper pro- duction under those conditions that gave an impetus to the business and started it in this state. The Globe mill was erected in 1872 to make one and a half tons of paper daily. As late as March 29, 1883, the following appeared in the "Menasha Press :" "Mr. Robinson, a machine tender in a Neenah paper mill, made a wager that he could make 4,800 pounds of paper in twenty-four hours on a cylinder machine. At the expiration of the time he required but one pound more to win the wager, having run off 4,799 pounds." Another press notice shows : "The Neenah Paper Company received an order for ten tons of paper for the 'Tribune,' made the order and shipped it inside of sixty hours." (In 1870.)

The old red Neenah mill used 1,000 tons of stock annually, employed forty persons, used 1,700 cords of wood for heating and used ninety tons of chemicals and required fifty horsepower to operate its machinery. The machine tender was paid $2.50

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433

WHY NEENAH IS THE PAPER CITY.

per day of twelve hours day shift and thirteen hours night shift.

Mr. Myron H. P. Haynes came over from the straw board mill at Whitewater to run this mill and remained here until his death in 1890. He was regarded as a skillful pioneer paper maker. After the mill was erected and ready to operate it was leased to Dr. N. S. Robinson for one year. He developed won- derful ability as a manager and made a great success of his venture. He was so successful that he attracted the attention of others to the possibility of the business and others became anxious to venture in this industry. Dr. N. S. Robinson was born and educated in Portland, Me., and came to Neenah in 1848 to practice his chosen profession, where he has been ever since a leading physician. He has held a number of civic posi- tions and was a member of the assembly in 1874, introducing the bill for the Menasha city charter. He may be justly con- sidered as the originator of profit making in paper making and the father of the paper industry in Wisconsin. The company concluded that its great success made it safe to operate the mill on its own account the second year and it was operated with Dr. N. S. Robinson as manager.

The third year it was leased by Hiram Smith and Edward Smith. On September 10, 1867, the "Weekly Times" of Neenah contained this startling item: "The fact that the Neenah paper mill has been leased for the ensuing year for a sum equal to its entire cost has set parties to talking up another mill here. We need manufactories the more, and Neenah will see this in time." The item is doubtless correct, as not long afterward Mr. A. W. Patten had said. "Any fool could make money in paper," and had told a reputable person that he made each year the cost of his mill, which was $60,000. But it must be understood that there never were a brighter colony of men engaged in any line of business anywhere than those then and afterward in paper making. They are far superior in business acumen to any other class of men in business in this country.

Before the expiration of the year Mr. Edward Smith had sold his interest to Mr. D. C. Van Ostrand and the firm became Smith & Van Ostrand, who took over three-quarters of the stock and operated the mill until it was sold to Kimberly, Clark & Co. in 1874, who continued to operate the mill until it was torn down to make room for the building of the great Neenah mill of

434

HISTORY OF WINNEBAGO COUNTY.

Kimberly, Clark & Co. in 1890, a double machine book mill, making an immense product of high grade paper.

At the beginning of 1872 a new firm was considered and a partnership was formed, composed of Charles B. Clark with one- third interest, J. Alfred Kimberly and Havilah Babcock with one-third and George A. Whiting and Frank C. Shattuck one- third. An option was secured on the Peckham foundry. In February the partnership was incorporated and articles of the incorporation of the Fox River Paper Mill Company was filed. Mr. J. A. Kimberly was president and Mr. George A. Whiting was secretary. The next month the incorporation was dissolved and the partnership of Kimberly, Clark & Co. was formed, com- posed of Mr. J. Alfred Kimberly, Mr. Charles B. Clark, Mr. F. C. Shattuck and Mr. Havilah Babcock, each with one-quarter interest. The Fox river flour mill of Mr. Hugh Sherry was pur- chased and removed in April, and work begun on the Globe brick mill, which was completed and in operation by October. This was the first mill and first paper mill venture of the firm who have since become the largest paper making concern in the world, with the head office still in Neenah. The mill was ex- tended in 1876 to cover the site of the Peckham & Krueger foundry property, removed for that purpose. In 1906 its machinery was entirely rebuilt and replaced with the latest de- signs for making book paper. It was the first mill to be pro- vided with a fourdrinier former for starting the paper and con- tained a number of additional driers to increase the speed. It was operated to make print originally, but subsequent develop- ment in the print making mills made print an unprofitable product of this mill. Print is now usually made on 140-inch machines running 600 feet per minute. Mr. Haynes was taken over by Kimberly, Clark & Co. with its purchase of the old red mill in 1874.

Mr. J. Alfred Kimberly was born in Troy, New York, July 18, 1838, and came to Neenah with his family in 1849. After at- tending school and college he entered the mercantile business, the firm being Kimberly & Babcock. The business in dry goods was originally conducted in the old brick store on Wisconsin street, built by J. & HI. Kimberly, and afterward was removed to the corner of Cedar and Wisconsin streets in the Pettibone Block. They made a success of this business. While still in the dry goods line they projected and operated the Reliance flour mill and made a big success of this business. Mr. J. Alfred

435

WHY NEENAH IS THE PAPER CITY.

Kimberly is still in active business and made a success in his three principal ventures as a merchant, flour and paper maker. · Mr. Kimberly was a director in 1871 in the National Bank of Menasha and the National Bank of Neenah, both of which he helped to found and organize. For thirty years he has been on the school board of Neenah, and they have honored him by nam- ing the new high school the Kimberly school. He is regarded as the brightest business man in the county.

Mr. Charles B. Clark was born in Theresa, Jefferson county, New York, August 24, 1844. When eleven years old his parents moved to Neenah. His parents were Luther L. Clark, who died in 1853, and Theda Clark, his widowed mother, with whom he removed to Neenah and took care of until her death at his home, February 16, 1871, aged 67 years. She was born in Jefferson county, New York, and resided at Theresa until she moved to Neenah in 1854. When he was sixteen years of age he went to work for Robert Hold at $2 per week in the furniture factory. Mr. Hold gives a lively sketch of his first acquaintance with the future successful paper manufacturer. The story is related in "Cunningham's History of Neenah:" "This old mill was also the scene of C. B. Clark's introduction to business in Neenah, he being first employed by Mr. Hold to work in this mill at the munificent salary of $7 a month. Mr. Hold gives an amusing account of his first interview with Clark, and inasmuch as the latter is now one of their most prominent and wealthiest busi- ness men and manufacturers, it will not be amiss to give it here- with. On the morning of Clark's arrival in Neenah, a penniless boy, he applied to Mr. Hold for a job, but was told that no more help was wanted. This was discouraging and the boy, looking around among the men and boys at work, said 'that he should think among so many he might find something to do.' Mr. Hold, as he expresses it, seeing that there was considerable 'git up and git' about the boy, consulted with the foreman and it was discovered that one of the boys was about to quit work and that a place might be made for the applicant. Therefore Mr. Hold returned and informed the waiting lad that he might commence work next morning. 'But,' says Charley, 'I want to commence now.' This was a poser, but it was finally decided that he should go to work at once, which he did, his first employment being bending chair backs."

When he was eighteen the Civil war broke out and he enlisted as a private in Company I of the Twenty-first Regiment, August,

436

HISTORY OF WINNEBAGO COUNTY.

1862. He was very soon promoted to lieutenant. He was long connected with the volunteer fire department and was several times elected mayor of Neenah. Tom Wall beat him for the State Senate by walking all over the district shaking hands and telling the people "he was poor and that was the best he could do, while he supposed Clark would beat him as he was rich and spending lots of money." The story had its effect and Tom Wall was elected. But soon Mr. Clark went to the Assembly, and when Wall went to bed with a bad case of fever Clark nursed him back to his place in the Senate again. In a few years Mr. Clark was nominated for Congress and elected by 10,000 majority. After his term was completed he was re- nominated and again elected by a large majority. The third time he was renominated the red school house issue was sprung in the state by the Democrats and the entire Republican party was defeated and Clark with the rest.

On his return to Neenah from the war he entered into a part- nership with H. P. Leavens and A. W. Patten, under the name of Leavens, Clark & Co., as hardware merchants on Wisconsin street. In April, 1870, Mr. Patten withdrew and the firm be- came Leavens & Clark. In about two years Mr. Clark sold his interest in the hardware business and put all his means and energy in the new paper mill enterprise of Kimberly, Clark & Co., destined to rival all similar industries on the globe. This company was excellently composed for successful enterprise, as Mr. Clark was a tireless builder and manager, Mr. Kimberly a most excellent buyer of stock and seller of the product and Mr. Shattuck an expert accountant. So it was arranged at the be- ginning, but the developments of the business soon left much of the details to other hands. Mr. Clark died in 1891. It was at his funeral, which was attended by a host of people from all parts of the state, that Senator Sawyer had a conversation with Robert M. Lafollett, then practicing law at Madison, which was offensively interpreted, much to the surprise of good Mr. Saw- yer, and it afterward became the cause of a bitter battle in the Republican ranks. The party divided into stalwarts and half- breeds.

Mr. Frank C. Shattuck was born in Coleraine, Franklin county. Massachusetts, January 3, 1839, son of Truman and Amanda Shattuck, natives of the same place. After attending school he was clerk in a store and postoffice and at the same employment for four years in New York City, then in Chicago

437

WHY NEENAH IS THE PAPER CITY.

several years in the notion trade and in 1866 engaged in the notion trade on his own account until he entered into this part- nership in 1872. The firm did business as a partnership under the name of Kimberly, Clark & Co., and in 1880 it was in- corporated under the name of the Kimberly & Clark Co., and Mr. Shattuck was treasurer. Mr. Shattuck was married June 6, 1876, to Miss Clara A. Merriman, a native of this county.

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History, Winnebago County, Wisconsin: Its Cities, Towns, Resources, People, Part 41

Author: Publius Virgilius Lawson Publication date: 1948 Publisher: Chicago : C.F. Cooper Number of Pages: 773

Author: Publius Virgilius Lawson
Publication date: 1948
Publisher: Chicago : C.F. Cooper
Number of Pages: 773