USA > Wisconsin > Winnebago County > History, Winnebago County, Wisconsin: Its Cities, Towns, Resources, People > Part 42
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The Globe mill as first constructed had a capacity of one and a half tons - per day and employed about forty hands. The capital stock was soon increased to $400,000, which in 1889 was increased to $1,500,000. The growth of the concern was steady until from a one-machine mill in 1872 it today owns and oper- ates nine mill plants, containing seventeen paper machines ranging in width from 671% to 155 inches, making all grades of paper from coarse wrapping to fine writing papers. Its product at present is 450 tons of paper, 110 tons of sulphite and 70 tons of ground wood per day. It employs 1,500 persons, and the amount of its annual pay roll is $750,000.
The business of this company, the Telulah Paper Company and the Atlas Paper Company, was succeeded January 5, 1907, by the Kimberly-Clark Company, whose officers are: J. A. Kim- berly, president; F. J. Sensenbrenner, first vice-president; J. C. Kimberly, second vice-president; S. F. Shattuck, treasurer; Charles B. Clark, secretary, and P. R. Thom, general superin- tendent.
The mills owned by this company are the paper mills at Ap- pleton. The old Atlas, three machines, makes 58,000 pounds daily; the Vulcan paper mill, one machine, 12,000 pounds daily ; Tioga paper mill, two machines, 25,000 pounds daily; Telulah mills, two machines, making 95,000 pounds book and writing paper daily. The Depere mill, built by this company. was sold to the American Writing Paper Company in 1900. At Kimberly the wrapper mill has two machines, making 20,000 pounds daily, and the writing mill operated by electricity has two wide machines making 90,000 pounds daily of book, writing and bond paper. At Neenah the Globe mill, one machine, makes 24,000 pounds daily; Neenah mill, two machines, makes 34,000 pounds book paper; Badger mill. one machine. makes 25,000 pounds writing and book, using all ground wood and fiber. At Niagara, where the company has a 72-foot head of water on the Menomi- nee river, they have two 156-inch width machines. making 140,- 000 pounds of paper daily, news and manila fiber. The ground
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wood pulp mills at Niagara make 160,000 pounds of pulp daily; the sulphite fiber mills at Kimberly make 100,000 pounds daily, and at Niagara 120,000 pounds daily.
Mr. A. W. Patten had come to Neenah in 1856 from Middlesex county, Massachusetts, where he was born in 1828, and engaged in making chairs, then flour, and dealing in pine lands and iron mining. In 1874 he cleared off the old shops on the head of the canal and built a paper mill with a daily capacity of three and a half tons. He went over to Appleton in a few years and had erected by 1881 the mills of the Patten Paper Company. In the mills at Neenah he made his paper from old paper stock only, making print, book and manila. He put in a rotary in 1879 and changed to rag stock. He did not claim a capacity over three tons for the mill, but by 1877 he had installed a four- drinier. James F. Gleason was head paper maker for some time, then Frank T. Russell, who had begun in the office as ship- ping and stock clerk, became manager in 1879. Hon. Samuel A. Cook had gone from Calumet county up to Unity into the forest of Northern Wisconsin, and having cut out a fair amount of wealth, sought more civilized surroundings and came over to Neenah and located. Very soon after, with Frank T. Russell, they bought the mill from Mr. Patten, and this was the begin- ning of Mr. Cook into the paper making business, in which he is still engaged. In 1900 the mill was sold to Mr. John A. Kim- berly, Jr., and since then, rebuilt and improved, has been under his management. Under Mr. John A. Kimberly, Jr., the mill now has two wide machines and one pneumatic dried bond machine. making 50,000 pounds of bond, Government envelope and writing and high grade book.
In 1886 Mr. A. W. Patten, with Mr. Henry Hewitt, of Menasha, and Mr. A. W. Priest, bought the power on the lower rapids at Kaukauna and built a dam. The Outagamie mill was erected, a large and profitable enterprise. Mr. John, Alexander and Peter McNaughton, who had been with Mr. Patten in Nee- nah. became interested in these enterprises, and afterward Mr. John McNaughton extended his interests to mills at Oconto, Park Falls and on the Wisconsin river, and became one of the extensive paper makers.
Mr. John R. Davis, an energetic Welehman, born in Wales in 1817. came to America and finally to Neenah in 1849, a wagon maker by trade. He purchased the old Government flour mill in 1852 and ran it for all the output he could get until one night
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in the winter of 1874 the mill took fire and burned with some saw and shingle mills of Henry Sherry near by. This cleared the ground for the Winnebago paper mill. He organized a com- pany, composed of John R. Davis, president; John R. Ford, sec- retary, and H. Shoemaker, treasurer. The other members of the company were C. H. Servis, C. Newman, Mrs. E. A. Servis and S. M. Brown. The original capacity of the mill was six tons of print. Col. George A. Whiting got into the paper making- business at this mill by the purchase, November, 1875, of the Shoemaker stock, and became secretary of this company. He tried the making of book paper in 1878, the first book paper made in the state. Mr. P. D. Squires had come on from an east- ern mill and had charge of the Winnebago. He was a splendid paper maker, but at a moment when it was difficult to find any- one to take his place he died, June 21, 1876. Mr. Whiting was compelled to take his place. Some books can still be seen con- taining the paper he made then. One of them is the "History of Neenah," by Cunningham. Mr. Davis gradually took over the stock of this company, and after his death in 1885 Mr. Wil- liam Davis had charge of the mill until the death of his brother, David, at Eau Claire, when he moved there and took charge of the Dells mills, in which the brothers controlled a large interest. The Winnebago was sold in 1905 to the Bergstrom Paper Com- pany, of which D. W. Bergstrom is the head and his son, John N. Bergstrom, manager. The mill, many times added to and in- creased, now contains two machines, making daily 40,000 pounds of super calendar book, railroad manila and cover paper.
Col. G. A. Whiting went from this mill in 1882 to erect the mill at Menasha of Gilbert & Whiting. IIe was president of the first paper mill on the Wisconsin river below Grand Rapids. Afterward in 1889 he built the Conant dam and erected two mammoth mills below Stevens Point, inaugurating the great paper making industry of the Wisconsin river region. His resi- dence is still in Neenah.
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XXXIV.
VARIOUS MANUFACTURING, MERCANTILE AND PUBLIC ENTERPRISES IN BUSINESS AND SOCIAL LIFE- THE DOCTORS AND LAWYERS.
Bergstrom Stove Works, long known as the Neenah Stove Works, was founded by W. N. and A. K. Moore and B. W. Wells under the firm name of Moore & Wells in 1857. After several years Mr. Wells sold his interest to the Moore Brothers and the business was conducted as W. N. & A. K. Moore. The stove works were extended and enlarged and the business grew year after year to larger proportion. Mr. A. K. Moore succeeded to the entire business in 1870, and died in 1873. The enterprise then came into the control of Smith, Van Ostrand & Leavens, with Mr. H. P. Leavens in active management, until January, 1878, when the property was sold to Mr. George O. Bergstrom and Mr. D. W. Bergstrom, who conducted it under the firm name of Bergstrom Brothers, and in 1904 incorporated as the Bergstrom Stove Company. Mr. John Bergstrom, father of these owners, had established a plow works many years ago, which later came into possession of Mr. George O. Bergstrom, and after he purchased into the stove works he added the plow works to the enterprise for several years. There is now manu- factured a full and complete line of stoves, ranges and furnaces in both steel and cast iron in all the latest styles and designs. and the product has a wide favor and sale over the Western states. They employ seventy-five skilled men, and their pay roll amounts to $60,000 per annum. The buildings are high and cover several acres of ground. It is a large manufacturing plant in a manufacturing town.
Aylward Sons Company was organized in 1905 with a capital stock of $20.000 and make sanitary iron catch basins and other castings. Their annual output is $50,000, employing twenty men. with a pay roll of $12,000 per annum. Mr. William Aylward, the founder of this business, was born in Ireland. May 4. 1838, came to America in 1844 and to Neenah from Corning. New York. in 1859. Hle established this foundry in 1871 and
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made a large success with hollowware and stoves. Mr. Aylward died in 1904.
Neenah Brass Works was organized July .1, 1905, with a capi- tal stock of $10,000 to make sereen plates, brass and bronze cast- ings. They have recently moved into a new cement building near the St. Paul depot. Johnson Brothers & Wells have their machine shop on the power and have for many years been expert machinists. They make gasoline engines. Robert Jamison also has a machine shop on Cedar street for grinding rolls.
The Neenah Shoe Company has a brick factory between the canals, where it makes its celebrated Neenah shoes for men, women and children. It was organized in 1880 by Mr. Louis Oborn with a capital stock of $25,000. It makes 60,000 pairs annually and employs seventy-five people.
The Jersild Knitting Company was organized March 8, 1901, and reorganized September 9, 1903; the capital stock is $40,000. It makes boys' sweaters, cardigans and ladies' goods, with an annual output of $75,000, and employs 100 people. It is the originator of men's necktie sweaters.
Neenah Knitting Company organized 1904, with a capital stock of $25,000, to make knit goods, at which it employs twenty persons. It makes sweaters and cardigans.
Mr. E. F. Wieckert commenced the business of planing mill and inside furnishings in 1872 and has had a successful business ever since. He also operates a sawmill at Underwood. Mr. A. C. Sorenson has a boat building business on Wisconsin street. Mr. Alexander Billstein was for many years a part of the enter- prise of Neenah. He was born in Darmstadt, Germany, October 5, 1831, and came to Neenah in 1856. IIe was a merchant for many years on the corner of Cedar street, but he was most ex- tensively engaged in buying wool, hides. hops, grain, furs and pelts, doing a business in this line reaching $200,000 a year. Mr. Phillip Gaffney commenced with Mr. Billstein and in 1874, after many years as confidential clerk, was taken into the firm. Afterward he entered into a clothing and dry goods business on his own account, a business he has since pursued with great success.
Mr. William F. H. Arnemann was born in Hanover, Germany, October 14, 1850, moved to West Bend. Wisconsin, and settled in Neenah in 1872, where he engaged in the manufacture of soda water, a business he has continued ever since. together with the manufacture of ginger ale and cream beer and packing and deal-
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ing in ice. Mr. Arnemann has been a member of the county board since 1870, mayor and alderman of the city and member of assembly.
Mr. William H. Hess, former proprietor of the Neenah Hotel, on Cedar street, has been alderman and mayor and ran for mem- ber of assembly. At present he is president of the county travel- ing library board and extensively engaged in gold mining at Nome, Alaska, and also in tin mining in Alaska. He visits his far-off possessions only in the summer months.
E. P. Marsh has been fifty years in drugs. He is the son of Rev. Hiram Marsh, a pioneer pastor of the Presbyterian Church.
H. J. Frank established himself in 1899 in fancy creamery butter making and handling butter and dairy products.
Hon. A. D. Eldridge has founded an extensive cheese ware- house business, taking the output of a great many of the fac- tories of Winnebago and the surrounding counties.
Neenah Cold Storage Company was organized in 1887 and its brick buildings near the Central depot contain a floor space of 10,000 feet. Their business is dealing in the products of the farm, dairy, creamery and apiary.
As early as 1849 Mr. D. D. Dodge built the Dodge Hotel, on the site now occupied by the First National Bank, which was destroyed by fire in 1852. A large brick building was then built opposite in 1854, called the Weeden House, afterward known as the Dolsen House, and afterward refinished and known as the Russell House, built in 1875. The city voted $4,000 to aid in its erection. Pettibone Block and Russell House were burned early in the morning of January 14, 1883. The occupants of these and adjoining buildings included the First National Bank, the post- office, Philip Gaffney, dry goods; Kimberly & Elwers, drugs; Osiers, meat market; Clausen & Grams, general store; Judge J. B. Hamilton's law office, Dr. J. R. Barnett's office and others. The mail was saved, and the bank vaults preserved the contents, but most of the occupants lost everything. Nothing was saved from the Russell House, but Mr. Russell awoke all the guests. who were taken out safely. The Russell House and the other buildings were all rebuilt and still remain.
John Roberts, who had opened the National Hotel at Menasha, in 1870, purchased the Grand loggery and the lands adjacent on the bank of the river on Doty island, the old homestead of Governor Doty, and in 1877 erected near the loggery a hand- some modern hotel for summer guests, which was very success-
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ful, and continued until the death of Mr. Roberts in 1900, after which it passed into other hands and was discontinued as a hotel.
The Schuetzen Bund, an old German organization for recrea- tion and benevolence, erected their large brick hall in 1875 on Cedar street. It was burned in 1892, and the basement built into a livery stable. The park on the lake shore road, so long occupied by the society for its summer outings and dances, was sold to the city for its waterworks plant in 1895.
The Neenah Theater , was erected by popular subscription, costing $40,000, and opened December 26, 1902.
Mr. William Krueger, born in Mecklenburg, Germany, Sep- tember 14, 1830, came to Clayton in 1851 as a farmer and re- mained until 1866, when he commenced the hardware business in Neenah, which has developed into an extensive business with a furniture store added to its stock. Mr. Krueger was inter- ested in making stoves in the stove foundry of Krueger & Peck- ham, who in 1871 were employing twelve men and making 1,500 stoves annually. The business was closed in 1876 after an opera- tion of ten years by sale of the property to Kimberly, Clark & Co., who tore down the buildings for the extension of the Globe paper mill.
The brewery of Adam Ergott & Brothers is located in the west limits of the city on the bank of the lake, where it was established nearly thirty years ago. The canning factory near by was run for only three seasons. Sindahl & Matheson's plan- ing mill, formerly occupied by George Danielson, was started in 1907, after the burning of Mr. Sindahl's planing mill, near the Wisconsin Central depot. The carriage factory and garage of Mr. Charles H. Bergstrom is located on Cedar street.
Mr. George M. Schmid, who succeeded his father in the cigar making business, established in 1877, has built up a prosperous business, employing fifteen cigar makers.
Mr. Joseph Reek, the inventor of blackboards, who is of Eng- lish ancestry, came from his old farm homestead near Lake Geneva, which he still owns, to live on the Deacon Mitchell place, just outside the city limits, a number of years ago. For many years he has been engaged in the invention of blackboards and his blackboard is now specified by school architects every- where. The slate stone blackboard is undesirable because of its porosity, which cuts away the chalk, creating too much dust. The blackboards of Mr. Reek are made of a paste material, the
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contents of which are a secret only known to him. It is plastered on to the wall, where it becomes hard as adamant plaster, and forms a black, hard, compact, polished surface, unequaled by anything ever devised for school room use. He has put on these blackboards in school rooms in half the states of the Union and in many of the finest school buildings, some of them costing over a million dollars.
The Equitable Fraternal Union, an insurance society, was. or- ganized in 1897, ten years ago, and has met with great suc- cess with 515 charter members from lodges at Neenah, Apple- ton, Green Bay, Winneconne, Little Chute, Omro, Waupaca, Manawa, New London, Hortonville, Kaukauna, De Pere, Iola and Menasha. F. T. Russell was the first supreme president. The order now has a membership of 19,000, and the territory covered embraces the states of Wisconsin, Michigan and Minne- sota. Up to July 1, 1907, the society had paid 384 death claims, aggregating the magnificent sum of $463,371.37, and had ac- cumulated a splendid reserve fund of $515,111.35. It is a par- ticularly noteworthy fact that fully one-half the insured mem- bers carry no other insurance. The society claims to hold the record for payment of death claims, it requiring on an average less than six days from the date of the filing of the claim. There is no other society of similar age which has as low a mortality percentage. The records show that during the entire history of the society it has never closed a year with any interest due and unpaid or any principal due and unpaid. Furthermore, the so- ciety has never foreclosed a mortgage nor has it ever taken a piece of property in payment of a loan. The value of the real estate on which the society holds first mortgages is worth, upon a conservative appraisement, three times as much as the amount of money loaned thereon. All the supreme officers are under heavy bonds furnished by the National Surety Company of New York. The idea of holding an annual picnic was inaugurated the first year. Two picnics have been held this year, one at Waukesha Beach for the assemblies in the southern part of the state, and the other at Waupaca. Probably three picnics will be held next year.
The Chicago & Northwestern Railway, which had been build- ing north from Janesville for a number of years, finally reached Neenah in January, 1861. the first bill of lading being 100 bar- rels of flour from Mills & Peet, dated January 15, 1861, but laid their line out on the west shore of Butte des Morts, about two
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miles from the mills on the water power. The old cut and grade over which the road was built may still be traced along the fields. The reason of this was the great expense of building through the villages of Neenah and Menasha, requiring four long, costly bridges, the one over the lower lake being nearly a mile long. The business men held a conference and arranged to furnish the right of way, build the bridges and to join with Menasha in a joint cost of a bridge over the lake, so the road was established through the village without cost of roadbed or bridges; only the cost of rail and laying was paid by the rail- way company. The road was completed across the village on its present location in December, 1862. The depot, at first a wooden structure on the south side of Commercial street on the island, used for both cities, was in 1900 moved to the north side of the street and an elegant brick station erected as an ornament to the town and road. The road does an annual business at this station of $300,000.
The Wisconsin Central Railroad started on the center of the island for Stevens Point and north to Ashland and Minneapolis in 1871. The Milwaukee & Northern Railway was building to Menasha from Milwaukee and joined the Central. After the Central arranged to build from Neenah to Milwaukee and Chi- cago via Oshkosh and Fond du Lac, the depot was erected on the west side of town, as at present located, and the old depot in Neenah at the foot of Wisconsin street abandoned. The road does a business of $150,000 at this station for both cities. The Northwestern road constructed a side track back of the mills along the whole length of the water power in 1875, and the Mil- waukee and Northern in 1879 ran a side track parallel, giving the mills car service at their doors.
The Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railway took over the Milwaukee & Northern road in 1890 and built a depot on the lower end of the island. This made three great trunk lines en- tering Neenah.
The horse street car line between Neenah and Menasha was constructed in 1886 by Mr. Lucius Clark, of South Bend, Indiana, promoter. This road subsequently came under the con- trol of Mr. Schumacker, of Quaker oats fame, and sold to the present Fox river valley electric interurban line in 1896, and made a part of their system built to Kaukauna in 1905. The interurban street car line arrived in Neenah from Oshkosh in 1903.
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HISTORY OF WINNEBAGO COUNTY.
The telegraph line reached Neenah and Menasha on a line projected from Fond du Lac to Green Bay in 1851. Their local office was located in the Jones and Yale store. This line ran through a dense forest and the wire was fastened along the tops of the trees, poles only being used in intermediate stretches in the absence of trees. The service was quite unsatisfactory. Mr. W. N. Webster has described his experience with the service : "The average time required for the transmission of a message being greater than by stage, with an even chance that it would remain tangled among the tree tops along the way, the writer, having occasion to communicate with Fond du Lac, endeavored for a whole day to get a message over the line. Failing in this, he took the stage at 2 o'clock the next morning at the old Win- nebago Hotel, Neenah, 'Dud' Cronkhite proprietor, and reach- ing Oshkosh at 8 o'clock, went immediately to the telegraph office and asked the telegraph operator if he could get a message to Fond du Lac. He replied, 'Yes, if I can get the d-d machine thawed out.' The subscriber took his breakfast in time to con- tinue his journey to Fond du Lac, deliberating upon the con- venience and importance of telegraphy, for which he had ample time, arriving at Fond du Lac at dark. The machine was not thawed out when we returned, and the line became inoperative in 1852."
Since then the Western Union came in with the railroads, and later the Postal line opened an office. Mr. S. F. Henry was the first to introduce the telephone by a line from his drug store to the offices of Dr. James R. Barnett, Sr., and Dr. N. S. Robinson in 1877. Mr. Cunningham in "Ilistory of Neenah" says of it in 1878: "The telephone is now a subject of general curiosity, but we deem it probable that in the future it will become quite a common means of rapid communication between offices and manufactories, as well as between offices and residences." This prediction made thirty years ago very soon came to pass. The line was first extended by Mr. Henry to Menasha and to do- mestie and business places and very soon the Wisconsin Tele- phone Company absorbed it and continued to perfect the service. It was about five years ago made part of the toll line with ex- tended connection over the entire country. During the last year the wires at Neenah and Menasha have been placed in un- derground conduits, and in 1908 the company will erect their own exchange buildings on Cedar street. The office for the service in Neenah and Menasha will be located in this building.
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The city has always been fortunate in having good doctors and surgeons to attend the sick. Back in the beginning Dr. Ward, of Green Bay, occasionally visited the place. His son is still living on a farm in Kaukauna. Dr. Yale, a retired clergy- man, settled as early as 1848 with Col. Harvey Jones. Dr. Fitch, an early physician, was drowned. Dr. Pugsley was connected with the army prior to 1848. Dr. N. S. Robinson came to Neenah in 1847 with its earliest pioneers from Maine, where he had ob- tained an excellent education. With his family he has been a splendid addition to its professional and social life. He was one of the founders of the First National Bank and the man who first made a success of paper making in the state, being the father of the great enterprise in Wisconsin. Drs. Robinson, Crane and Ayers, of Neenah, have been members of the state as- sembly, and Drs. Robinson, Barnett, Crane and Torrey were as- sistant surgeons in the civil war. Dr. Crane, being appointed United States examining surgeon, moved to Green Bay, the loca- tion of the office, where he died in 1875. Dr. Torrey died from disease contracted in the Civil war. Dr. Samuel Galentine com- menced practice in Neenah in 1858, long connected with profes- sional and civic life in Neenah, and died in 1880. Dr. James R. Barnett came to Neenah in 1871. His office, recently fitted, was burned in the great fire that destroyed the Pettibone Block. He has been an influential and leading citizen. His son, Dr. James R. Barnett, Jr., is now practicing in the city in partnership with his father. Dr. James R. Barnett was born near Waukesha, May 31, 1842. He enlisted from Fond du Lac in the First Wis- consin Cavalry, August, 1862, serving to the end of the war, leaving the services as first lieutenant of Company I. Resuming the study of medicine, he graduated from Rush Medical College in 1868, soon after removing to Neenah, where he has since en- gaged in the practice of his profession. He was married to Emma G. Scribner, of Fond du Lac. IIe has been superintendent of schools and president of the Wisconsin Medical Society. He is a Mason, a member of the Lewis Post, G. A. R., and a Re- publican.
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