USA > Wisconsin > Marathon County > History of Marathon County, Wisconsin and representative citizens > Part 27
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The police force consisted of a marshal and one night watchman, re- enforced for a couple of months in the spring by a special policeman. The fire department consisted of the unpaid voluntary fire company, with the hand engine, assisted by the hook and ladder company, also volunteers. There was enough for the mayor to do in those days, especially if one was inclined to be more than mayor in name only, or limit his official authority to the presidency
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over the city council. Mr. Hoeflinger was conscious that, although there was no salary attached to the office, still some duties were to be performed, not of a pleasing nature, or in connection with the merely administrative affairs of the city, but duties onerous and unpleasant, but he did not shrink from performing them.
Wausau being then on the end of a railroad line, and the last place of importance on the Wisconsin river, had a very large floating population, sometimes as many as a thousand, who spent a large part of their earnings here. It had assumed somewhat the airs and complexion of a frontier town, which in fact it was, and shady characters plied their trade almost everywhere. Livery rigs, whose occupants delighted in gaudy colored and highly scented dresses, paraded the streets. inviting the unsophisticated pinery boy to make acquaintance with the world, rather demi-monde. Mayor Hoeflinger under- took the heroic task of cleaning out the city. He made no pompous declara- tion of what he was going to do, did not begin this work by a bugle blast. He went at it in a most primitive way. One night he called to his aid his faithful adlatus, the city marshal, George Stelz, and-Harun al Raschid-like-they made a tour of the suspected parlors of Dame Fortune. No arrests were made on the spot, but next day it was said on the street that the mayor had deliv- ered himself of some forceful speeches in some places. Some arrests fol- lowed and a number of business men in the wet goods line gave bond for their appearance in circuit court. After some terms of court these cases were for- gotten, but the mayor's bold appearance as a social reformer had a good effect for more than his own term of office. Some of the professionals left the town, the bunco steerer disappeared, and the olfactory nerves of the pinery boys were no longer termpted on the streets by the odors of musk or patchoulie with which the air seemingly had theretofore been impregnated. Wausau assumed its normal condition; legitimate enterprises prospered; the building of fine residences, especially in the northeastern part, continued, mainly the work of a new architect and builder. John Mercer, who had come to Wausan in 1872. The N. T. Kelly residence was his first work here, which to this day is one of the finest residence buildings in the city, and many others are of his conception and plans.
At this time the city began to spread out across the river, but nevertheless the hard times beginning with the fall of the banking house of Jay Cook begun to be felt in Wausau. Its effect had been retarded somewhat by the building of the railroad to Wausau in 1874, but lumber had fallen in price, collections were slow, and the municipality began to feel the downward trend of affairs about this time.
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Mr. Hoeflinger did his best to keep city expenses down to a proper limit, but he could not prevent a large return of unpaid taxes, which in those days, at least so far as personal property tax was concerned, was nearly a clear loss. He was glad to relinquish the cares of office and devote himself to his private business as a real estate and insurance man.
Carl Hoeflinger came to Wausau in 1860, and was county treasurer from 1865 to 1873; he occupied the chair as editor of the Wausau Wochenblatt when it was founded, and at different times thereafter, being a fluent and racy writer in both the German and English languages. Alone and unaided by any society or organization, he organized and led the first procession on Memorial Day in honor of the departed soldiers of the Civil war, furnishing with a lavish hand, from his own garden, all the flowers for the occasion. The ceremony fell in disuse after this first procession, to be revived after many years by Cutler Post, G. A. R., at Wausau. C. Hoeflinger was a man of attractive qualities of mind and heart, always popular, generous almost to a fault. He died a victim to that dread disease, consumption, on the 21st day of September, 1880, only forty-eight years of age.
The office of mayor was purely an honorary one until lately, but there never was a dearth of candidates, many citizens not only being willing, but glad to serve their fellow citizens in that capacity, though they had to go through the ordeal of an election and take the chances of defeat at the polls. They considered it an honor to be the candidate of a portion of the people, the candidate of their party, and next to the honor of being elected, stood the honor of being defeated; at least that was the view taken by people in earlier days, and they brought forward good men in each instance, the community being the gainer by it.
The choice for mayor in 1876 was B. Ringle, who was then and had been for years, the county judge of this county. The election was very animated, not only as to mayor, but for every office from mayor down. The political parties were drawing the lines and marshaling their forces preparatory for the presidential contest of 1876, and each party put forward their best and most popular man.
Such men as D. L. Plumer and R. E. Parcher were contestants for the office of supervisor of the Third ward, which included all the territory north of Washington and east of Main street. Both of these men were excellent citizens, their reputation for competency, integrity and local patriotism as well established as now, but curiously enough their nomination, instead of bringing forth unanimous rejoicing, brought forth only bitter denunciations from their respective partisans. It was Archbishop Whatley who said that
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in a heated political contest it could easily be proven that Abel had killed Cain, and the truth of this remark was proven by the heated disputes of the partisans of these candidates.
The Republicans were bound to elect their candidate; the Democrats felt they could not afford to have their candidate defeated, and other wards took more interest in the election of the Third ward than in their own. When on the night of the election, D. L. Plumer emerged with a majority of three votes out of the contest there was a sigh of relief among Democrats, and the Republicans were satisfied, feeling that they had done their whole duty by their candidate.
The election in this year, including the presidential election of 1876, was the last one in which these two gentlemen were found in opposite camps. The exigency of politics brought them together in less than two years, and from that time on until the death of R. E. Parcher, they trained together in busi- ness and pretty much in the same political camp.
The administration of Mayor B. Ringle continued the established policy of street improvements, and in general kept a watchful eye on the interests of the city. But business was getting duller and duller, prices were still fall- ing, and as taxes were bearing hard on the people the expenses of the city were curtailed as much as possible. Still one work worth mentioning was undertaken. The city had been spreading out and homes were erected all along and close up to the edges of the marsh. The miasma arising from this stagnant pool caused much sickness, especially among children, with an appal- ling death rate.
The drainage of this marsh was undertaken by digging a ditch at the southwest end of the marsh leading to a plank culvert, which ran underground through the property of Adam Young and P. B. Mckellar, and underground across Grand avenue into the ravine which comes up to Grand avenue at Columbia park, leading to the river. That ditch and culvert served its purpose for a time, lowering the height of the pond and narrowing its limits, but in the nature of things could only be of a temporary character. .
The pool on William's flat in the first ward, was also partially trained and the sanitary condition was greatly improved, though the cause was not wholly removed.
Few men, if any, filled the office of mayor who devoted more time to its interests and had more executive ability, a more thorough understanding and knowledge of municipal affairs. B. Ringle had been county clerk of Mara- thon county for six years, had served it five times as representative in the leg- islature and was county judge from 1864 until his death, on the 27th day of
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October, 1881. He was familiar with the needs of the city as well as the county.
When he took the office of county clerk, and found the county owing the state $20,000 for taxes, a very large sum in those days, when money brought one and one-half or two per cent interest per month, and lands were considered a burden, he was the originator and, with the aid of his intimate friend, Sena- tor E. L. Brawn of Waupaca, succeeding in enacting a law by which the state accepted forty thousand acres of tax title land in cancellation of this debt.
These lands were sold by the state for 75 cents an acre soon afterwards, and thereby again returned to the assessment rolls, increasing to that extent the taxable property of the county. For this act Mr. B. Ringle received high praise from all parties at that time.
In his private life, as well as in his official capacity, he was a man of un- impeachable integrity, plain-spoken in language, going always directly to the point, never deceiving friend or foe with phrases of doubtful import or double meaning. He was a powerful factor in shaping the destinies of Marathon county and the city of Wausau, and politically exerted more influence soon after his coming to Wausau than any other man. He was a native of the Palatine, Germany, where he was educated and worked in some minor official capacity. He emigrated to this county in 1846, and came directly to Wis- consin, settling first in Germantown, Washington county, but two years later took up farm life in the town of Herman, Dodge county, Wisconsin. where he remained until the spring of 1859. when he came to Wausau. He was postmaster, chairman and justice of the peace in Dodge county, and familiar with town, village and county government when he came to Wausau. The numerous German settlers who came to Marathon county about that time and settled in the new towns, consulted him more than any one of the lawyers then here on town organization and the like, because he could speak their language, explain the meaning of the law and instruct them in their duties. They found him a reliable and willing advisor, and that in connection with his sturdy and honest character accounted for the strong political influence which he exerted until his death.
The census of 1875 and the presidential vote of 1876 showed a large gain over the previous years. Nevertheless business was suffering more and more, there was a disposition to find fault with the government of nation, state and municipality, and whenever a mayor had served his one-year term. he asked for no other, but was glad to retire and leave the thankless job to some other person.
In 1877 J. C. Clarke became mayor and the council which was elected
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with him was conspicuous in more than one sense, than any of its prede- cessors. Not only was the mayor one of the largest businessmen of the city, but so were most of the supervisors, who under the old charter were also mem- bers of the city council. There were B. G. Plumer, from the first ward; Jacob Paff, from the second; Carl Hoeflinger, from the fourth, and Alex Stewart, from the newly created fifth ward. They found an empty treasury, empty because a large amount of taxes was returned as unpaid, and in those days the county treasurer did not pay the delinquent taxes on the return to him of the tax rolls. It took an order of the county board requiring him to do so after the tax sale, at which the county was usually the only bidder, and then county orders were issued to the city or towns for unpaid taxes. In 1877 the city had no less than $4.000 in county orders for unpaid taxes, but these county orders were not par, but stood at a discount of from 20 to 25 per cent. Of course the city kept these orders in the treasury expecting to pay the county taxes for the ensuing year, and tried to get along with the license money which was not to exceed $50 a year where it is now $200 until the next tax paying time.
There was not much change for improvements, and the best that could be done was to keep streets and bridges in some kind of repair. There was then no money for such luxuries as street lights or street crossings.
Still the administration managed to run the city without going into debt. and they had to exercise much wisdom in accomplishing it. The hard times had struck Wausau with full force; many men were out of employment, and wages were at low ebb. Yet one ray of hope penetrated the dark outlook. The Wisconsin Valley Railroad opened a real estate office at Wausau in Music Hall building, and put J. M. Smith in charge of the business. He as principal contractor of the building of the road had taken a large interest in that land in part payment and was directly interested in the sale; it was said at the time that he had a half interest. Certain it is that after a few years he purchased the interest of the railroad in the land, and owned it himself with his co-part- ner Thompson. In the spring of 1875 he made his first trip through the settled portion with a view of examining the land as to fertility of the soil and its adaption for farming. The season was unusually late that year, and he found the growing crops decidedly backwards and felt rather blue over the prospect of realizing much out of the land. About two months later he made the same trip again, and was then surprised to see the waving fields of grain and thick fields of timothy which greeted his astonished gaze. He knew then that his interest in the lands would turn out much better than expected, and he lost no time in endeavoring to get actual settlers. He adver-
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tised liberally, but judiciously, spending thousands of dollars in making known the agricultural richness of Marathon county, establishing a number of branch offices, and had hundreds of little frames made, boxes, in which the grains produced in Marathon county were exhibited, which were distributed at rail- road stations and on all points liable to attract the attention of prospective purchasers. His energetic work began to tell in 1877; there was a large influx of strangers who settled on these lands, and they had to purchase their home and farm supplies at Wausau, as their nearest market. Their trade not only enlivened the extremely dull season somewhat, but held out great hopes for the future.
He was very successful in bringing settlers to this county, selling lands at reasonably low rates, even for that time and by giving such liberal terms as to payments that even the poorest was enabled to obtain a home; provided he would be industrious and honest. Nearly every one of these settlers became a well to do farmer, and to J. M. Smith's push and energy, and his honorable and fair dealing with the parties to whom he sold, was due much of the growth of agriculture in this county, and a corresponding growth of Wausau as an industrial and manufacturing center. This immigration helped Wausau over the worst of the hard times in 1877, and the careful manage- ment of city affairs saved it from running into debt.
The end of Mayor Clarke's administration was remarkable by the begin- ning of suits against city and county with a view of the cancellation of taxes which were sought to be declared illegal. This controversy was hurtful to the city more than to the county, but both passed out of it with no more damage than a black eye, for the time being, figuratively speaking, but the after effect was rather beneficial in that assessors were brought about to a better under- standing and realization of their duties.
J. C. Clarke had often been mentioned as pioneer lumberman who came as a boy to Wausau in 1845. He was harder pressed than any other of the mill owners at Wausau during the time from 1874 to 1879, but he held up his head and succeeded in saving his property when other lumbermen went down. Fortune began smiling on him after 1879, and he was on the road to pros- perity, when he sold out his mill property and standing pine to the McDonald Brother Company, a corporation in 1882, retaining only a respectable minor- ity of the shares. But being used to the full and unrestricted control of his large business for so many years, which he was no longer allowed to exer- cise after the new corporation had taken possession, he sold his remaining interest in the following year and looked around for a new field of labor. In an evil hour he invested in a tobacco plantation in Virginia, and what it
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was that could induce him, a Wisconsin pioneer lumberman, to go down into old Virginia among the Southern planters with whom he could not have any- thing in common, remained a mystery to his friends until the end of his life. The venture turned out a complete failure and so was his next venture of farming in the state of New Jersey. He returned to Wausau after a few years, then took up a homestead near Bradley on the Sault St. Mary Railroad, cleared the title to some of his propertly at and near Tomahawk City, which was then being founded by a Mr. Bradley, and succeeded in getting means enough to build himself a decent and respectable home, the only property which descended to his children. He was an energetic and hard worker all his life; came as a boy of fourteen years into the pinery without any acquaint- ances or friends; he understood the lumber business thoroughly, and in his younger days was sought as a pilot, particularly to run Big Bull. He was honest and warm hearted, but he could not always read the signs of the times; his first error was in selling out at a time when remaining a few more years in sole control of his property would have brought him a little fortune; but his greatest error was his venture in going into the plantation country of Vir- ginia which came nigh ruining him financially. When he returned, how- ever, he was the same John C. Clarke, undaunted by reverses, beginning life anew, and to the end of his days had the respect and good will of all his many old friends and acquaintances.
He was sheriff of Marathon county in 1859 and 1860, and many years a very influential member of the county board. He was elected to the assem- bly in 1881, and was a very creditable representative. While in the legis- lature, it happened that the railroad construction company which was building the railroad from the city of Eau Claire to Superior City went into bank- ruptcy and the state was forced by sheer humanity to send provisions up the line of the road to save the working people of that road from starvation.
John C. Clarke with a few other honorable and far seeing members desired the state to take the land grant given for the building of the road and build and operate the railroad itself. That land grant was worth more than it cost to build and equip the railroad, but for the state to take the grant. as it had a perfect right to do, and get the railroad substantially for nothing and still have valuable land was, in the opinion of the great majority of the legislature at that time, looking too much towards socialism, and the grant was given to the Chicago & Northwestern Railroad, which built the new line and organized it as the Chicago, Milwaukee, Minneapolis & Omaha Railroad.
There was a sequel to that land grant. The Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railroad also sought to get that grant, and the competition of these
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railroads endangered the success of either and worked indirectly in favor of the scheme of John C. Clarke and a few of his friends, who wanted the state to take over the grant and build the railroad itself.
Under the circumstances the two railroads made common cause; the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Company withdrew, leaving the field clear to Chicago & Northwestern Railroad under a secret agreement, letting the last mentioned railroad take the grant, and build the road, about 62 miles in length, in consideration of which the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Rail- road should have a one-fourth interest in the lands granted, and be allowed to run their trains over the newly built road on very favorable terms and other very important and valuable concessions.
When the Chicago, Milwaukee, Minneapolis & Omaha Railroad had obtained that grant, had built the road and operated it. it refused to stand by the bargain made with the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railroad, claim- ing that the contract was void as against public policy. In the litigation which followed the breach of the contract, the Omaha road made that their defense, and the supreme court could not but adopt the same view. In the language of later days, this agreement was "a gentleman's agreement" ("rogue" would be a better term), which is binding on gentlemen without any aid of courts, just as gambling debts are called "debts of honor" because no court in the world will enforce them, and in this instance the Omaha road did not play the part of the gentleman with the gentleman on the other side. In strict course of justice, the successful railroad should have been also deprived of the grant or the benefits derived from it, because obtained under a corrupt bargain.
See 75 Wis. 225, and Sec. 4482 R. S., cited by court.
Such and similar agreements of and between railroads and favored cor- porations and large shippers, and actions of this sort, have brought about the hostile feeling against railroads which manifested itself in unfriendly legislation in late years, under which railroading is suffering to some extent at this time, but for which they themselves are largely responsible.
Since his return to Wausau, John C. Clarke was elected justice of the peace, re-elected from term to term, and he died at the age of seventy-six years, after a comparatively short illness. The last years of his life were spent fairly comfortably at his home on Franklin street, a modest, unpretentious but neat little house. He was a native of north Wales and came as boy with some emigrant friends to Dane county in June, 1845, from where he wan- dered up in the Wisconsin pinery in the same year, a poor, friendless boy, and stayed here all his life, with the exception of the few years spent in Vir- ginia and New Jersey after he sold out in 1883 before his return back home.
CHAPTER XIX.
The City of Wausau from 1878-1912-3.
D. L. PLUMER.
Up to the year 1878 the majority of voters in Wausau were attached to the Democratic party. Officers were nominated by political conventions, but while there was opposition in the election, the Democratic party succeeded in electing the head of the village or city government without interruption, and also most of the minor officers, and the village trustees or the city council. The government was honest though a party government, no charges of graft were ever made, much less discovered or sustained, nor did any defalcation of public funds occur.
But in the spring of 1878 there came a change. It was brought about by the organization and growth of the Greenback party, which had drawn its strength so much from the Democratic party that when the Greenback party nominated a city ticket in 1878 with D. L. Plumer, a prominent formed Dem- ocrat at the head, the Democrats put up no ticket in opposition, but left it to the Republican party alone to put up the opposition ticket. The Repub- lican party thus challenged, nominated a straight party ticket, which was defeated, and Mr. D. L. Plumer and the whole Greenback ticket was elected by a big majority. Mr. R. E. Parcher was elected on the Greenback ticket for assessor.
D. L. Plumer was no novice in city government, and with a competent council he did all that could be done to steer the city clear of the bars and cliffs which threatened the municipality. It was a time when tax litigation was rampant. A fe wsuits had already been commenced in the winter of 1877-78 to cancel taxes, and towards spring they multiplied. A decision of the highest court in the state seemed an inducement to fight taxes. In one day not less than twenty actions were served upon Mayor Plumer. The treas- utry was at low ebb, and the outlook for a betterment was not flattering. But in matters of litigation of this kind the mayor was of an unyielding dis- position, and by his holding out against all settlements or compromises with
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