USA > Wisconsin > Marathon County > History of Marathon County, Wisconsin and representative citizens > Part 57
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HON. DANIEL LONGFELLOW PLUMER.
One of the pioneers who have witnessed the progress of Marathon county from its wild and uncultivated state to its present proud position as one of the foremost counties as regards agriculture, industries and general culture, and who had his full share in the accomplishments of these results, is Hon. D. L. Plumer of Marathon county.
He came to the village of Wausau from his native state, New Hamp- shire, in 1857, when the whole county, including Merrill and all territory north to the state line, had less than 500 inhabitants. He started in life as a surveyor and the reliability of his work recommended him to town and county authorities for making all needful surveys. His work soon took him into the northern parts of the state and thus he became early familiar with the resources of central and northern Wisconsin, and a strong believer in its future greatness. When after years of hard work, and through his own personal efforts, fortune began to smile upon him, he was always ready to assist with his means any enterprise promising to benefit the people of this community. The larger part of his manhood was spent in public service as related in the pages of this book. In political creed Mr. Plumer is a Democrat and on many occasions has been called upon for active service by his party. For seven years he was supervisor of the village of Wausau and mayor, many more years county surveyor, served as member of assembly and as delegate at large to the Democratic National Convention in 1900, and for six years served as member of the Board of Regents of the State Uni- versity.
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He is president of the First National Bank of Wausau, president of the Northern Chief Iron Company, and one of Wausau's most substantial citizens and has been identified with its interests since 1857. He was born in Rock- ingham county, New Hampshire, July 3, 1837, and is a son of Abraham and Sarah (Longfellow) (Cilley) Plumer.
The first of the Plumer family to come to the American colonies was Francis Plumer, in 1633, and his descendants settled in Massachusetts and New Hampshire, taking part in the early Indian troubles, in the War of the Revolution and later in the War of 1812. On the maternal side, Gen. Brad- berry Cilley was a distinguished officer in the War of the Revolution. The later generations of the family cared less for military life, and the father . of Daniel L. Plumer spent his days as an agriculturist. In his family of seven children, the fourth born was named Daniel Longfellow.
After his school days were over, Daniel L. Plumer prepared for a future career by learning civil engineering. He came to Wisconsin and located at Wausau in 1857, starting to work at lumbering and became interested mainly in timber lands and the manufacture of lumber until 1890. As early, however, as 1867 he started a private bank, doing a brokerage business with the Bank of Marshall & Ilsley of Milwaukee as correspondents and after a couple of years he with W. C. Silverthorn and George Silverthorn opened a regular bank, doing business under firm name of Silverthorn & Plumer, which bank was reorganized as the First National Bank of Wausau in 1882. Mr. D. L. Plumer has been president of this bank since its organization, but his banking record covers a period of forty-five years. It was mainly through his influence that the First National Bank erected its splendid bank- ing house, beginning building in the fall of 1890 and had it ready for occu- pancy after New Year, 1892, which was at the time and is yet, the finest bank and office building in Wausau.
D. L. Plumer has other interests, being financially interested in many important enterprises, and is president of the Northern Chief Iron Com- pany, which corporation owns extensive iron ore mines on the Gogebic range in Wisconsin.
In 1869 Mr. D. L. Plumer married Miss Mary Jane Draper, a daughter of Josiah Draper of Otsego county, N. Y. One son was born to them, Abraham L., who died in infancy. Mrs D. L. Plumer has taken great interest in all the work of the Ladies' Literary Society, and in the public library of Wausau, of which she has been an active working member for years, and in a quiet retiring manner extends needful help where needed. In political creed Mr. Plumer is a Democrat and on many occasions has
HON. JOHN RINGLE
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been honored by his party. He served one term as a member of the Legis- lature of Wisconsin, three terms as mayor of Wausau, many years as county surveyor, and for six years was a member of the Board of Regents of the University of Wisconsin. He has witnessed the growth of Wausau from a town of 500 inhabitants to a city of 18,000 population.
HON. JOHN RINGLE.
For conspicuous public service of many years, for results accomplished as a legislative as well as an executive officer, the record of Mr. John Ringle is an enviable one. From the time he first entered public service in 1872 as county clerk, until the present time when the exigency of the times . brought him forward again as mayor of Wausau, his public service in one position or another has been referred to in previous chapters. To be in the glare of public scrutiny, and able to hold the trust and confidence of the people for nearly half a century in so many different public positions, speaks volumes of a person's integrity, capacity and honesty.
Hon. John Ringle, present mayor of Wausau, and first vice president of the First National Bank of this city, was born October 2, 1848, at Her- man, Dodge County, WVis., and is a son of Bartholomew and Amalia ( Pick) Ringle. The parents of Mayor Ringle were born in Rhenish Bavaria and came to America in 1846, taking up their residence on a farm in Dodge county, Wis., in May, 1859, coming to Wausau. There were five sons and three daughters in the family, John being the youngest born of the sons and the fifth of the family in order of birth.
John Ringle was eleven years old when his parents came to Wausau and here he attended school until he was eighteen years of age. He then taught school for one year, following which he served as deputy county clerk. In 1872 he was elected county clerk of Marathon county and served continuously for six years, after which he went into the real estate busi- ness. His friends, however, were not willing that he should retire from public affairs and elected him in 1879 to the Wisconsin General Assembly, and again in 1880 and once more in 1881, and in 1882 elected him to the senate for a term of four years. He had also been, in the meanwhile, hon- ored locally, being elected mayor in 1884, serving for one term and during that administration the contract was let and the present system of water- works was built. In 1892 he again became a member of the general assem- bly and from 1894 until 1898 served as postmaster of Wausau, appointed by President Cleveland during his second term. For a number of years he
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served as a member of the city council and was chairman of the county board and was made president of the building committee when the present fine courthouse was erected. In the spring of 1912 he was elected for a term of two years as mayor again of Wausau, an office which he honors equally as it honors him. His political affiliations have always been with the Democratic party and at one time he was his party's nominee for state treasurer. He was a delegate to the Democratic National Convention in 1880 that nominated General Hancock for the presidency, although, on account of the high waters at that time, he almost failed to make connection with Stevens Point, being obliged to travel in a skiff with many elements of danger surrounding. In 1892 he served again as a delegate to the Demo- 'cratic National Convention. He has been prominent also in business and was one of the organizers of the Ringle Brick Company, of which he is president ; he is vice president of the Mathie Brewing Company, and presi- dent of the Clay Manufacturers' Association, while his banking interests are also important.
In 1872 Mr. Ringle was married to Miss Augusta Engel, of Wausau, and to that marriage five sons and four daughters were born, namely: Gustav, who is in the lumber business; Edward, who is a clerk in the Wau- sau postoffice ; Oscar, who is a member of the law firm of Regner & Ringle at Wausau; John, Jr., who is teller in the First National Bank at Wausau; Leander, who is manager of the Ringle Brick Company; Annie, who is the wife of Dr. G. A. Thielke of Wausau: Beatrice, who resides at home : Leo- nora, who is the wife of Abraham Ringle of Jersey City, N. J .; and Valeria, who resides at home. The mother of the above family died in 1894. The second marriage of Mayor Ringle took place in 1895, to Miss Louisa Kem- mer, of Zweibruecken, Germany, who died without issue in 1905. The present wife of Mayor Ringle was formerly Mrs. Augusta Frey, a widow. They enjoy a beautiful home, the residence standing at No. 108 Grand avenue. Mayor Ringle has always been interested in the public schools and is a member of the board of education. He is a Mason, belonging to the Blue Lodge and Chapter and is identified also with the Odd Fellows at Wausau. He and family belong to St. Paul's Evangelical church.
HON. WALTER ALEXANDER.
The public life and fame of a citizen is the property of the people of the community in which he lives; they esteem the man whose achievements in life are the result of honest efforts, intelligently and perseveringly pur-
HON. WALTER ALEXANDER
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sued. The man of capacity, of integrity and probity of character is the man whom the people delight to honor and in whom they bestow their con- fidence. In all the qualities of mind and heart which compel esteem and the respect of the people generally, none stands higher in the good opinion of the people of Marathon county than Hon. Walter Alexander, who has proven himself a leader in affairs affecting to a high degree the welfare and pros- perity of Wausau and Marathon county.
The political arena did not attract him to any considerable extent, he being content to serve his home city one or two terms as alderman, and discharging his duty as a citizen in quietly casting his vote, only going out of his usual course when in his judgment the interest of the whole country demanded more than usual activity from every man. But as a leader in business affairs he had no superior, and he proved himself as faithful in this field as in all other walks of life. The same integrity of purpose characterized him when chosen by his party to represent it in the arena of politics.
He was elected as a delegate to the national Republican convention in 1900 and chosen as one of the committee to deliver to President William Mckinley the notification of his re-nomination to the presidency. But higher honors awaited him which were, however, not willingly granted, which were gained only by the force of his character, and in the reliance of the people of his (the tenth) congressional district in the rectitude of his own inten- tions, which made him the choice of his party as a delegate to the national Republican convention of 1908 for William H. Taft in opposition to the ambition of Sen. Robert M. La Follette, who contended with William H. Taft for the same place. When Mr. Alexander assumed this duty which was rather averse to his natural inclinations, submitting only to the urgent demands of friends whose friendship he valued highly, and agreeing with them in political sentiment, he was opposed by the whole strength of the political machinery of the state which the senator held in the hollow of his hand, but his election in spite of this handicap was the expression of the people in his personal honor and integrity, and their confidence in him. He was elected as the only Taft delegate in Wisconsin, which was an elec- tion by popular choice at open primaries, not in an indirect way picked in caucus by other delegates.
While the administration of William H. Taft has already passed into history, it is too early at this date to pass upon the merits or demerits of the same; but history written in coming years, free from the passions and the excitement of the recent contest, may give approval to some of the meas-
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ures which came under the most hostile criticism of the present day, and met with the strongest opposition of contemporaries.
Among the men who are developing the dormant forces of this valley which will make it in not far distant time, the center of industry in the state, Walter Alexander stands in the front rank. His life has been one of unre- mitting activity, his early years full of toil, devoted to honorable pursuits, and guided by intelligence and experience, he was remarkably successful.
When fortune had bestowed her favors upon him, he remained the same unassuming, modest man he had been while still battling for success, simple in his manners and tastes, and did not use the means so earned for the gratification of idle desires or in pursuit of hollow pleasures, but em- ployed them in founding, and assited in founding useful enterprises which at the same time enure generally to the welfare of the people of the Wis- consin valley.
He had his training under his uncle, Walter D. McIndoe, where he learned from personally taking part therein, the lumber business from the cutting down of the tree through all its stages to the putting the manufactured prod- uct on the market. There is one authentic incident in his life, which shows the metal there was in the boy when not yet of age. It occurred in the year 1870, when the Wausau boom had very little storage capacity. In that year there was an unusual large quantity of logs to be sawed at the three mills at Wausau, owned by McIndoe, Plumer, and Clarke. The freshet came early, and logs were coming down fast, quicker than expected, filling up the boom and being pushed and pocked by the boom crew even up stream to fill every available nook and corner of the same. Millions were still above, which unless stopped from coming down and arriving, were liable to break the boom and pass by, to the great detriment of log owners and manufac- turers, or because being mingled with logs destined for points below, Stevens Point and Grand Rapids, could not be held here in a jam, but must be passed on below, taking with them the logs intended to be manufactured at Wausau. In this emergency it became necessary to stop the drive at once. Stopping a drive means to call off the men who are keeping the logs afloat ; they will not float many miles in a swift river like the Wisconsin with its many shoals and rapids, because the current in the center will wash them ashore, or onto the islands and bars where they ground, or into dead water sloughs. The largest drive, belonging to Walter D. McIndoe and one belonging to John and Alexander Stewart, were still behind in the neighbor- hood of Grandfather Falls. This drive had to be stopped and quickly. too. There was no time for hesitation or vacillation; it was not the time to send
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an untried man with this important message; the trip could only be made on horseback, over soft sticky roads, over a territory nearly uninhabited, there being then not over a dozen farm clearings between Wausau and Mer- rill, and an unbroken wilderness from there to Grandfather Falls.
Walter Alexander was ordered by his uncle to go up there and stop the drive. It was late in the afternoon when he was told to go. He asked no questions ; there was no time for parley. He lost no time in getting ready, but was ready. Saddling a horse he started immediately, riding on through the night in darkness to reach the driving crew at Grandfather Falls or there- abouts. He reached the crew in the morning before breakfast and stopped the drive. This may now seem to have been an easy performance. Let somme one try to ride over such a rough road in the darkness of night only five or six miles, and he will change his mind, especially when it is remem- bered that the distance to be covered by Mr. Alexander between late in the afternoon and daylight next morning was thirty-six miles, made in the spring with the frost just out of the ground and every creek high, and to be forded. His experience with laboring men made him their friend; no em- ployer of labor was ever held in higher esteem in the Wisconsin valley be- cause he always took an interest in his men.
His gift to the city of Wausau of "McIndoe Park" in memory of his uncle has been referred to and he has generously assisted philanthropic insti- tutions ; he has seen the city grow from a hamlet of less than 500 to a city of over 18,000, much of the growth of which is due to his public spirit and enterprise. He is at present officially connected with, or financially inter- ested in more than twenty industrial concerns, in this state, in the south and west. Ever since the organization of the A. Stewart Lumber Company, for many years the largest lumber manufacturing concern in the Wisconsin val- ley, he has acted as secretary and treasurer for the same, but his business is not confined to the lumber industry alone.
He is president of the Wausau Paper Mill Company, vice president of the Marathon Paper Mills Company; president of the Marathon County Bank; vice president of the National German American Bank, and a director in the First National Bank of Milwaukee.
Mr. Alexander comes of good Scotch ancestry, being born in Glasgow, Scotland, on the 14th day of June, 1849; his parents were John Alexander and his wife Jane, a sister of W. D. McIndoe. They emigrated to America in 1858 and settled in Portage county where the father, a farmer, engaged in agriculture, and died in Wisconsin in 1900 at the age of seventy-three years, surviving his wife by three years, she having died in 1897 at the age
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of seventy-two years. They were the parents of five sons and four daugh- ters, of whom seven are still living. Of these children Catherine died un- married; Anna, now deceased, was the wife of Thomas Blair Sheridan of Waupaca county; Walter was born next; Hugh, a son, lives at Wausau, WVis .; Margaret, a daughter, is unmarried; McIndoe Alexander, a son, re- sides in Owatonna, Minn., where he is engaged in lumber business; Taylor, a son, is a resident of Wausau, Wis .; John Alexander, a son, is in lumber business in Aurora, Ill., and Jean, a daughter, is the wife of F. G. Dana, of Milwaukee, Wis.
After the death of Walter D. McIndoe in 1872, the business was con- tinued by John and Alexander Stewart, Mr. Alexander becoming a partner three years afterwards.
Walter Alexander was but nine years of age when he came to this coun- try with his parents and passed his early boyhood days at home with his parents at Buena Vista, Portage county, and with his uncle at Wausau, his home being really at the latter place, where he went to school. After finishing the course at Wausau which was then rather elementary, he spent some time at Ripon College from which institution he returned to Wausau to take a course of training in his uncle's saw mill and lumber business which gave him the education which made him what he became in after years.
He was married to Miss Sarah, a daughter of Cyrus C. Strobridge and Lydia, his wife, in 1874, which nuptials were the social event at the time, the groom being one of Wausau's most popular young men and the bride the most charming of the many handsome young ladies, distinguished alike for her personal attractions as for the goodness of heart and culture and refine- ment, and the many wishes for their future happiness were fully realized. The father of the bride, C. C. Strobridge, was one of the pioneers of Wausau and most respected citizens as a man of sterling integrity ; he was for years engaged in the commercial and lumber business at Merrill and Wausau.
The union of Mr. and Mrs. Alexander is blessed with four children, namely: Walter D., who was married to Miss Esther Law, and who is engaged in lumber business in Bloomington, Ill .; Judd, a son, unmarried, who is associated with his father; Ruth, an unmarried daughter, at home and another son at home, Ben. Mrs. Walter Alexander is a very prominent member of several societies, and universally beloved for her benevolence and affiliations with charitable institutions and the unpretentiousness of her aid rendered in cases where it is needed. In her endeavors in this respect
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she has the co-operation of her husband as in all her other charitable work. The members of the family are affiliated with the Methodist Episcopal church.
HON. NEAL BROWN.
Hon. Neal Brown is one of the distinguished men of Wausau. He was born on a farm in Jefferson county and formerly took pride in the assertion that there is no work on the farm which he has not done or cannot do. Nevertheless he preferred mental to manual labor, graduating from the law department of the state university in 1880 and coming to Wausau, opened his law office in the fall of the same year.
Of course clients did not come to him in alarming numbers for some time, but he plodded on, got into courts, and after a few years had estab- lished a remunerative practice, not only in state courts, including the Supreme Court, but including the federal courts as well. When the Law and Land Association was formed in 1885 he became the head of the legal department and since that time, until recently when he gave his time to other business, had been very successful as a practicing attorney. As a lawyer he had his successes and his defeats, as every lawyer with a large practice has, but he never lost a case for lack of preparation or the best presentation of the case on his part, but simply because his client's case de- served defeat. He was elected as a Democrat to the State Assembly in 1890, and to the State Senate in 1892 and made a good record as a legislator. To him was due the extension of the lien law, securing to the laborer his wages for all work done on all products of the forest, where there formerly was no lien, except on logs. His friends lovingly refer to him as the orator, philosopher and litterateur of Wausau, and he may justly claim all these honorable titles. Twice he made a political canvass of the state, not as a candidate for office, and it was the unqualified opinion of his party friends that his speeches were eloquent and effective. He is equally strong as a forensic debater, which is conceded by all his brother attorneys. In the session of the Legislature of 1893 he received the vote of the democratic minority for United States Senator, and in 1908 the democratic primary nomination for the same high office and the vote of his party for this high office in the Legislature in the next session.
Neal Brown is entirely at home with the old and new classics, has pub- lished himself essays on literary topics, and published a book entitled "Crit- ical Confessions," which was favorably received by the literary critics and secured him a place among literary men. In later years he has been called
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to address chambers of commerce in Milwaukee and Boston and other important business bodies. His addresses and writings show him to be a man of original thought and a correct reasoner, impatient of the shams and shallow pretensions, which in these days are attempted to be passed off as statesmanship.
In later years he has withdrawn from active law practice, and had given his thought and ability to the organization of large business enterprises, such as the Wausau Street Railroad Company and other large business concerns. The water powers of the Wisconsin, which were formerly in three hands, the owners of the saw mills, have been under his guidance largely, united in one strong company, but instead of three owners there are now a hundred owners, nearly all in the city of Wausau, stockholders, and the power-electrical power-drives wheels in many factories in this city and lights it and more will be developed.
It was through his efforts, after years of perseverance, that a company was organized to develop the water power at Rothschield, of which he was the president, and through his effort again that a large number of men, capitalists, took over the rights of this company and actually developed the power and built up the Marathon County Paper Mill, one of the largest business concerns of the county.
He is directly interested in that paper mill and one of the directors of the corporation. He has proved an organizer of large capital by uniting many men of moderate means, and in that way must be regarded as one of the best resourceful businessmen of the Wisconsin valley. He loves nature above everything, even business, and at his summer home on the Plover river entertains his friends during fishing and hunting season in a royal manner.
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