USA > Wisconsin > Milwaukee County > Milwaukee > History of Milwaukee from its first settlement to the year 1895 > Part 89
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been adopted and copied all over the civilized world. He is also the patentee of many of the leading machines and devices entering into the manufacture of flour and cereals.
As a citizen of Milwaukee he has become known also as a large owner of productive real estate in the city. He built and owns the Melrose flats on Cass and Mason streets, and the Ivanhoe flats on Mason street. During his later life he has been identified with industrial enterprises of great magnitude, and the accumulation of a comfortable fortune has crowned his worthy effort and activity as a business man. He is a man of broad general intelligence, as well as superior ability in his special sphere of operations. Thoughtful, studious and a tireless worker, he has been, and still is, one of those strong characters who bring about revo- lutions in the industrial world, and who thus con- tribute enormously to the material development of the communities with which they happen to be identified, and to the development as well of the country at large.
Mr. Gray is a Republican in politics because he believes in the principles of the party, but declines political preferment because he has no taste for that kind of life. He is a Mason of the thirty- third degree, and a member of Ivanhoe Com- mandery and the Wisconsin Consistory. He married Miss Katie Chipman, daughter of Col. S. P. Chipman, of Litchfield, Minnesota, June 11, 1874.
In 1884 Mr. Gray purchased a beautiful im- proved farm in the town of Greenfield, a few miles distant from the city, which he named Lauderdale, and on which he spends with his family a portion of each summer, in the en- joyment of rural surroundings and a rural atmo- sphere of which they all have a thorough appre- ciation.
GEORGE J. OBERMANN .- A distinguished honor was conferred upon the brewing interests of Milwaukee when Mr. George J. Obermann was advanced from the first vice-presidency to the presi- dency of the United States Brewers' Association as successor to William A. Miles, at the beginning of the year 1894. Mr. Obermann has not only been prominently identified with the brewing interests of Milwaukee for many years, but in other fields of enterprise he has also been con- spicuous, and as a public official and a liberal and progressive citizen has been not less favorably
known. Although still a comparatively young man, he is in a sense one of the pioneers of the city, having been born here in 1844 and having spent the greater part of his life here. He is one of the sons of Mr. Jacob Obermann, and may be said to have grown up with Milwaukee. His early educational advantages were the best the city afforded, and after graduating from the high school he pursued a special course of study in the German-English Academy, an institution of which not only the German-Americans, but all classes of people in Milwaukee are justly proud.
After completing his education he went East, and for a number of years thereafter was engaged in the import trade in New York city. Mean- time the brewing business his father had estab- lished here in 1854 had grown to considerable proportions, and in 1882 he came to this city to become connected with this enterprise. When the elder Obermann retired from business some years since to spend the remaining years of his life in the enjoyment of the fruits of his earnest and successful effort, the business which he had founded and which had grown to large propor- tions was left to his sons, who in 1883 organized the stock company of which Mr. George J. Ober- mann is now (1894) the president and executive head.
Mr. Obermann's brewery being one of the oldest members of the United States Brewers' Association, the new president of the association has been for many years closely identified with the work of that organization. An accomplished business man, with a broad capacity for organi- zation, and a happy faculty for harmonizing differ- ences of opinion and outlining policies calculated to promote the welfare of the brewing interests. he has rendered valuable services to the trade and enjoys to an unusual extent the esteem and good will of those engaged in the brewing business throughout the United States. In the conduct of the local organization of brewers he has taken the same prominent part as he has taken in the conduct and management of the national organiza- tion. For some years he was vice-president of the Chicago & Milwaukee Brewers' Association, and during a portion of his incumbency of that office was acting president of the association. As a director of the Commercial Bank and in other capacities he has also been identified with finan- cial and other important enterprises.
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As a citizen of Milwaukee he has been promi- nent among those who have labored most ear- nestly and effectively to promote the material prosperity of the city, and to the advancement of educational interests he has given special atten- tion and consideration. Appointed a member of the city Board of Education some years since, he has been three times elected to the presidency of the board, and only retired from that position when other obligations resting upon him made it necessary for him to decline an extension of the honor. Although his declination to serve longer as a member of the Board of Education relieved him from that responsibility, he found it difficult to avoid assuming other official responsibilities, and in his absence from the city was appointed by the mayor a member of the Fire and Police Com- mission of the city.
ADOLPH MEINECKE is the son of Dr. Fer- dinand Meinecke, and was born August 16, 1830, in Burhave, a small country town on the borders of the German Sea, in the Grand Duchy of Olden- burg. He enjoyed all the educational advan- tages afforded in his native place and received private instruction from his learned father up to the time he was thirteen years of age, when he was sent to the high school in Oldenburg, where he took thorough courses in the higher studies. He then attended Commercial College in Osna- bruck. Being now equipped with a good educa- tion he, in the spring of 1848, took passage on board the ship " Belinda " for New York, where he landed June 10th of that year.
His limited means were soon gone, but he was fortunate in securing a situation with Mr. Edward Hen, a German importer at No. 28 Liberty street, New York, with whom he remained seven years, occupying a position of considerable trust. In 1855 he settled in Milwaukee, and that year es- tablished himself in business as a dealer in toys and fancy goods. In 1864, when importation was practically precluded by the high gold premium, he established a factory in Milwaukee for the manufacture of baskets, toys, children's carriages, etc., and in keeping with his ambitions, activities and far-seeing shrewdness, Mr. Meinecke estab- lished, soon after he embarked in this branch of business, an auxiliary to his manufactory in the cultivation of Osier willows, thus enabling him to produce from the root a large portion of the willow used in his factory. As his busi-
ness increased the demand for this willow became so great that it became a profitable farm pro- duct in the neighborhood of Milwaukee, the farm- ers finding at Mr. Meinecke's establishment a market for cultivated willows which was very re- remunerative to them. Gradually he developed an industry of large proportions and built the large factory on the corner of Mason and Front streets, which from time to time has been ex- tended until it now covers the whole block from Mason to Oneida streets. The toy business is now superintended by Adolph Meinecke, Jr., and Carl Penshorn. His eldest son, Ferdinand, has charge of the factory, which furnishes steady em- ployment to about two hundred and fifty per- sons.
A successful manufacturer Mr. Meinecke has been conspicuous also in the advancement of edu- cational and other interests. In 1876 Gov. Tay- lor appointed him one of the commissioners from Wisconsin to the Centennial Exposition. He has been one of the trustees of the Public Museum ever since its establishment, and the work he has done for the institution and the liberal donations he has made to it entitles him to the warmest commendation. He has contributed many liter- ary articles to Frank Leslie's Illustrated News (German edition), and to the German newspapers, both here and in Germany, and notwithstanding the fact that his business affairs have required close attention and supervision, he has found time to evidence in many ways the fact that he is a man of broad culture. Both as merchant and manufacturer he has shown himself a man of su- perior ability and in all respects he has taken rank among the public spirited and enterprising citi- zens of Milwaukee.
In politics he is a Republican and was brought up in the Lutheran religious faith. He married February 25, 1854, Mary Louise, the daughter of George Krafft, Esq., of Heilbroun, a lady of su- perior culture and social graces, and eight chil- dren have been born of their union.
LEMAN BARTLETT was born in Jericho, in Chittenden county, Vermont, November 11, 1829, and is the son of William and Betsey (Dean) Bartlett. He is of Scotch ancestry, his grand- father, Phillip Bartlett, having come to this coun- try from the highlands of Scotland at about the time the Revolutionary War began. It is evident that this immigrant ancestor of the family came
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HISTORICAL AND BIOGRAPHICAL.
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to America with the intention of making it his permanent home, because no sooner had he fairly settled in the country than he espoused the cause of the revolutionists, and demonstrated his loyalty to the cause by serving seven years in the conti- nental army during the struggle for national inde- pendence.
After the war he was a part of the wave of im- migration which flowed from the older colonies of New England into Vermont, and he lived there many years, dying at a good old age in Saranac, New York. His son, William Bartlett, removed from Vermont to Saranac about 1835, and Leman Bartlett may be said to have grown up in New York state. Brought up on a farm he found abundance of work todo, even in early childhood, and his educational opportunities were limited to three months attendance at school in summer and three months in winter, from the time he was old enough to go to school until he was ten years of age, and after that time he attended school during the winter months only, until he was fourteen years of age. He continued to work on the farm until he was eighteen years of age, and then went to work by the month in the woods and lumber mills of Northern New York. Honest, industrious and trustworthy, when he was twenty years old he was sent to Herkimer county to start the first gang saw-mill operated in that county, a mill which was looked upon at that time as a modern wonder. After completing his work there he went to St. Lawrence county, where he started a much larger mill, and after that he was engaged for a short time in similar work in Canada.
While working by the month at a salary which would be considered small by young men of the present day he husbanded his earnings carefully, and when his parents concluded to come West he furnished the money with which they purchased a farm in this state. About 1855 he joined the family at Arena, Wisconsin, and after remaining there a short time he again went to work by the month in the lumber business in this state. For nine years he was employed in this capacity, and it was not until some time after his marriage that he turned his attention to other pursuits. He was married when he was about thirty years of age to Miss Eliza Barnard, a daughter of John Barnard, one of the pioneer merchants of Arena, and at once they settled down on the farm of which he had for some years been the owner. Mr. Bartlett
had, however, led such an active life since he left the old homestead in New York, that farming seemed to him altogether too quiet an occupation, and after remaining on the farm nine months he formed a partnership with his father-in-law in the mercantile business. With one or two changes of partners he continued in this business in the village of Spring Green until 1867, when he sold out his interests there and came to Mil- waukee.
Before coming to this city he had become inter- ested to a considerable extent in the grain trade, and had acquired a knowledge of the possibilities of the business which led him to believe that it was an exceedingly promising field of operations at that time. Forming a partnership with Her- man Zinkheisen, a well-known German citizen of Milwaukee, the grain commission firm of Zinkbei- sen & Bartlett was formed, which continued in business until 1875, when Mr. Zinkheisen lost his life on the steamship Schiller, along with other prominent citizens of Milwaukee. After the death of Mr. Zinkheisen, Mr. Bartlett became the head of the firm so far as its conduct and manage- ment was concerned, and continued the bus- iness with other partners until 1886. At that time the partnership was dissolved, and he associated with himself his only son, Mr. Oscar Z. Bartlett, ur.der the firm name of L. Bartlett & Son.
The business with which Mr. Bartlett became identified when he came to Milwaukee has since grown to large proportions. The value of the grain handled by this firm has sometimes amounted to as much as four million dollars a year and this gram has come from the Dakotas, Minnesota, Iowa, Nebraska, Kansas, Illinois and Wisconsin. The methods of business adopted by Mr. Bartlett have commended themselves both to the producers and the consumers with whom he has been brought into contact. Speculation has never en- tered into the business done by him to any extent whatever, but year after year he has purchased grain from the same sources and sold to the same consumers, acting as the agent and intermediary between the great Eastern markets and the Western producers. Both producers and consumers have learned from long experience that they will be fairly, honestly and conscientiously dealt with under all circumstances and both have implicit confidence, not only in the integrity, but in the
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sagacity and good judgment of Mr. Bartlett. Milwaukee consumers of grain, such as the Schlitz Brewing Company and other large establish- ments, have entrusted to him almost entirely the purchase of their supplies for many years, and time has served to strengthen their con- fidence in, and regard for each other as business men.
Mr. Bartlett has been a member of the Board of Trade of Milwaukee for more than twenty-five years, and is also a member of the Board of Trade of Chicago. IIe is a Democrat in politics, but has never held any office, and has taken no inter- est in political affairs other than to contribute his share toward securing good local and general government.
Besides Mrs. Bartlett, who has contributed her full share to his success in life, his family consists of one son, who married the daughter of Capt. John Schaffer, a noted sugar planter of Louisiana, and one daughter, now the wife of S. G. Courteen, of Milwaukee. Highly esteemed as a business man and citizen of Milwaukee, Mr. Bartlett is one of the men now most active and prominent in the trade and commerce of the city, whose success in life is due to his own efforts and who is in every sense of the term a self-made man.
FRANCIS BOYD comes of an independent, sturdy and high-minded line of . ancestors, and is a worthy son of his worthy predecessors. Mem- bers of both his father's and mother's families served in the Revolutionary War, among them being Gen. Church, his mother's grandfather. His father's family came from Scotland, and was de- scended from the chiefs of the same name, fre- quently mentioned in Scottish history. He is a native of Wisconsin, and was born on a farm in the township of Sugar Creek in Walworth county, December 14, 1840, to John Smith and Julia Ann A. (Noyes) Boyd. His parents settled in Milwau- kee in 1837, where his father kept a general store near the southwest corner of Wisconsin and East Water streets. He closed his business shortly before our subject's birth and settled on the farm in Sugar Creek. In 1846 he was elected Register of Deeds of Walworth county, and moved to Elkhorn, the county-seat ; he held the office till 1850, and two years later returned with his family to Milwaukee, where he died in 1868. Our sub- ject's mother, who was a woman of superior at- tainments, was a graduate of the celebrated Miss
Willard's school of Troy, New York. She died in Milwaukee in 1878.
After finishing his preliminary studies, Francis attended " Milwaukee University " and later was a member of the class of 1855 of the "United States Naval Academy," Annapolis, Maryland. He lived at home till 1861, assisting his father and helping himself in various employments. It is worthy of note that he was one of the sixty-five passengers rescued from the steamer "Lady Elgin," which was wrecked with more than four hundred passengers on board, on her return trip from Chi- cago to Milwaukee, in September, 1860. From 1861 to 1863 he was teller in the Bank of Green Bay, at Green Bay, Wisconsin, after which he associated himself with Mr. John Shadbolt under the firm name of Shadbolt & Boyd, and estab- lished the iron business in which he has been engaged continuously since. Their business was first located on East Water street ; later it was moved to another location on the same street, and from there to its present location at Nos. 129 and 131 West Water street. When the business was incorporated in 1888 as the "Shadholt & Boyd Iron Company," Mr. Shadbolt became president and Mr. Boyd vice-president; but upon the de- cease of the former Mr. Boyd became president of the company.
He has been somewhat active in municipal af- fairs, and in whatever pertains to the welfare of his city he shows commendable interest. In 1867-68 he was a lieutenant in the Milwaukee Light Guard, a volunteer military organization, and has also served two years as alderman of the Fourth ward ; he was a director of the "Milwau- kee Exposition Association " several terms ; also director of the Milwaukee Chamber of Commerce for two terms, and is president of the " Academy of Music Company," and one of the owners of its property. He is a man of genial, social nature, fond of good fellowship and is strongly attached to his friends. IIe is a worthy member of the Knights of Pythias, and also belongs to the Inde- pendent Order of Odd Fellows. He has traveled extensively throughout the United States ; keeps himself well informed on current topics and has a pleasing manner of imparting his wide range of information. Ile is a man of marked personality, prompt, decisive, outspoken and upright and at the same time modest and unassuming. In reli- gious faith he is an Episcopalian. In politics he
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has always been a Democrat. His tastes are do- mestic and his habits simple, and in his home life he is especially happy.
On September 25, 1869, he married Miss Sarah M. Lamberton, only child of William E. and Lucy R. Lamberton, of Milwaukee, who is in the high- est sense a worthy helpmate and companion.
JOHN BENTLEY, a native of Wales and the son of Thomas and Jane (Jones) Bentley, was born at Newtown, Montgomeryshire, North Wales, March 23, 1822. Thomas Bentley, the grandfather of our subject, who was born in Yorkshire, England, was greatly beloved by all who knew him, and his many acts of kindness and benevolence are often recalled by the present generation in the com- munity with which he was identified. Both he and his wife were members of the Church of England, and lived to the good old age of eighty- eight years. Four sons and two daughters were born to this union. Their son Thomas, the father of our subject, was born July 15, 1788, in Wales. He was a manufacturer of woolen goods, who immigrated to America and located in New Jersey, where he followed his former occupation until he came to Milwaukee to reside with his son. He died here May 11, 1866, aged seventy-eight years. At an early age John Bentley was engaged as a elerk in a seed store in Wales, and soon developed traits of character which made him greatly admired by his employers. His school advantages had been limited, and as a elerk he greatly regretted his lack of a proper education and resolved to improve every opportunity to add to his attainments and qualify himself for a busi- ness career. By diligent study during evenings, holidays, and after business hours, and by a syste- matic course of reading, he acquired a fund of general knowledge which enabled him to begin life fairly well equipped for its duties and respon- sibilities. At the age of seventeen years he joined his father in America, and upon his arrival in New York apprenticed himself to a plumber and brass- fitter in Brooklyn. After remaining in this employ a year and a half he went to Saratoga county in Northern New York, where he found employment with a farmer who was engaged to some extent in the lumber business. The following spring he went down the Hudson river on a raft to New York city. New York city had no attraction for the young Welshman, and while visiting his father in Orange county he apprenticed himself to a
master builder and mason, and in this business learned his trade thoroughly. He worked one year as a journeyman in Haverstraw on the Hud- son, and then began to take contraets himself. He came to Milwaukee in 1848, and followed this business here up to the time of his death. He thus became one of the builders of the city in the broad sense of that term.
The first large contract he took was for the building of the Milwaukee Female Seminary; then came in quick succession the North Presby- terian Church, St. John's Church, and many other well-known buildings and residences. He also built the State Reform School at Waukesha, and had the contract for the mason work of the ill- fated Newhall House and the Nunnemacher Grand Opera House.
About this time his son, Thomas R. Bentley, came into the business, and took hold of the same with a vim and energy that brought to the firm increased prosperity. Together they did much important work outside of Milwaukee, erecting some of the state buildings at Madison, the north wing of the Northern Insane Asylum at Oshkosh, the Deaf and Dumb Institute at Delavan, Wis- consin, also the Court House at Racine. They also built the State Insane Asylum at Traverse City, Michigan, where they were responsible for nearly one-half million dollars worth of work. The elder Bentley some years since retired from active business, which the son carried on, however, with great vigor and continued success, as will appear from the sketch of his business career which appears in this history.
Mr. Bentley was married May 17, 1845, to Miss Sarah Ann Roberts, daughter of John and Alice Roberts, natives of England. Mrs. Bentley was a woman of high character, devoted to her hus- band and the children who blessed their union. Their surviving children are Mrs. Ann M. Smith, Thomas R. Bentley, Mrs. Sarah C. Lund and Mrs. Clara M. Dadmun. Mary E. Bentley, John F. Bentley, Mrs. Nellie E. Millard and Mrs. Jennie Jones are deceased children.
Politically Mr. Bentley was prominently iden- tified with the Democratic party. IIe cast his first vote for James K. Polk, and ever after interested himself in advancing the interests of the Democratic party to such an extent as he found himself able to give attention to poli- tics without interfering with his business in-
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terests. He felt it his duty to give some time and thought as an American citizen to the affairs of his city and state, and his was an unselfish interest.
He served in various capacities in school and township affairs and always for the good of the masses, and not for his own aggrandizement. The first office to which he was elected was that of chairman of the Board of Supervisors of the town of Lake, in which town he resided when he first came to Wisconsin. He was next a member of the Legislative Assembly in 1863. He was a war Democrat, and was active in filling the quota of soldiers required from the state of Wisconsin, and in various ways helped the cause of Union and National supremacy. After his removal to Mil- waukeee he was elected to the Board of Aldermen, and subsequently re-elected ; at the same time he served as county supervisor and helped to com- plete the court-house. For many years he took an active interest in local politics, but he allowed no one to dictate his course of action, and marked independence was always one of his chief charac- teristics. Ile was known as a liberal Democrat, and was again elected to the legislature, serving in that body in 1878, 1879 and 1880. He served on the Committee on Claims for two years, and was also chairman of the Milwaukee delegation; and it was undoubtedly his untiring effort and energetic action, coupled with those of the late George H. Payne, which secured to Milwaukee the State Normal School. Mr. Bentley was the author of this bill and the measure was one which brought the leading cities of the state into hot competition, each striving to become the seat of the proposed institution of learning. He was also the author of the joint resolution which was sent to Washington requesting the Senate and House to make Milwaukee a harbor of refuge. During the years of his public life Mr. Bently was looked upon by the adherents of both parties as a useful legislator, who sought not individual gain, but bad at heart always the best interests of his con- stitutents and, better still, the interests of the state at large. In the fall of 1880 his party nomi- nated him for sheriff of Milwaukee county, but he was defeated by John Rugee, that being the only time he was ever defeated for an office when before the people. He was later elected to the office of sheriff and served two years, and it is the expression of the business men of the com- munity that the affairs of the office were never
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