USA > Wisconsin > Rock County > Rock County, Wisconsin; a new history of its cities, villages, towns, citizens and varied interests, from the earliest times, up to date, Vol. II > Part 29
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Under Mr. Thompson's careful, conservative and skillful management the business has shown a constant growth from the start and is recognized as one of the prominent manufacturing industries of Beloit. In 1902 Mr. Thompson retired from active participation in affairs of the concern and Mr. O. T. Thompson was made president and treasurer and Mr. A. S. Thompson its secretary.
In 1857 Mr. Thompson went back to his native land, and there, at Flak, on May 13, married Miss Martha Wallesverd, and with his bride returned at once to Beloit, arriving the following
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June. Of nine children born to them five are living, viz .: Oscar T., Edwin A., Alfred S., Cora and Josephine. The fiftieth anni- versary of their wedding day, May 15, 1907, was celebrated by Mr. and Mrs. Thompson with a golden wedding at their home and was an event long to be remembered by the large number of relatives and friends present. Aside from his private business Mr. Thompson has been actively identified with publie affairs in his city and as a Republican has served three terms as a member of the city council. In religious faith he is a Lutheran and in charitable and benevolent work is always ready to give encour- agement and material aid.
Frank H. Williams, who is a native of Roek county, Wiscon- sin, was born at Johnstown, this county, November 24, 1857. His parents, Hiram and Eveline (Reilly) Williams, were both na- tives of Chautauqua, N. Y. In an early day they came West and settled in Rock county, where they made their future home and reared their family.
The subject of this sketeh was educated in the public and high schools of Lake Geneva, Wis. After leaving sehool he en- gaged in the butcher business, which he followed for a few years, and then commeneed the study for a veterinarian under the tutelage of Dr. Martin, at Janesville, one of the oldest residents and veterinarians of Rock county. After six years of study and practice at Janesville Dr. Williams moved to Beloit, where for the past fifteen years he has successfully engaged in the practice of his profession.
Henry Pentland, who is now retired from active business and resides at 524 Broad street, Beloit, Wis., was born in County Down, Ireland, on September 11, 1833. His parents were William and Agnes (Clark )Pentland, who in 1843 came to Wisconsin and settled on a farm in Geneva township, Walworth county, where they lived until their death, the father at the age of sixty- two years and the mother at fifty-six years of age. The father was buried at Geneva and the mother at Kenosha.
Henry was raised on his father's farm and received his edu- cation in the common schools of Walworth county. In 1853 he went to California in search of gold and remained there for six years, when he returned to his native land and spent six months in the town of Newtownards. At the expiration of this time he came back to America and located at Beloit, where he engaged
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in the grocery business at 325 State street, which he conducted for thirty-two years, retiring from active business in 1899.
Mr. Pentland is one of Beloit's oldest and most respected citi- zens, having made this city his home for nearly half a century. He was married at Beloit in 1872 to Mrs. A. F. Briggs, a native of New Hampshire, who died in 1892. He again married in 1894, Mrs. Margaret M. Cochrane, who is a native of Pittsburg, Pa.
Leonard Hemenway Wheeler, who devoted his life to mis- sionary work among the Indians, was born in April, 1811, at Shrewsbury, Mass. Soon after his birth his family moved to Bridport, Vt., where he grew up and passed his early manhood. He there completed his preparatory studies and later was gradu- ated from Middlebury College, at Middlebury, Vt. He next pur- sued a course of theological studies at Andover Seminary, and supplemented this with a course of medical lectures at Pittsfield, Mass.
When thirty years of age, on April 26, 1841, Mr. Wheeler mar- ried Miss Harriet Wood, of Lowell, Mass., and immediately there- after, accompanied by his bride, took up his chosen work among the Ojibway Indians at Madeline island, Lake Superior, under commission from the American Board.
Their early years in the mission field were filled with hard- ships and privations that would have made persons of less heroic mold quail and turn back. But not so these consecrated souls. Touched by the appeal of a benighted people, they labored on, patiently enduring their trials, and faithful to him who had called them to the work of uplifting those under their charge. After some years the mission station was moved to Odanah, near Ashland, Wis., and here, chiefly through Mr. Wheeler's tireless efforts, his Indian wards were finally settled on a fine govern- ment reservation. In all he spent twenty-six years among the Indians, who believed in him as their teacher, physician and friend.
During these years of service there had been born to these faithful and self-sacrificing missionaries a family of nine chil- dren. The father's health finally giving way through the years of strain and hardship, he was forced to abandon his cherished work, and in order to secure to his children suitable educational advantages, and to recuperate his failing strength, he in 1866
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moved with his family to Beloit, where he passed the remainder of his days, and where he died on February 22, 1872.
The value and results of his missionary labors are well summed up in two brief quotations taken from the tributes of two men for one they honored: "It is safe to say that no man was ever more thoroughly devoted to the work of rescuing the Indian from barbarism, vice and degradation than was Mr. Wheeler. His primary object was to preach Christ, but he saw clearly that the Indian must be civilized or exterminated. When un- serupulous and grasping men were to rob and wrong the red man his watchful eye and sound judgment saw the danger and, like the old cavalier without fear and without reproach, he raised his voice and used his pen for their defense. His inter- cession in their behalf was usually productive of essential good, for those that knew him knew that truth and justice were at his back and that it was not safe to take up the gauntlet against so unselfish a champion. It was not for himself that he pleaded, but for those who could not defend themselves." And again: "The great results of all missionary and church work are written only in the Book of Life. But upon the pages of history, even as men write it, there is honorable place for the record of twenty-six years' labor among a once barbarous people, the establishment of civil government among them, the development of improved plans of missionary and educational work, the training of labor- ers for other fields, the founding of a town and the establish- ment of a successful business carried on in the spirit of the Master."
Mr. Wheeler was a man of varied talents and inventive genius, and it was during the last years of his life, while living in Beloit, that he perfected and had patented what is known as the Eclipse windmill, the idea of which came to him as early as 1844 and grew out of the needs of his mission work, namely, the necessity for some cheap power to pump water and grind corn and wheat for the Indians. The idea was worked out into a crude model while still in the mission field, but the pressure of his mission duties obliged him to put it aside. Not until 1866 was he able to put his invention to a practical test. A patent was granted September 10, 1867, and in the fall of the same year the first full- sized Eclipse windmill was exhibited at the state fair at Madison and there sold to an influential farmer of Albany, Wis. It was
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in the early stages of the development of the windmill that Mr. Wheeler also contrived and had patented what is known as the "offset link" used in windmill pumps. Rock county cradled these two inventions, and it has since been the home of their development and growth. It is from Rock county that the Eclipse windmill and pump and allied specialties are still being sent out world-wide by the great Fairbanks-Morse Company.
As Ashland Academy, recently expanded into Northland Col- lege, at Ashland, Wis., will stand as a memorial to the educa- tional branch of the missionary labors of Mr. and Mrs. Wheeler, so will the Eclipse windmill here in Rock county memorialize the industrial side of a life wholly consecrated to his Master's service.
Charles Eugene Wheeler, a native son of Wisconsin, was born at Odanah March 8, 1856, and lived among the Indians of north- ern Wisconsin until he was ten years old. His paternal ancestors settled in and about Bridport, Vt., at an early day and those on his mother's side in and around Lowell, Mass. His parents, Leon- ard Hemenway and Harriet (Wood) Wheeler, were sent out as missionaries and lived and labored among the Chippewa In- dians from 1841 until 1866, when they removed to Beloit with their family in order to give their children the benefit of its edu- cational advantages. After finishing his preliminary studies our subject entered Beloit College and was there graduated with the degree of bachelor of arts with the class of 1878, after which he taught school two terms. During the next fifteen years Mr. Wheeler was associated with his brothers at Beloit in the manu- facture of the Eclipse windmill, tanks, etc. This windmill was invented by Mr. Wheeler's father, as was also the "offset link," now in general use on windmill pumps, and the business, which became known as the Eclipse Wind Engine Company, was sold to Messrs. Fairbanks, Morse & Co., who are still manufacturing its products. Since 1895 Mr. Wheeler associated with his brother in contracting work, giving special attention to building and equipping waterworks plants.
As a business man Mr. Wheeler is prompt, energetic, clear- sighted and thoroughly practical, and the movements with which he has been identified have been of great material benefit to the city of Beloit. He has devoted himself closely to his business affairs and enjoys a well-earned reward of conscientious, per- sistent and faithful effort along the line of his chosen work, and
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is rightly classed among the public-spirited men of his city. Mr. Wheeler is a Republican, but has never cared for political office. In religious faith he is affiliated with the Congregational church and takes an active interest in the work of the Young Men's Christian Association. He is also a member of the Six o'Clock Club of Beloit.
On June 7, 1894, Mr. Wheeler married Miss Rosalia J. Phil- lips, whose womanly qualities of mind and heart endear her to those who know her. Mr. and Mrs. Wheeler have two children, named respectively Horace P. and Charles Eugene, Jr.
William H. Wheeler was born January 1, 1847, on Madeline island, Lake Superior, where his parents were engaged in mis- sionary work among the Ojibway Indians under the auspices of the American Board. The family later moved to Odanah, Wis., near the present city of Ashland, where Rev. L. H. Wheeler was chiefly instrumental in locating the Indians on a fine reservation. Here the boyhood of W. H. Wheeler was spent, amid surround- ings and under conditions that developed physical hardihood, a strong moral fiber and a trained ingenuity to meet the varying as well as exacting requirements of a frontier life peculiarly iso- lated at that time. It was an experience calculated to awaken all his mental and moral faculties and furnish him with an effi- cient working equipment of wide versatility for the large busi- ness undertakings that were to engage his attention.
On account of its educational advantages he was sent to Beloit in the early '60's, where, with other Beloit College men, he re- sponded to the call of his country and went to the front. Re- turning, he pursued his studies at the college.
In 1866, after twenty-six years of missionary service, the parents and remainder of the family came to Beloit for the edu- cation of the children. The father, though much broken in health, completed his model of a self-regulating windmill of an entirely new and original principle. A patent followed promptly. The business of developing the windmill with its allied machinery fell to the lot of W. H. Wheeler, as the father survived only a few years after his invention was patented.
From extremely small beginnings the business yearly took on increasing proportions, continually enlarging its scope by in- cluding the manufacture of machinery and equipment directly allied with the windmill itself, and covering an ever widening
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circle of demand. The farmer, the ranchman, the planter, the extensive railroad field, the large export trade and many mis- cellaneous uses of power mills were all included in this widening circle of demand. W. H. Wheeler was the recognized genius and moving spirit of this rapidly growing enterprise, and him- self invented subsequent improvements in the regulating mech- anism of the windmill as well as other devices the enlarging business suggested.
A brief glance at this point of Mr. Wheeler's mental equip- ment is of interest. While his mind is of a distinctively legal type in its grasp and mastery of detail and in its reasoning and logical faculties, it is also as sensitive and retentive as a pho- tographer's plate of all impressions and facts coming to it from without, classifying them in due order for instant use. Coupled with these mental traits is the imaginative faculty of the born inventor, and, transfusing all, the tremendous initiative char- acteristic of the true captain of industry. A man of dominating personality, strong sympathies; beloved for numberless, and by him forgotten, acts of kindness; public-spirited in behalf of the best things; a man of vision, of untiring activity, and self-for- getful.
But to proceed with the things he has actually accomplished : The Eclipse windmill began its career under the title of L. H. Wheeler & Son, enlarged to the Eclipse Windmill Company, and again to the Eclipse Wind Engine Company, in all three of which he was the active manager. He further developed at Be- loit the Eclipse Clutch Works and later added the Williams en- gine, under the new title of Williams Engine and Clutch Works.
After building up an extensive manufacturing plant all these interests were sold out to Fairbanks, Morse & Co., a firm of world-wide reputation, who expanded the plant to a normal working capacity of 2,500 men.
Since retiring from the manufacturing business in Beloit Mr. Wheeler entered the contracting field, and has installed large municipal waterworks and lighting plants in this and other states. But he has always had unbounded faith in Beloit and its future, and has seen it progress from a small town of 3,500 to an important manufacturing city of 15,000, and he is credited with having contributed to this growth as much or more than any other single citizen. He was the prime mover for a system of
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waterworks for Beloit, and was president of the Beloit Business Men's Association at the time of its greatest activity, when he gave much time and thought to realize a greater Beloit, and at which time the Berlin Machine Works were induced to move to Beloit, where it has grown to immense proportions and is only exceeded by the Fairbanks-Morse plant.
That Mr. Wheeler is a man of vision is evidenced by the pos- sibilities he saw in a strip of territory, unoccupied except for farming purposes, just over the state line south of Beloit. He acquired the strip of something over 500 acres, immediately con- tiguous to the heart of Beloit proper; opened up a subdivision with platted streets and cement sidewalks; set apart the north frontage for factory sites; induced the C. & N .- W. and C., M. & St. P. railway companies to put in a joint switching track; all of which has been done, including the locating of seven indus- trial enterprises in the new tract, known as South Beloit. Among these plants are John Thompson & Sons, the Racine Feet Knitting Company and the Warner Instrument Company.
It involved the courage of strong conviction as well as faith in a vision to forecast what has actually been realized in this latest enterprise of Mr. Wheeler's.
In politics he has always been a dyed-in-the-wool Republican of the whilom Stalwart type; but as a man who always reasoned out his faith politically and otherwise his confidence in the old brand of Republican medicine as a cure for present ills is strongly shaken.
Edward Franklin Hansen was born October 7, 1860, at Beloit, Wis. He is the son of Carelius and Guri J. Hansen, both natives of Norway; the father came to America in 1853 and the mother in 1851. They were married in Janesville in 1854 and moved to Beloit. Here they made their home and reared their family, consisting of six sons and five daughters, of whom nine are now living. One of the daughters died in infancy, and one son, Charles L. Hansen, died in 1893. Mr. Hansen's father was a blacksmith by trade. He started a small factory at Beloit for the manufacture of walking plows, and for years supplied the local and general trade. He was a man of ingenuity and very skillful in the use of steel and iron, and his numerous improve- ments and original inventions which were studied out by him have been universally adopted by all manufacturers of plows.
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HISTORY OF ROCK COUNTY
The subject of this sketch, Edward F., received his prelimi- nary education in the public schools of Beloit, and when not at- tending school found plenty to keep busy at in his father's fac- tory, so that his early education was practical in learning to do by doing. He later served a regular apprenticeship and worked as a machinist at the shops of O. E. Merrill & Co., of Beloit, Wis. In this manner he built up a practical knowledge of how a suc- cessful business concern could be carried on.
Mr. Hansen's integrity has been recognized by his fellow citizens to the extent that they have honored him in many ways- first, by placing him in the office of city treasurer of Beloit in 1885 and 1886, and again in 1887; then in the year 1888 the common council of the city of Beloit placed him in the office of city clerk, which office he held until his resignation, February, 1896. In 1889 he was elected treasurer of the Beloit school dis- trict, which office he held for ten years; in 1895 and 1896 he served the people of the First assembly district of Rock county as their representative in the state legislature. In 1896 he served as a member of the board of public works of the city of Beloit; in 1897, 1898 and 1899 he served as alderman of the Second ward of Beloit, and in 1901 was appointed by Judge Dunwiddie as a member of the Rock county board of jury commissioners, which office he still holds. In 1891 Mr. Hansen was elected a director of the Beloit Savings Bank, and in 1892 he was elected to his present office of secretary and treasurer of the bank. This is a strictly mutual savings bank and is owned by the depositors, who now number (1908) nearly 6,000, while its deposits are over $1,130,000, which proves that the people of this community are in a highly prosperous condition and that their surplus savings are being well handled and carefully conserved.
Our subject has always cast his lot politically with the Re- publican party, and in fraternal societies is affiliated with the Beloit Lodge No. 40, Knights of Pythias, and Lodge No. 864, B. P. O. Elks, of Beloit. Mr. Hansen and family attend the First Congregational church.
On May 29, 1895, Mr. Hansen was united in marriage with Miss Carrie A. Ross, daughter of L. E. and Susan M. Ross, of Beloit, Wis.
Charles Butler Salmon, a native of Peru, Huron county, Ohio, was born August 16, 1850, to Ebenezer Putney and Elizabeth
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(Pomeroy) Salmon, the former a native of Goshen, and the latter of Williamsburg, Mass. The father was a graduate of the Col- lege of Physicians and Surgeons, New York, and practiced medi- cine for several years in Ohio. IIe was also an alumnus of the Union Theological Seminary, New York, and was a successful preacher in Ohio after giving up his medical practice.
In 1860 he settled at Allen's Grove, Walworth county, Wis- consin, as president of the academy there, which under his man- agement became the leading preparatory school of southern Wis- consin and northern Illinois, being especially affiliated with the Beloit college. In 1865 he moved with his family to Beloit to educate his sons Edward and Charles, and there died at the age of seventy-five years. The mother, who was a direct descendant of the Pomeroys of Revolutionary fame, and of Jonathan Ed- wards, died at Beloit, at the age of seventy-six years.
Entering Beloit Academy in 1865, our subject was there graduated the following year, and in the fall of 1866 entered Beloit college and pursued the regular classical course till the beginning of his junior year, in the fall of 1868, when he left college to become the western representative of a large New York manufacturing company with headquarters in Chicago; three years later he went to New York, and from the main office of the company, traveled through the principal cities west of Ohio. Mr. Salmon resigned his position in 1873, and with Messrs. S. T. Mer- rill and W. H. Wheeler organized the Eclipse Windmill Company at Beloit, which later became the largest concern of its kind in the United States. In 1881, being obliged to retire from business on account of impaired health from overwork, Mr. Salmon sold his controlling interest in the business to Messrs. W. H. Wheeler and C. H. Morse, and out of this grew the present great factory of Fairbanks & Morse Company, the site and a small part of the buildings of whose plant was sold to it by Mr. Salmon. In 1885 Mr. Salmon organized and became the leading spirit in the Beloit Water Works Company, and directed the construction of its plant, and in 1892, with his brother, Edward P. Salmon, became its sole owner. Under their management and control, the plant and business were greatly enlarged and increased, and in 1906 were sold to the present merger company-the Beloit Water, Gas & Electric Company-for $300,000, Mr. Salmon becoming and still being president and treasurer of the merger company. In
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1887 Mr. Salmon purchased the old Huston & Whitford flouring mills and reorganized the business, which under the new name, Salmon Milling Company, was, until the plant was destroyed by fire in 1893, the largest concern of its kind in southern Wisconsin.
Mr. Salmon has always been a firm believer in his city as an educational and manufacturing center, and among the many public-spirited citizens of Beloit, none is more loyal to her inter- ests and to the welfare of Rock county and the state at large than he. He at different periods organized the "Unity Associa- tion," for owning and constructing business property, and the Beloit Improvement Company for subdividing and developing unimproved real estate. Among the buildings in whose construc- tion he had the principal part may be named the Foster Shoe Factory, which he sold to the shoe company, the postoffice block, Unity block, Grand Avenue block, City mills and other smaller properties, all of which he with his brother still owns. Mr. Sal- mon has, as a matter-of-fact, improved more business and manu- facturing property than any other one citizen. Mr. Salmon has always been a zealous and staunch worker in and supporter of the Republican party, but has never sought or desired political office. In religious faith he has been affiliated with the First Con- gregational church of Beloit since 1865. Both he and his brother are generous supporters of the Beloit college, and he has for many years been a member of its board of trustees, and at pres- ent (1908) is vice-president of the college.
On June 24, 1874, Mr. Salmon married Miss Addie, daughter of the late A. B. Carpenter, who died, aged ninety-two years, and who probably was more intimately associated with the early his- tory and progress of Beloit than any other man. Of five children born to Mr. and Mrs. Salmon, two, viz .: Edward and Loretta, are . living, and three, Cornelia, Charles, Jr., and James, are deceased.
David H. Pollock is one of the wide-awake, progressive men of Beloit, Wis., whose energy, enterprise and persevering indus- try have gained for him a degree of success of which he may just- ly be proud. A native of Jefferson county, Wisconsin, he was born in 1860 and is a son of Arthur and Lydia (Nagle) Pollock, both natives of the north of Ireland. In 1842, while yet single, they came to the United States and settled in New York state, where they were married and whence, in 1866, they moved to Hebron, Jefferson county, Wisconsin, where the father spent his
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life as a farmer. His death occurred in 1895. His mother died in the fall of 1906.
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