USA > Wisconsin > The United States biographical dictionary and portrait gallery of eminent and self-made men, Wisconsin volume > Part 35
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Jacob was the son of John Peter and Magdelena Obermann, and was born at Selzen, Province Reihn, Hesse-Darmstadt, Germany, March 23, 1819. He received an education at the schools of his native place, but it was limited, and as soon as he was able to work he went to Mayence to learn the shoemak- ing trade, where he remained nine years, making but little money, although he exercised both indus- try and economy. He returned home and started business for himself in his father's house, and in a short time had four men at work; but at the end of the year, not finding it sufficiently remunerative, he determined to try America, of which he had heard so much.
He embarked April 29, 1843, and after a long and tedious passage arrived in New York, July 14, and thirteen days later reached Milwaukee, where he has since made his home. He sought employ- ment in the boot and shoe trade without success. He offered to work for a month without wages, that he might learn some of the customs of a new country, but everyone was full-handed. The pros- pects were, indeed, discouraging; he had left his fatherland, his friends and home, spent more than two months on stormy seas, escaped the perils of the ocean, was in a strange land among strangers, of whom a few seemed to be doing well, but there was nothing for Jacob. He did not despair. and although he possessed but a few dollars he had courage and self-reliance, and started a shop for himself. Business grew upon him, and he continued
with good success; before long he employed five hands, and had enough for all to do, and so he continued for six years steadily increasing his busi- ness, and making warm friends besides.
But all his energies and his time were not given to his business, he had time to think of those in misfortune. The winters were cold; he sought the poor of his countrymen and organized relief. His deeds to this day are gratefully remembered.
His hard work, his patient industry was too con- fining, and although he was saving money, his health failed and a change of occupation became necessary. He sold out his stock of boots and shoes, and opened a general store. Here he re- mained five years, when he was burned out. All his savings gone, except an insurance of six hundred dollars. His loss was heavy; but he had won a good name. After a while he bought three building lots on the corner of Fifth and Cherry streets, upon which he built a brewery. It was only a small concern, a frame building twenty by forty feet, his business increased, and he employed five men. -
In 1864 he associated himself in business with Max Fueger, and two years later they built a brick brewery, forty by eighty feet, with malt house attached. These buildings have also since received additions and have been supplied with newer and larger utensils and machinery, and from the humble beginning has sprung a large well-regulated and complete establishment, embracing brewery, malt houses, ice houses, and large vaults for storing beer. His business continued to increase and he has grown and is steadily growing in wealth and repu- tation.
In 1860 he was elected member of the city council and in 1862 was reelected; was a member of the legislature in 1865 : one of the founders and presi- dent of the Milwaukee Mechanics Mutual Fire In-
Fac. Oberman 7
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surance Company, subsequently, and to the present time, its treasurer ; was made president of the Brew- ers Fire Insurance Company of America : was school commissioner, and has held other offices.
Mr. Obermann was married September 2, 1843, to Mary Schmitt, who died September 12, 1852, leav- ing five children, one having died previous to her death. In January, 1853, he married Barbara Schmitt. His eldest son, George, has finished a law course, and is now in a mercantile business in New York city. Two of his sons are at the present time employed in the brewery. It is Mr. Ober- mann's view that every child-boys as well as
girls- should be taught how to support themselves in case of need.
Mr. Obermann takes a deep interest in the public schools, and has been unremitting in his efforts to establish free German schools.
In the year 1846 he, with others, established a society to aid the poor of Milwaukee, and during the severity of the next two winters he spent a great deal of his time in searching out and relieving want. No man is more alive to the interests of Milwaukee, and none receives or merits greater praise from his countrymen, as a true friend and counselor, than Mr. Jacob Obermann.
WILLIAM P. MERRILL,
MILWAUKEE.
W ILLIAM P. MERRILL, son of David and Eunice Lord Merrill, was one of the first settlers in the eastern portion of Wisconsin. He was born on the 12th of March, 1817, in South Berwick, Maine, where he spent the first three years of his childhood.
In the autumn of 1820 David Merrill removed with his family to Adams, Jefferson county, New York, where for about twelve years he was occupied with the multifarious duties of a country merchant. In 1832 he disposed of his business, and again removed his family to Massena Springs, St. Law- rence county, New York. Being self-reliant, and possessing an adventurous spirit, William was anx- ious to quit the humdrum life in which he moved, and to carve his own fortune abroad.
Accordingly, having gained the consent of his parents, he left home soon after arriving at Massena Springs, and went to Prescott, Canada East, hoping to find some congenial employment, but sickness prevented the consummation of his plans.
Returning home, he speedily regained his health, and again set forth in search of fortune. This time he went to Cleveland, Ohio, which was then "the Far West." The only practicable route thither was by the way of Ogdensburg up the St. Lawrence river, to the mouth of the Glencoe, thence to Roch- ester, and by the " raging canal " to Buffalo, where a rickety steamboat was found which conveyed him to his destination, consuming as much time as it now requires to cross the continent.
tion, and still seeking the excitement of travel, an opportunity was soon afforded him to make a trip to the Ohio river. From this excursion he derived but little pleasure or satisfaction, as he speedily fell a victim to the disease of the climate, from which he suffered for nearly a year. Recovering, he vis- ited the more important towns in the State, giving his attention particularly to acquiring the carpenter trade, but could not make up his mind to settle per- manently in Ohio. The fall of 1835 found him at Ohio city, where he remained until the following spring, when, hearing much of the opening up of the vast territories of the great West, he was not long in determining to follow the track of the setting sun. Securing a passage on the schooner A. C. Baldwin, Captain Ben Sweet, master, he left for the port of Milwaukee early in March, in company with several other passengers, among whom were William Longstreet, part owner of cargo, S. R. Freeman and Onslow Brown. The passage was long and very tedious, owing to the ice which impeded their prog- ress. At the foot of an island below Mackinac they were compelled to lay by for several days. Longstreet, desirous of visiting the nearest settle- ment, persuaded Merrill to accompany him. They supposed from information gained from the captain that they would have to travel only about ten miles ; but the captain had purposely deceived them, to punish Longstreet, with whom he had had some difficulty, as it proved that the settlement was about twenty-five miles distant. Starting out without sup-
Finding but little at Cleveland to engage his atten- plies for a long tramp over the ice and slush, they
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certainly would have perished had they not met some friendly Indians, who, for a nominal reward, assisted them in reaching their destination. A sud- den change of weather occurred before night, and they reached Mackinac in a half-frozen condition. They were conveyed to a tavern, where they were confined to their beds for three days. Meanwhile the schooner came up, and they reembarked, and arrived at Milwaukee without further trouble, the passage having consumed nearly a month's time. Going ashore Mr. Merrill proceeded to the house of Sol Juneau, where the principal attraction seemed to be dogs and Indian sqnaws and papooses. His first impression was that this would be a good place to " get away from," and was about to return by the boat and proceed to Chicago, when he fell in with J. B. Miller and Samuel Brown, who set forth the desirableness of this location for the founding of a large commercial town in such glowing terms that he was induced to remain. Shortly after this the tide of emigration set strongly westward, and this Territory received its share of the new-comers, many of whom settled permanently in the embryo city, which ere long gave tokens of its future great- ness. Land was secured by many all around the city, at the government price of one dollar and twenty-five cents an acre, by those who had been farmers and who wished to continue their vocation Many of these farmers are still living on the original claims, and are among the most prominent and wealthy of our citizens. Their farms are now of great value, especially those which subsequently were brought within the city limits. Among these may be mentioned the estate of Samuel Brown, and those of Hon. Horace and Dr. E. Chase.
Mr. Merrill's fortune on landing at Milwaukee amounted to one hundred dollars, a chest of carpen- ter's tools, and a good gun. Although he was a skillful workman in those days, he did not follow the calling he had chosen to any extent, but chose in subsequent years to speculate in land - or rather city lots - by which he amassed, in time, an inde- pendent fortune.
In the spring of 1838, having a strong desire to see more of the great West, Mr. Merrill set out upon a journey which proved longer than he had at first contemplated. He visited Chicago, and then pro- ceeded to Rockford, Illinois. At this place, in March, 1838, he, with two others, bought a canoe, provisioned it with pork and meal, and with a blanket for a sail they set forth down the river, with
no well defined idea whither they were going or where they would stop. At night they camped on the river banks, and spent their evenings around the cheerful camp fires telling stories and relating their experiences.
About the 20th of March they reached the Mis- sissippi, and concluded to take the first boat that came along, whether up or down. After a halt of nearly two days they embarked on a boat going north to Galena. Here Mr. Merrill remained until July 4, on which day he left on the steamboat Bra- zil, Owen Smith, for Fort Snelling. Boats ran day and night as far as Prairie du Chien, but as the pilot's acquaintance with the river extended no far- ther, they ran only by day above that place, tying up at night. This made the trip necessarily slow. The principal points of interest were Indian villages.
At the point where Lake City now stands Mr. Merrill went ashore, in company with the captain and some others, and visited the bluffs, where he planted some white beans which he had provided for that purpose before leaving the boat. This was doubtless the first planting ever done by a white man on the shores of Lake Pepin.
Mr. Merrill's experience of Indian life and man- ners was by no means of an agreeable nature. He found them lazy and filthy, the squaws doing the drudgery and hard work. Arriving at Fort Snelling they found the post garrisoned by about twenty-five men. The fort itself was delightfully situated on an eminence which commanded an extensive view of the river and surrounding country. Mr. Merrill and other travelers from the boat helped themselves to Indian ponies, which they found grazing near the fort, and explored the country, visiting the Falls of St. Anthony and Falls of Little St. Peter, now known as Minnehaha, and other points of interest, all then in the wild, natural state. Twenty years after he again visited the same places with his friend J. M. Stowell, whose biographical sketch appears in this book. The changes were wonderful. Where before all was in repose, as it were, there was now life and activity ; towns and cities now were speedily cover- ing the land where before was a wilderness, peopled only with Indians. He returned, by the same boat that carried him to the fort, to Galena, where, how- ever, he remained but a short time. He then went to Comanche, a small town in Iowa, then numbering but five or six houses. Here he entered a claim adjoining the village plat. In the spring a man by the name of Clayborn, who had come from Tennes-
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see, proposed joining him in building a boat, and establish a ferry to be propelled by horse-power. He closed with the proposition, and established the first permanent crossing of the Mississippi north of Davenport, and the only ferry-boat at that time run by horse-power and wheels north of St. Louis. Emigration was at that time very active, and as the boat was in constant demand they were making money. But in July Mr. Merrill was taken sick, and as he was unable to attend to business for sev- eral months affairs were left to his partner, who proved incompetent, and by whose carelessness the boat was wrecked.
In the fall of 1839 he returned to Milwaukee, where he purchased a stock of dry goods and groceries, and took them to Summit, where he opened a store, the first one established between Prairieville (now Waukesha) and Watertown. He built the first frame house in four townships, including Oconomowoc (then known as Baxter's Prairie). The following summer he sold his stock of goods, being convinced by the experience of eight or nine months that a mercantile life was not his forte. Subsequently, ex- changing his property at Summit for eighty acres in town of Lake, he settled permanently in Milwaukee
county. To this he added another eighty, bought of the government in 1849 at one dollar and twenty- five cents per acre, making in all a quarter of section six. Of this property he still owns forty acres, which is very valuable, being within city limits. Recently he has divided this property and laid it out in lots and streets, about twenty acres of which he has offered for sale.
From this record it will be seen that Mr. Merrill has done much to improve the city of Milwaukee by building stores, residences, etc. He is endowed with a very social nature, and is liberal almost to a fault. He has been twice elected alderman for the fifth ward, and always takes great interest in char- itable objects. He was among the most active in starting and endowing the Home for the Aged, now one of the permanent charitable institutions of Mil- waukee.
He was married in Milwaukee county, on the 26th of August, 1841, to S. Elizabeth Harris, of Halifax, Vermont, by whom he has two sons : David L., who is married, and resides in Michigan, engaged in the lumber business; and Zachary T., of the firm of Kendrick, Merrill and Brand, law and real-estate business, in Milwaukee.
THEODORE L. BAKER,
MILWAUKEE.
T HEODORE L. BAKER, cashier of the Mil- waukee National Bank of Wisconsin, was born in New York city June 6, 1824; son of William F. and Maria E. Baker. Mr. Baker comes of good old Knickerbocker stock, his mother first seeing light on his grandfather's farm, or Bowerie as it was called in those days, situated where the Astor Library buildings now stand.
Mr. Baker received a liberal education at the Columbia College Schools, New York. Upon leav- ing he was placed in the counting house of a dry- goods establishment, doing a large southern busi- ness, where he remained five years. At the age of twenty-two he decided to try his fortune in the West, and in the year 1847 came to Milwaukee, where, in connection with Henry P. Peck, he opened a dry-goods store, under the firm name of Peck and Baker. This partnership existed for six years, when the firm dissolved, Mr. Peck con- tinuing the business. Mr. Baker entered the State
Bank as teller. In 1863 he was appointed cashier and has remained in that position since that time, and has always been esteemed as an honorable, faithful bank officer and director. The State Bank was organized in 1853, and reorganized in 1865 as the Milwaukee National Bank, with a capital of two hundred and fifty thousand dollars. It has paid yearly dividends of from ten to twelve per cent, and now holds a surplus of something like one hundred and fifty thousand dollars.
In religion Mr. Baker has always been an Episco- palian. In politics, a conservative republican.
He is one of the vice-presidents of the North- western National Bank Association, and secretary of the Wisconsin National Bank Association. He has held the responsible position of manager of the Milwaukee Clearing House almost from its organization in 1868; after the breaking out of the rebellion he was mainly instrumental in giving to the State of his adoption a sound circulating
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medium, by compelling the banks to receive only on deposit legal tender notes, and such bank notes as were redeemed at par in Milwaukee. During the panic that swept over the land in the fall of
1873, the banks of Milwaukee braved the storm with- out suspending currency payments; the Milwaukee National not even losing its legal reserve, or calling upon its New York correspondents for currency.
SOLON MARKS, M.D., MILWAUKEE.
S OLON MARKS was born in Stockbridge, Ver- mont, July 14, 1827. Availing himself of the opportunities for obtaining instruction in the ele- mentary branches of education, which the district and private schools of his native town afforded until he was sixteen years of age, he then entered the Royalton Academy for a full course of instruction.
In 1848 he turned his face westward, finding a home in Wisconsin. Having decided upon the med- ical profession as that best suited to his tastes, he at once set himself to the task of providing the means for the accomplishment of his wishes in this direc- tion ; and, by his own unaided effort and persistent will, earned a sufficiency to carry him through a full course in the Rush Medical College of Chicago, Illinois, where he graduated in the year 1853. Im- mediately thereafter he commenced the practice of medicine in Jefferson, Wisconsin, removing thence to Stevens Point, in 1856, where he had established himself in a large and successful practice when the war of the rebellion broke out. Full of patriotism he at once tendered his services to the government, and was commissioned surgeon of the 10th Regiment Wisconsin Volunteers, September 27, 1861. This regiment left the State November 9, 1861, and he had been with it but one month when he was de- tailed upon the staff of General Sill as brigade sur- geon, which position he held until the capture of Huntsville, Alabama, April 11, 1862, when he was placed in charge of the military hospitals established at that point. Remaining here till about the time
that Buell's division commenced falling back toward the Ohio river, he was then ordered into the field, and on 8th of October, 1862, assigned to duty as medical director of General Rosseau's division, which position he retained until the organization of the army of the Cumberland, when he was appointed surgeon-in-chief of the Ist division of the 14th army corps, with which command he remained until the expiration of his term of enlistment. Being with the army in nearly every engagement, he gained thereby extensive practice and large experience in that de- partment of his profession, to which by natural incli- nation he was especially adapted - that of surgery - and to which, in the subsequent years, he has de- voted himself with unceasing assiduity, making it a specialty.
On the closing up of the war Dr. Marks returned to Wisconsin and settled in Milwaukee, resuming his practice.
In 1873 he made a trip to Europe with the three- fold object of rest, relaxation, and the pursuit of his favorite study in the hospitals of London, Paris, and elsewhere. Returning, he again resumed his prac- tice in Milwaukee. As a practitioner the Doctor has unbounded success and unlimited popularity. Never sparing himself, he is always " on duty," and this ceaseless strain must sooner or later compel him to take another season of rest. As a man he is upright and honorable, full of tender and helpful sympathy toward the suffering and unfortunate, and generous to a fault.
GENERAL GEORGE B. SMITH,
MADISON.
G EORGE B. SMITH was born at Parma Cor- ners, Monroe county, New York, May 22, 1823. His father, Reuben Smith, was a native of Rhode Island, but immigrated from that State to Western
New York. In 1825 he removed to Cleveland, Ohio. where for some two years he carried on an extensive business in pork packing. In 1827 he took up his residence in the village of Medina, Ohio, as mer-
& Marks
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chant, where he was appointed one of the judges of the court of common pleas of Medina county, the only office he ever held. In 1843 he immigrated with his family to Southport, now Kenosha, Wiscon- sin. He died at Madison, Wisconsin, in February, 1874, at the age of eighty years. Judge Smith was a man of much ability, and of great enterprise of character. General Smith is the only child of Judge Smith's first wife, who died when he was but ten weeks old. Her maiden name was Betsy Page; she was a woman of great strength of character and of uncommon intelligence ; a graduate of a female academy at Hamilton, New York, and previous to her marriage was for several years a teacher, in which vocation she was very successful. When his father removed to Medina, in Ohio, he was but four years of age, and the sixteen years spent in this locality afforded him all the opportunities he ever enjoyed for attending school. In 1841 he began the study of law with H. W. Floyd, Esq., in the village of Medina, with whom he remained about a year, spending the next succeeding year in Cleveland in the law office of Messrs. Andrews, Foot and Hoyt, when he accompanied his father to Kenosha, Wis- consin, where he continued his legal studies in the office of the late O. S. Head, with whom he remained until admitted to the bar, on the 4th of July, 1843, at Racine, Wisconsin, in the United States district court, presided over by Judge Andrew G. Miller. On the 29th of August, 1844, a little over one year after his admission to the bar, Mr. Smith was married to Miss Eugenia Weed, at Medina, Ohio. The fruits of this union were five children, only two of whom are now living, a son and a daughter; the latter, Anna, is married to Robert J. McConnell. James S. Smith, the son, and Mr. McConnell, compose the firm of McConnell and Smith, booksellers and stationers, at Madison.
Returning to Wisconsin after his marriage, he be- gan the practice of his profession at Madison in the fall of 1845. In January, 1846, he was appointed district attorney of Dane county, an office which he held by appointment and election over six years, the duties of which he discharged with marked ability and unquestioned fidelity. In October, 1846, he was chosen a member of the first constitutional con- vention, and was the youngest member of that body. He held no other office except that of court com- missioner of Dane county until 1853, when he was elected attorney-general of the State, which position he held during the years 1854 and 1855, and declined
a renomination. In the spring of 1858 he was elected mayor of the city of Madison, and in the fall of the same year was chosen a member of the popular branch of the legislature. He held the position of mayor for three successive terms. In 1863, and again in 1869, he was elected to represent the peo- ple of his district in the legislature of the State. During the several times in which he occupied a seat in the assembly, his party was in the minority. By common consent they assigned to him the position of leader on all party questions, a position for which he was well qualified, not only by reason of his talents as a debater, but for his skill as a parliamen- tarian and legislator. He was never a great talker, but some of his elaborate speeches in the legislature commanded admiration at home and abroad. In 1864, and again in 1872, General Smith was the democratic candidate for congress in his district ; in both instances he stumped the State in advocacy of the principles of the party to which he belonged, but his party being in a hopeless minority the result was a defeat, although in each instance he ran consider- ably ahead of his ticket. In 1869 he received the unanimous vote of his party as a candidate before the legislature for the United States senate in oppo- sition to the Hon. Matt H. Carpenter, the successful republican candidate. He was nominated as presi- dential elector in 1868, and again in 1872. Since the memorable campaign of 1872, when General Smith took such a prominent and active part for the election of Horace Greeley to the presidency, he has taken less interest in politics. In every public position which he has been called upon to fill, he has discharged the trust confided to him with ability and unshaken fidelity to principle. In his profession he occupies a high position among the ablest lawyers of the northwest. His practice has been extensive, not only in the State but in the United States courts, in which tribunals he has had to deal with a great variety of important cases, both civil and criminal. He has reached the summit of mature manhood with an enviable reputation and a private character on which rests no blemish. As an orator, as an advo- cate, and as a political speaker, he has but few equals in the country. In many of the character- istics of successful oratory he is peculiarly gifted. To the attractions of a fine presence, an easy, grace- ful and dignified mien, is added that of a rich, full, clear voice, that can be distinctly heard at a long distance. His masterly self-reliance is of inestima- ble value to him when he rises to address an audi-
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