USA > Wisconsin > Wisconsin, its story and biography, 1848-1913, Volume VII > Part 2
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THOMAS E. LYONS. Since 1911 Thomas E. Lyous, who for more than twenty years was a member of the bar at Superior, has served as the second member of the Wisconsin Tax Commission. In this connection some general reference may be made to the Wisconsin Tax Commission By various amendments since the commission was created by the legis- lature in 1899, practically the entire administration of the tax laws in the state, both local and state-wide, have been placed in the hands of or under the supervision of the tax commission, comprising three members. At the present time the commission has supervision, not only of the usual departments of taxation, but also of the administration of the new income tax law, the inheritance tax, public accounting and over prac- tically all functions connected with the distribution and assessment of taxes within the borders of the state of Wisconsin.
Thomas E. Lyons, who is a close student of taxation and general economies, in addition to being a successful lawyer, was born in Fond du Lac county, Wisconsin. His early education was acquired in district schools and the Fond du Lac high school. After two years teaching in district schools, Mr. Lyons entered the University of Wisconsin in 1882, graduating as a Bachelor of Letters in 1885. During his senior year he was elected school superintendent of his native county, which position he held for four years. That was followed by study in the law depart- ment of the University until he left with the degree of LL. B. in 1890. Mr. Lyons began practice at Superior, and was a member of the bar in that city from 1890 to 1911. In the latter year came his appointment as a member of the tax commission and he has since had his home at Mad- ison, in order to attend to the duties of his office.
Mr. Lyons has served on the school and library board of Superior and he was elected and served as city attorney of that city from 1902 to
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1906, and again from 1908 to 1910. Mr. Lyons is a member of the Commercial Club and the country club of Superior, and the University Club of Madison.
JULIUS SIMON. When Julius Simon came to Milwaukee in 1897 and here established himself in business at the corner of Third and Prairie streets, he was possessed of a slender capital in cash, but he had a valuable experience in business and a reputation for integrity and ability as a merchant that was worth money to him in the busi- ness world. Those assets have been the mainspring in his success, and for years he ranked among the leading merchants of the state. A small department store to which he gave the name the Boston Store, was his first Milwaukee venture. This was a small, one story building, but he equipped it well and applied himself to the business of building up a following in the city and out of it. The result was that his little store became well known throughout the state, and after three years spent in that location he found it possible, as well as expedient, to establish himself upon a larger scale. The move he made at that time was one that established him as one of the greatest merchants in the state, while his establishment came to be ranked second in size and importance in Wisconsin. As the founder of the present Boston Store of Milwaukee, his place in the mercantile world was well established, but he reached that position by no care-free route, for the first few years of his business activities here were of a character that made the most insistent demauds upon his courage, his resources and his initiative. A less determined or a less able man could never have stood out against the discouragements and responsi- bilities that fell upon Mr. Simon, but the qualities that make for suc- cessful merchandising were strongly inherent within him, and his reward was worthy of his labors.
In the earlier years, only a portion of the new and larger build- ing was utilized, and the business, though a thriving one, drew its trade mainly from the city and a few towns in the vicinity. Through the constant application and the admirable management of Mr. Simon, who early learned the value of printer's ink, the enterprise rapidly expanded in scope and importance and finally the original quarters proved inadequate to the demands of the business. It was then that Mr. Simon made a decisive stroke by assuming control of the entire building, which he fully stocked with the most attractive and com- prehensive lines. Every department was brought up to a high stand- ard of efficiency, the number of clerks was largely augmented, and the concern soon came to be known as one of the model department stores of America.
When Mr. Simon sold his interest in this great business, on Octo- ber 1, 1906, the Boston Store was the second largest department store
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in Milwaukee, with a corps of five hundred salespeople, as compared with his little store at Third and Prairie, where he first conducted a store less than ten years previous. The story of such marvellous advancement shows few dramatic chapters, but one can not fail to appreciate something of the sterling character and untiring efforts of the man who has thus wrought, and who gained prestige as one of the great merchants and reliable and progressive citizens of the coun- try to which he came as a poor boy.
Mr. Simon is a native of Russia, where he was reared to the age of eight years. At that age he accompanied his parents, Aaron and Naomi Simon, to the United States, and with them settled in Chicago, Illinois. There the father engaged in merchandise activities upon a modest scale, for he had been similarly engaged in his native land, and in that city he and his wife passed the remaining years of their lives. To the public schools of Chicago Julius Simon is indebted for his early education, and while he made good use of the opportunities thus afforded to him, his schooling did not extend beyond his sixteenth year, at which time in his life he took upon himself the responsibility for his own maintenance. He secured employment in a store in Omaha, Nebraska, and for five years was there employed in various mercantile establishments of that city. Energy and ambition were qualities that were dominant within him, and in that time he gained an excellent knowledge of business details and methods. He was twenty years old when he came to Wisconsin and settled in Boscobel, Grant county, this state, the year 1885 marking his settlement here. He established himself in that place in the dry goods business, in a small way, to be sure, and to him was given the credit for having established and conducted the first successful business enterprise that was ever carried on in the town. When he had outgrown the possi- bilities of Boscobel, he sold out and moved to Portage, where he assisted in the upbuilding of a well equipped department store, of which he became the sole owner when he was but twenty-five years of age. Energy and progressiveness, fair and honorable dealings and careful business methods characterized the entire career of Mr. Simon from the time of its initiation, and his success was the normal outcome of his ever broadening activities. After five years in Portage he disposed of his business there and removed to Milwaukee, the results of which decisive move have already been set forth in an opening paragraph.
Since his retirement from the mercantile field, in October, 1906, Mr. Simon has devoted himself principally to making and handling investments, and to general activities in a financial way. He financed and aided in the erection of the Grand avenue viaduct in Milwaukee, the same being known as the largest structure of its kind in the world, and his name has ever been synonymous with integrity of purpose and
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reliability in connection with all matters with which he has con- cerned himself.
Mr. Simon shows a loyal interest in all that touches upon the well being of his home city and state and as a liberal and broad minded man is well fortified in his views concerning governmental affairs. He has membership in the Merchants' & Manufacturers' Association in Milwaukee and in the Milwaukee Athletic Club, and is known as one of the representative and influential citizens of the Wisconsin metropolis. His office is in the Caswell building, and his attractive residence is at 703 Marietta avenne.
On November 24, 1892, Mr. Simon was married to Miss Esther Silber who was born and reared in Milwaukee, and who is a popular factor in the representative social circle in which she moves. The late Morris Silber, her father, was for many years a leading mer- chant at Waupun, this state, and his venerable widow now resides in Milwaukee. Mr. and Mrs. Simon have two children: Naomi Grace and Julius, Jr., both of whom share the parental home.
A. J. MYRLAND. No other state department exercises such important powers, more closely connected with the vital welfare of the people than the tax commission, a body which in Wisconsin has reached probably a higher state of development than in any other state. Mr. Myrland is secretary of the Wisconsin Tax Commission, a lawyer, a man of broad experience in practice and in public affairs, and until his appointment to his present office in 1912 was for sixteen years a leading member of the bar at Grantsburg, in Burnett county.
A. J. Myrland was born January 15, 1861, in Norway, and in 1866 came with his father, who located in Primrose in Dane county, Wiscon- sin, and followed farming until his death in 1893. His father was a Republican in politics, and a member of the Lutheran church, as was his mother, a daughter of A. J. Sellevold, in the forties a member of the Norwegian parliament for six years.
A. J. Myrland grew up in Dane county, attended the district schools until fifteen years old, and further than that his opportunity for getting an education and preparing himself for his profession were limited to the resources accumulated by his own work on the farm and elsewhere. After he was twenty-one years of age he was a student for two years in the Milton Academy at Milton, Wisconsin, and in 1885 entered the Uni- versity of Wisconsin, in the Academic department, graduating in 1890 with the degree of Bachelor of Letters. For three years before Mr. Myrland had been identified with educational work in Wisconsin, and after leaving the University became principal of the high school at Belle- ville, in Dane county. His duties in the school room continued during the greater part of the years from 1890 to 1895, and in the meantime he had turned his attention to the law, entering the law department of the
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State University, he attended one year, and then successfully enconn- tered the examination for admission to the bar. On getting his license to practice law in Wisconsin, Mr. Myrland moved to Grantsburg iu Burnett county, and was identified with the bar there from 1896 to 1912. Since his appointment as secretary of the tax commission, his home has been in Madison. Mr. Myrland served as district attorney in Burnett county from 1898 to 1912. From 1903 to 1907, he was a member of the University Board of Regents, and was secretary of the school board at Grantsburg for fifteen years. His politics is Progressive Repub- lican, and fraternally he has passed all the chairs of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows Lodge at Grantsburg, belongs to the Encampment at Madison, is affiliated with the Modern Woodmen of America, the I. S. W. A. and the Sons of Norway. In more direct line with his pro- fession, Mr. Myrland is a member of the Board of Revisors of Criminal Law and Criminology for the State of Wisconsin.
On August 21, 1890, Mr. Myrland married Miss Lena B. Anderson, of Dane county. Their four living children are: Arthur L .; Ruth H .; Otto E .; and Mina M .; the first two attending the University of Wis- consin, the last two attending the high school and the graded school respectively.
W. O. PIETZSCH. The Chief Clerk of the Industrial Commission of Wisconsin, and for a number of years, until its abolition, connected with the Bureau of Labor and Statistics, Mr. Pietzsch has had a career of varied activity and experiences which have made him well known throughout the state of Wisconsin. He was a soldier in the Union army, has been prominent in Grand Army affairs for many years, has been a leader in business, and now for some years has devoted his energies and time to official duties.
W. O. Pietzsch was born July 13, 1844, in Germany, a son of Moritz and Henrietta (Guenther) Pietzsch. The parents came to America in 1848, bringing their family of children, and located in Milwaukee. There the father followed his trade as a book-binder, having acquired that art in the old country, and being a man of superior education, he quickly took a place in the community of much greater influence than his vocation and regular business would otherwise have entitled him to. After one year's residence in Milwaukee he moved to Watertown, and became the proprietor of the old Rock River House, one of the best of the old-time hostelries of central Wisconsin. There engaged in the hotel business, the senior Pietzsch acquired the reputation of a kindly, genial host, and a man who always made his guests feel at home. Ten years were given to his work as landlord, and he then moved to Baraboo in Sauk county, and after ten years there moved to Monroe, which was his home at the time of his death. He was a member of the Lutheran church, and active in social and civic affairs. His military bearing had
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been acquired in Germany, and in Wisconsin he served as first lieuten- ant in the Watertown Rifle Company at Watertown, and was highly thought of as a disciplinarian. He was an able speaker, and only a few years before his death delivered a national patriotic speech on the Fourth of July, in the German language. He was the father of several children, of whom W. O. was the oldest.
Mr. Pietzsch attended the district schools until he was twelve years of age, and was a child of four years when the family came to America. For a brief while he was a student in night school in Baraboo. His first business experience was as a clerk in a mercantile honse at Bara- boo, and he was working in a store there at the outbreak of the war. Hle was then about seventeen years old, and on the twenty-sixth of Jan- uary, 1862, he enlisted in the army in Company A of the Nineteenth Wisconsin Regiment of Infantry. His exact age at the time of his enlist- ment was seventeen years, six months and thirteen days. The Nineteenth Regiment was transferred to the Army of the Potomac, and he was in its service for three years and five months. At the expiration of his regu- lar term of enlistment he veteranized, and continued until near the close of the war. Many of the historic battles were participated in by Mr. Pietzsch, including several around Richmond, Petersburg, Blackwater, Drury's Bluff, and at the latter engagement he was captured and con- fined in the notorious rebel prison of Libby, and later at Salisbury, in North Carolina. His imprisonment continued until 1865 and after his release he received his honorable discharge on June 23, 1865. When cap- tured he was acting as orderly for Colonel R. M. Strong, who was also taken prisoner with him.
After his discharge from the army, Mr. Pietzsch returned to Bara- boo, and was engaged in merchandising there, and then from 1875 until 1885 was traveling agent in the wholesale dry goods business at Milwau- kee. Later his business was at Reedsburg, and he continued there for several years. In 1901 Mr. Pietzsch came to Madison to perform his duties as chief clerk of the Bureau of Labor and Statistics, and held that position until the bureau was discontinued. In 1911 he became chief clerk of the Industrial Commission of the State of Wisconsin and is now giving his efficient services in that direction.
Mr. Pietzsch is a Progressive Republican, is affiliated with the Ma- sonic Order, having received the thirty-second degree, has gone through all the chairs of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, and is a mem- ber of the Joe Hooper Post, No. 9, G. A. R., at Baraboo. He is president of the Nineteenth Wisconsin Association, comprising the veterans of the Nineteenth Regiment.
On November 9, 1873, in Sauk county, Mr. Pietzsch married Miss Mary Shumway, a daughter of the Rev. W. and Sarah Shumway of Sauk county. To their union has been born one daughter, Mrs. R. B.
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Anthony, whose husband is manager of the Bristol Manufacturing Com- pany at Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
ARTIIUR J. GALLAGHER. With well appointed offices in suite 12, Tenney Block, Mr. Gallagher is one of the leading representatives of the real estate and fire insurance business in his native city of Madison, the capital of the state, and his operations, conducted with marked circum- spection and scrupulous integrity, have reached substantial proportions. He has been most progressive and enterprising in his chosen field of endeavor and has controlled a large and important business in the handling of both farm land and city and village realty, the while he has made a specialty of the exchanging of properties and the extend- ing of financial loans upon approved real estate security. He is one of the popular business men and alert and public-spirited citizens of Mad- ison, and thus is fully entitled to specific recognition in this history of his native state.
Mr. Gallagher was born in Madison on the 2nd of May, 1869, and is a son of James and Jane (Hartley) Gallagher, the former of whom was born in Ireland and the latter in England. James Gallagher was reared and educated in his native land and as a youth he severed the home ties and set forth to seek his fortune in America. He landed in the city of Quebec, Canada, with his financial resources reduced to but two dol- lars, but with a goodly stock of energy, ambition and self-reliance. He worked for a short time as a teamster and in 1852 he came to Wiscon- sin and established his residence in the little village of Madison, capital of the new state. Here he engaged in the work of his trade, that of shoemaker, and through well directed efforts and impregnable integrity of purpose he finally became one of the honored and representative business men of the little town that has been developed into the beautiful capital city of the state. For more than a quarter of a century he con- ducted a shoe store in Madison and he gained independence and gener- ous prosperity through his own ability and well ordered endeavors. His mature judgment prompted him to make judicious investments in local real estate and he accumulated a fortune of fully two hundred thousand dollars, which he left as a heritage to his family upon his death, which occurred on the 15th of February, 1913, his widow still maintaining her home in Madison and having attained to the venerable age of seventy-five years, in 1913. James Gallagher was one of the pioneer business men of Madison at the time of his death and was well known in this section of the state, with a circle of friends that was limited only by that of his acquaintances. He was loyal and liberal as a citizen and was deeply appreciative of the attractions and advantages of the city and state which had afforded to him opportunities for the acquiring of success and independence after he had left the Emerald Isle and earnestly set to himself the task of winning his way through his own efforts and by Vol. VII-2
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methods guided and governed by the highest principles of integrity and honor. His name merits enduring place upon the roll of the sterling pioneers of the capital city. He was a devout communicant of the Con- gregational church, as is also his widow, and his political support was given to the Republican party. Of the eight children, five sons and three daughters survive the honored father, and he whose name introduces this review was the seventh in order of birth.
Arthur J. Gallagher gained his early educational training in the public schools of Madison and supplemented this by an effective course in the Madison Business College. At the age of sixteen years he assumed a clerical position in the Madison postoffice, and with this department of local government service he continued to be identified for sixteen years, within which time he won consecutive advancement and held respon- sible positions, his long retention of his post offering the most effective voucher for his ability and faithful and effective service.
In 1908 Mr. Gallagher formed a partnership with W. J. McKay and engaged in the general real estate business in Madison, under firm name of Mckay & Gallagher, and this alliance continued until 1911, when Mr. Gallagher engaged in the same line of enterprise in an inde- pendent way, as the founder of the substantial business which he now controls, as a dealer in real estate and as representative of leading fire insurance companies. On his books are to be found listed at all times most desirable investments in improved and unimproved farmis in Wisconsin, as well as properties for exchange, and he also handles all kinds of city realty and has adequate facilities for making loans on real estate.
Mr. Gallagher's loyalty to his native city is on a parity with his appreciation of its manifold attractions, and he takes a lively interest in all that touches its welfare. He maintains an independent attitude in politics and gives his support to men and measures meeting the ap- proval of his judgment, without special regard to partisan lines. Both he and his wife hold membership in the Unitarian church and they are popular factors in the social activities of the capital city.
On the 30th of October, 1905, was solemnized the marriage of Mr. Gallagher to Miss Minnie Marian Ellis, daughter of William H. Ellis, of Milwaukee, and they have a winsome little daughter, Ione Hartley, who was born on the 14th of March, 1907.
HARRY G. SMITH is essentially an exponent of the progressive spirit and civic loyalty that mark the representative native sons of Wiscon- sin and his varied and important interests give him place as one of the prominent business men of the capital city of the state, where he is proprietor of the substantial business conducted under the title of the Jefferson Transfer Company, with well equipped barn and gar- age at 409 West Main street. The establishment does a general transfer,
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livery and taxicab business, with carriages, hacks and automobiles of the best order, and the enterprise is one of the most important of the kind in the capital city. Mr. Smith is also an influential factor in connection with real estate operations, and the raising of high grade live stock, in which connections it may be noted that he is the executive head of the State Land & Loan Company, and owner and operator of the Wisconsin Stock Farm, which latter is situated near the village of Mazomanie, Dane county. Alert, vigorous and far-sighted, Mr. Smith is essentially one of the representative young men of affairs in Madison, and his sterling qualities have given him inviolable place in popular confidence and esteem.
Harry G. Smith was born at Hammond, St. Croix county, Wisconsin, on the 7th of August, 1878, and is a son of Jabez B. and Marcia (Brad- ford) Smith, the former of whom was born in the state of New York, in 1845, and the latter of whom is a native of Massachusetts, and is a direct descendant of Governor William Bradford of Plymouth Colony. Jabez B. Smith is a scion of one of the old and honored pioneer families of Wisconsin and was but five years of age when his parents came to this state, in 1850, about two years after its admission to the Union. His father, Merwin H., first located in Kenosha county, whence he later re- moved to St. Croix county, where he became a farmer in the pioneer community and where he contributed his quota to the civic and material development and upbuilding of the county, besides which he long served as an able and loved clergyman of the Free-will Methodist church. He was a staunch abolitionist during the climacterie period leading up to the Civil war and aided greatly in the operations of the historie "underground railway," through which many slaves were able to gain freedom. He continued as one of the influential and honored citizens of St. Croix county until his death.
In the pioneer schools of St. Croix county Jabez B. Smith continued his studies at regular intervals until he was about eighteen years of age, and in the meanwhile he assisted in the work and management of the home farm. After the completion of a course in the normal school at River Falls he devoted five years to successful work as a teacher in the public schools and he then began the study of law under effective preceptorship of Levi J. Bradford, at Hammond, St. Croix county. He was admitted to the bar in 1875 and forthwith engaged in the practice of his profession at Hudson, the judicial center of St. Croix county, where he was a member of the representative law firm of Baker & Smith from 1878 until 1888, in which year he removed with his family to Madison, where, as junior member of the law firm of Richmond & Smith, he gained and retained secure prestige as one of the able and representative members of the bar of the capital city. Here he and his wife still maintain their home and he has been retired from active practice since 1900. He has long been one of the prominent and valued
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