USA > Wisconsin > Wisconsin, its story and biography, 1848-1913, Volume VII > Part 20
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Mr. Philipp has been a Republican from the time of casting his first vote, and has always maintained his connection with the con- servative side of the party, in Wisconsin, of which he is the acknowl- edged leader. For the last four years he has served as a police and fire commissioner of Milwaukee, and at the beginning of July, 1913,
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Mayor Bading reappointed him to the office, to which he had pre- viously been appointed by Mayor Rose in 1909. As Republican leader in Milwaukee, Mr. Philipp entertained President Taft ou his visit to Milwaukee in 1912, and also entertained Former Attorney General Wickersham. Fraternally Mr. Philipp affiliates with the Masonic fraternity, having his membership in Milwaukee Lodge, with Ivanhoe Commandery, and the Wisconsin Consistory of the Thirty-Second Degree Scottish Rite. He belongs to the Milwaukee Club, the Mil- waukee Athletic Club, the Milwaukee Country Club, the Merchants' and Manufacturers' Association, and at the present time is president of the Wisconsin Humane Society.
Mr. Philipp married Miss Bertha Schweke, of Reedsburg, Sauk county, Wisconsin, a danghter of Diedrich and Bertha Schweke. Her mother is now living, and her father was for many years a country merchant at Reedsburg. During the early days he was also one of the California forty-niners. Both her parents were born in Germany, but Mrs. Philipp was born and educated at Reedsburg in Sank county. The three children of Mr. and Mrs. Philipp, all born in Milwaukee, are: Florence 1., Cyrus L., and Josephine.
Like many successful business men Mr. Philipp has found a profit- able recreation in farming. He owns one of the fine stock farms of Wisconsin at Hartford, comprising two hundred and eighty acres of land, and developed as a modern dairy farm, where he keeps sixty Guernsey cows. The only part of their product which he ships from his farm is the cream, all of which is sold in Milwaukee. The skimmed milk is fed to the hogs, of which he keeps a large drove of Poland China and Berkshires. It is one of the most sanitary and best equipped dairies in the state. Mr. Philipp also owns a farm of one hundred and sixty acres in North Dakota, operating that through a renter.
HAUMAN G. HAUGAN. Among Wisconsin's adopted sons few have made so notable records in railway and financial circles as Hauman G. Haugan, a resident of Chicago, and a loyal member of the Wisconsin Society of that city. Mr. Haugan was for a period of forty years con- nected with the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railroad, having recently retired from the position of comptroller.
He was also one of the personal factors in the upbuilding of what is now the State Bank of Chicago, one of the strongest institutions in the Chicago banking district, and which started more than thirty years ago as a private bank. Hanman G. Haugan was born at Christiana, Nor- way, November 7, 1840, a son of Helge A. and Anna Haugan. The father was born in 1799, and died at LaCrosse, Wisconsin, in 1874. The mother was born in 1815, and died in 1880. They were married in Nor- way, and were the parents of nine children, of whom five are living,
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Hauman G. being the third in order of birth. The father came to America alone, by sailing vessel, landing at San Francisco, California. Later he went to New York City by way of the Isthmus of Panama and, a painter by trade, he followed that line of work in New York city until 1858, when he moved to Canada, where he took up farming. In 1859 he sent for his wife and five children, who joined him in Canada.
Hauman G. Haugan was educated in his native city and was just entering manhood when he came to Canada. In 1863, he located in Chicago, and brought the rest of the family to this city in the same year. A little later the family moved to LaCrosse, Wisconsin, where the son became bookkeeper and afterwards acting cashier of the Batavian Bank, working in that capacity from 1864 to 1870. In the latter year he entered the railway service as paymaster of the Southern Minnesota Railway Company, and was afterwards auditor of that line, with which he was connected until 1880. From 1880 to 1883 he was secretary to the general superintendent, W. C. Van Horne, of the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railway Company. He was made land commissioner for the Milwaukee Road in 1883, and held that place until 1901. From January 1, 1901, until July 1, 1910, he was comptroller of the Milwaukee Sys- tem, finally retiring from the railroad service after completing forty years of efficient and faithful work.
In 1884 Mr. Haugan, who was then land commissioner of the Mil- waukee Railroad, was admitted to partnership in the firm of Haugan & Lindgren, private bankers in Chicago. Helge A. Haugan, a younger brother of Hauman G., and John R. Lindgren, had established this private bank on December 8, 1879, in very modest rooms on LaSalle street. These young bankers were without experience in banking and without influential connections, having only their character and their business ability to guide them in their undertaking. The business pros- pered and deposits grew with each year, until by 1884, the firm moved to larger quarters and increased its capital stock to one hundred thou- sand dollars. It was at that time that Mr. H. G. Haugan joined the firm. By 1890 Haugan & Lindgren, private bankers, had become one of the largest banks in Chicago. In 1891, the owners took out a charter from the state, and at that time adopted the name State Bank of Chicago, which has ever since been a stable institution in the financial district. Its capital stock at the beginning was five hundred thousand dollars and the deposits aggregated over a million dollars. The stability of the bank was successfully tested during the panic years from 1893 to 1897, and in the latter year the bank having successfully passed through the crisis moved to its present offices in the Chamber of Commerce Building. At the beginning of 1901 the capital of the bank was one million dollars and its total deposits were more than seven millions. Its growth in the ten years since that time has shown by the figures for its capital, surplus and profits, aggregating over three million dollars, while its total depos-
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its in 1911, were more than twenty-three million dollars. Mr. H. G. Haugan has been interested in the bank since 1884, and is now a mem- ber of its board of directors. Mr. Haugan was married at Rockdell, Minnesota, October 22, 1879, to Miss Emma Peterson, who was born in Norway, and whose death occurred in 1905. One of their four children died in infancy and the three now living are Helga C., wife of W. D. Dean, a Chicago lawyer; Ragna L., wife of D. W. Figgis, of New Jersey; and Alice J. Mr. Haugan is a member of the English Lutheran church at Milwaukee. His clubs are the Union League and the Evanston Golf Club at Chicago and the Milwaukee Club in Milwau- kee. In politics he is a Republican.
WILLIAM ORMSBEE BRIGGS. As an exponent of true American man- hood, William Ormsbee Briggs stands in the front rank and well upholds the prestige of a family name that has been closely identified with the nation's history since the early colonial days. The lineage of the Briggs family is traced back to sterling English origin. The early progenitors of the family came to this country with the first settlers, and gave valna- ble assistance in the pioneer work carried on at that time.
Valiant service as a soldier of the Continental line was rendered by Abner Briggs in the war of the Revolution. He first enlisted in 1775 from Freetown, Massachusetts, at the age of twenty-two, and partici- pated in the various activities of his command in the conflict for national independence. Shortly after this he married Miss Sarah Phillips, a mem- ber of the same family line as Wendell Phillips, and they were among the pioneer settlers of Essex county, New York, where they lived in the old homestead until his death in the spring of 1827.
Their son, Alexander Ellis Briggs, grandfather of William Orms- bee Briggs, was born on July 26, 1800, and was the first male child born in the township of Hague, Essex county, and for this, as well as being named in honor of a sterling pioneer, Alexander Ellis, the latter deeded to him one hundred and sixty acres of land in his native township. Here he gained practical experience which proved of immense benefit to him in his later activities as a pioneer in Wisconsin. When a young man he went to Vermont, and at Shoreham, that state, on the twenty-ninth of October, 1826, he married Miss Robey Ormsbee. Mr. Briggs continned to be actively engaged in agricultural pursuits in Vermont until 1850, when he moved his family to Wisconsin and settled in the township of Douglas, Marquette county, thus becoming one of the pioneers of that section of the state. He purchased from Jonathan Butterfield a large tract of land and undertook improvements, which, under his able man- agement resulted in an excellent water power and the formation of the beautiful sheet of water now known as Lake Mason. The initial business venture made by Mr. Briggs in Wisconsin was the manufacture of lum- ber. After two years he expanded his operations by establishing a grist
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and flour mill, to which he gave the title of Eagle Mill and to the opera- tion of which he gave his attention until 1860. His immigration to Wis- consin was followed by a number of his eastern friends, principally from Vermont, and a village called Briggsville was established on Lake Mason, in honor of the man who, as leader of this section, had contributed so generously to its civic and industrial development. Originally a Whig in his political proclivities, he transferred his allegiance to the Repub- lican party upon its organization, and continued a staunch advocate of its principles until his death, which occurred on April 12, 1861. His loyal helpmate survived him by more than a decade. Their son, James Alexander Briggs, was born at Whiting, Addison county, Vermont, on the seventh of March, 1836, and was fourteen years of age at the time of the family removal to Wisconsin. His early education in the district schools of Vermont was supplemented by a course in the public schools of Portage, Columbia county, about twelve miles from Briggsville. Early in his youthful career, he assisted in the work and management of the mill and, upon his father's death in 1861, he assumed charge of the business. He successfully operated the mill for eighteen years there- after when the property was sold to Joseph Champney. Since that time Mr. Briggs has given his attention to agricultural pursuits and stock raising, and has become one of the prominent representatives of the great dairy industry of Wisconsin. Associated with him is his son, Wil- liam Ormsbee, the subject of this sketch. Under the firm name of J. A. Briggs & Son, they own several improved farms in Marquette county and also one of the finest herds of Holstein cattle in Wisconsin. It is pleas- ant to record that they still retain the farm at Briggsville obtained from the government by Alexander Ellis Briggs, the founder of the family in this state. James A. Briggs, as a staunch Republican, has been called upon by his fellow-citizens to serve in various township and county offices. His marriage to Ellen Frances Gay was solemnized on Novem- ber 12, 1861, and of their six children, two sons and one daughter are living. William Ormsbee Briggs being the youngest. Ellen Francis Gay came of the most distinguished ancestry. One of her progenitors was William Bradford who immigrated from England to America on the historic "Mayflower" in 1620 and became the governor of Plymouth. His son William, born at Plymouth in 1624, became the father of Hannah Bradford who became the wife of Joshua Ripley. Their daughter, Alice Ripley, became the wife of Samuel Edgerton, whose daughter Mary wedded Ezekial Story. The daughter of this marriage, Eunice Story, wedded Joseph Gay and became the mother of Ellen Frances Gay. Thus can Mr. Briggs trace his maternal ancestry back to the historic colonial governor.
Mr. William Ormsbee Briggs was born at Briggsville on November 3rd, 1874, and takes pride in reverting to the Badger state as the place of his nativity. After pursuing his early studies in the district school
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of his native village, he availed himself of the advantages of the high school at Portage and was graduated in the class of 1893. During that summer, he assisted in the work and management of the home farm and in the fall secured a position as teacher in the township of Lewiston, Columbia county. He continued to make his home with his parents, driving two and a half miles to and from the little schoolhouse where his first duty was to kindle the fire. In addition he also assisted his father with the work about the farm. In the spring of 1894 Mr. Briggs taught one term in the school in Lake township, Milwaukee county, and during this period he gained his initial experience in selling life insurance. Shortly after he formally entered the service of the New York Life Insurance Company, with which his elder brother, James Ellis Briggs, was already actively identified.
A brief survey of his status in his chosen field of endeavor is given in a brochure published in the fall of 1912 by the New York Life Insur- ance Company, from which the following extract is taken :
"Mr. William O. Briggs, of the Wisconsin Brauch, entered the ser- vice of the company in 1894 as a solicitor of business. He has ever since devoted his entire time to writing life insurance and has for many years been among the most steady producers of business throughout the entire field. Mr. Briggs is not only one of the oldest and best known members of the Wisconsin branch but is also known throughout the agency force of the company. He is now a third degree Nylie and will soon become a senior Nylic. He is a $200,000 Club member and has made many nota- ble records in the past in various contests and other important occasions where loyal efforts were required in order to accomplish big results. For many years his name has regularly appeared on the Leaders' List of his branch, division, department and home office. He has many times captured the first place among the leaders of his branch and in Septem- ber, 1912, he also occupied first place among the leaders of his division. The work of Mr. Briggs has always been of the highest order and his loyalty to Nylie is second to that of no other agent. Space prevents us from giving a more extended notice of the long and effective record of Mr. Briggs, but the above is sufficient to show that he is one of the most successful men in our business and his record ought to prove an inspira- tion to many other agents. As Mr. Briggs is still a comparatively young man we hope he will be able to give to our great company many more years of service."
This quotation shows the high esteem in which Mr. Briggs is held by the company of which he is a valued representative. Character, ability and close application are the forces that have enabled him to achieve his position. For those not familiar with the somewhat esoteric use of the term "Nylie," it is here stated that the word is coined from the initial letters of the title of the company. Under this system Mr. Briggs will become a senior Nylie in January, 1916. He will have the distinction
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of being one of the youngest, if not, indeed, the youngest to hold this enviable position, being just forty-one years of age. This prestige indi- cates also the great volume of business done by him for the company, which in consonance with the provisions of its system, will accord to Mr. Briggs thereafter a monthly income for life with but the one condi- tion that he does not contract with any other life insurance company.
Mr. Briggs has shown, throughout his business career, sound judg- ment, initiative and executive ability, as well as an unusual capacity for judging character. Sincerity and geniality, dominant traits in his character, make friends for him of all who come within the compass of his influence. Reared in the tenets of the Republican party, he is un- swerving in his adherence to the party cause, but has never aspired to hold office.
Mr. Briggs maintains his office and residence in the city of Milwaukee, where he is a member of representative clubs. He is also affiliated with Lafayette Lodge, No. 265, Free and Accepted Masons, in which he received the sublime degree of Master Mason in August. 1901 and of which lodge he was elected an officer in December, 1911.
. On October 23, 1906, was celebrated the marriage of Mr. Briggs to Miss Ella Harold Serrell of Plainfield, New Jersey. Her ancestry is traced back to John De Seres who, on account of the Huguenot persecu- tions in France, fled to England in 1572 and entered Queen Elizabeth's navy against the Spanish Armada under the name of John Serrell. The family continued to live in England. The great-grandson, William Serrell, at the time of his marriage in 1807 to a cousin, Ann Bourne, was the only living member bearing the family name. In 1831 he and his family came to America on the steamship Cambria and made their home in Brooklyn. He engaged in the practice of patent law, in which his youngest son, Lemuel Wright Serrell, grandfather of Mrs. Briggs, eventually became associated with him. This business has descended from father to son until it is in the hands of the fourth generation. At the time of Lemuel Wright Serrell's death, he was the oldest patent law- yer in the country. His brother, General Edward Serrell, one of the best known engineers during the Civil war, was in charge of the engi- neering work in the attack on Charleston. He was also the builder of the first suspension bridge in this country-that across the Niagara river. Mrs. Briggs was born in Colorado in 1885, where her father, George Serrell, the second son of Lemuel Wright Serrell, had secured a government grant of five hundred acres which were worked as a ranch with over, six hundred head of cattle. At the age of eight, upon the death of her mother, Susan Malci, she removed to Plainfield, where she made her home with her grandfather until her marriage.
Mr. and Mrs. Briggs have two children, Zaidee Frances, born on March 20, 1908, and Marion Eleanor on June 14, 1910.
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HON. RASMUS B. ANDERSON. Editor and publisher of the Norwegian Weekly Amerika, former United States minister to Denmark, educator, scholar and business man, Rasmus B. Anderson was born at Albion, Dane county, Wisconsin, of Norwegian parentage, January 12, 1846. Björn and Abel Catherine (Von Krogh) Anderson were natives of Nor- way, and the mother a daughter of Lieutenant Van Krogh, of aristocratic and military family. Björn Anderson was one of the leaders in the organization of a Norwegian colony, which came to America in 1836, and in 1837 was established in LaSalle county, Illinois, and in 1840 at Albion, in Dane county, Wisconsin.
Rasmus B. Anderson, after an education in district schools and pri- vate instructions by a Lutheran minister, entered Luther College, at Decorah, Iowa, where he was graduated A. M. in 1866. Subsequently in 1885 the University of Wisconsin bestowed upon him the honorary degree of A. B. and in 1888 awarded him the degree of LL. D.
He was professor of Greek and modern languages at the Albion Academy in 1866, was instructor of languages from 1869 to 1875, and professor of Scandinavian languages and literature from 1875 to 1883 in the University of Wisconsin. In 1885, President Cleveland appointed him United States minister to Denmark and he served until 1889. Mr. Anderson has been editor and publisher of the Amerika since October, 1898. He has been president of the Wisconsin Life Insur- ance Company since 1895, president of the Wisconsin Rubber Company since 1904, and president of the Tobasco-Chiapas Trading and Transpor- tation Company since 1908.
His work as an editor and author is indicated in part by the follow- ing list : Author of "America Not Discovered by Columbus," 1874; "Norse Mythology," 1875; "Viking Tales of the North," 1877; "The Younger Edda," 1880; "First Chapter of Norwegian Immigration, 1821- 40," 1895. He has translated from the Norse -"Synnöve Solbakken," 1882; "Magnhild," 1883; "The Fisher Maiden," 1883; "Captain Man- sana, and other stories," 1883; "The Bridal March and other stories," 1883; "Arne," 1883; "A Happy Boy," 1884. His translations from the Danish comprise, "History of the Literature of the Scandinavian North, from the most ancient times to the present," 1884; "Eminent Authors of the Nineteenth Century," 1886; "Nordisk Mythologi," 1887; Teu- tonic Mythology," (from Swedish) 1889; "Among Cannibals," 1889.
Mr. Anderson has edited the "Norway Music Album (with Auber Forestier) 1881; "Ileimskringla" (four volumes) 1889; "Norroena Library" (sixteen volumes), 1905-06. IIe has been a contributor to the American Supplement of the Encyclopedia Britannica, MeClintock and Strong's, Johnson's, Kiddle and Schem's, and Chamber's Cyclopedias, the United Editors Encyclopedia, Encyclopedia Americanna, Standard Dictionary and various periodicals,
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Mr. Anderson married July 21, 1868, Bertha Karina Olson of Cam- bridge, Wisconsin.
WILLIAM HARVEY AUSTIN was born at Binghamton, New York, Octo- ber 22, 1859. Came to Wisconsin in the spring of 1868. Was admitted to the bar in 1879; was assistant district attorney for Milwaukee county in 1880; was school commissioner for Milwaukee city in 1889; was ap- pointed assistant city attorney for Milwaukee in 1890 and was city attorney in 1891. In 1892 he was elected to the assembly branch of the state legislature and in 1894 to the senate, serving in that body until 1898, since which time he has devoted his entire time to the practice of his profession. He is a member of the firm of Austin, Fehr & Gehrz.
Mr. Austin was married in 1882 to Miss Janet F. McLean and has four children, William M., Robert HI., Allen S. and Janet Grace, (now Mrs. W. C. Carlson).
LEON L. IIINE. One of the admirable institutions that contribute materially to the position of the city of Milwaukee as an educational center is the Hine College and institution for commercial and tech- nical training, the principal and sole proprietor of which has for many years been a resourceful factor in the Wisconsin field of prac- tical business education. Few schools of this class have a more sys- tematic and more comprehensive curriculum and better facilities for vocational training. Its four general divisions or departments are the preparatory, commercial, shorthand and drafting, and its branches of study comprise not only those usually taught in a business col- lege and English school, but also the higher branches of technical mathematics on such subjects as mechanical drawing and machine design, architectural drawing, and similar instruction that prepares its students for immediate admission as practical workers in the great field of modern industrialism.
The present proprietor of the Hine College is exceptionally well equipped by training and experience for his present profession. Hav- ing lost his parents when he was between three and four years of age, his childhood days were marked by fellowship with adversity and tribulations. That a youth thus circumstanced should have emerged triumphant through his own ability and strength of character, is a matter of inspiration to other aspiring young men and stands as a fact for the credit and honor of Mr. Hine.
Leon L. Hine was born in Dodge county, Wisconsin, on the twen- tieth of March, 1874, the son of John and Maria (Couer) Hine, the former of whom was born in Holland and the latter in France, and both of whom died in Pierce county, Wisconsin. Left an orphan at the age of three and a half years, Leon L. became an inmate in a benevolent institution at La Crosse, and later was taken into the
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home of Killean Flasch, a bishop of the Catholic church, and at that time a resident of La Crosse. Later he was placed under the guar- dianship of Rev. Muers of Lyndon, Wisconsin. Under these condi- tions the boy lived a number of years, and his recollections are of both a pleasant and sorrowful nature. The seclusion and rigid dis- cipline of these early homes were ungrateful to the alert and vigorous youth, and at the age of fourteen he took "French leave" of the parsonage and made his way to Minnesota. In the following year he showed his self-reliance by providing for his living throngh active service as a newsboy and bootblack in the cities of St. Panl, Minne- apolis, and also of Chicago. He was literally tossed about from pillar to post, but the fundamental characteristics of the boy were not de- spoiled by associations and troubles such as have wrought havoc to many persons thus placed. His bright and reflective mind enlarged even under depressing circumstances, and he eventually began fol- lowing out a definite ambition to gain an education, with the result that he applied himself to study whenever possible, and availed him- self of all the advantages that came. Finally he returned to Wiscon- sin, and established himself in Milwaukee, at the age of nineteen, he found work as a bookkeeper. His proficiency as an accountant event- nally gained him the recognition and appreciation, which made it possible for him to direct his attention to the line of educational work in which he has been most successful. His first work as an instructor was in the commercial and technical school at Milwaukee conducted by Mr. Anton Rhende, and he remained one of the instructors for five years. In order to equip himself the better for his profession, Mr. Hine entered the University of Chicago, where for three years he continned his studies along general branches and also with specializ- ing on commercial work in the school of commerce and adminis- tration.
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