USA > Wisconsin > Wisconsin, its story and biography, 1848-1913, Volume VII > Part 24
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The Tribune Publishing Company was organized in April, 1904, the first number being issued May 16th of that year. Among the in- corporators were W. E. Barber, John C. Burns, Henry A. Salzer, John P. Salzer, James B. Murray, J. J. Hogan, Grant E. Reynolds, Fred Heil, Henry N. Boehm, J. J. Poehling, Henry Waters, Peter Newberg, V. Tausche, M. & C. Newberg, Walter B. Rose, B. E. Edwards and John Dengler. Later subscribers to the stock were L. F. Easton, S. Y. Hyde and Norris C. Bacheller. The paper supported William Jen- nings Bryan in the ensuing campaign and under its original ownership was classed as Independent Democrat. W. E. Barber assumed the business management and A. M. Brayton was employed as editor and publisher. During the following year Mr. Brayton acquired stock in the company.
Although there were three other daily papers in the field at the time of its organization. The Tribune made rapid strides and within two years enjoyed a greater patronage from both advertisers and readers than any of its competitors. This was due, in part, to the fact that a quarrel involving the lighting and power utilities of the city had divided the populace into two bitter factions. The Tribune vigorously criticized the consolidation of the lighting utilities, over which the civic controversy had arisen and advocated the erection of a competing plant. A majority of the population sympathized with this view, and the feeling which gave the newspaper immediate strength also resulted in the organization of the Wisconsin Light and Power Company, which at once constructed a modern electrical plant. The plant has since been taken over by its competitor, and the lighting fight, which fur- nished one of the most sensational periods in the history of La Crosse, has worn itself out.
On February 12, 1907, The Tribune passed into the hands of the Lee Syndicate, of which the late A. W. Lee, of Ottumwa, Iowa, was president, and E. P. Adler, of Davenport, Iowa, vice-president and sec- retary. The syndicate is purely a business arrangement, its method being to leave the policy of each paper in the hands of its publisher and manager. E. P. Adler, president of the Lee Syndicate at this time, became president of the Tribune organization which was re-incorpo- rated under the style of the LaCrosse Tribune Company. The other
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officers are : James F. Powell, vice-president; F. H. Burgess, treasurer, and A. M. Brayton, secretary. Mr. Brayton was retained as editor and publisher and Mr. Burgess was elected business manager. Mr. Burgess had previously had ten years' experience, having been associated with the circulation department of the old Chicago Record and Daily News, and later with the Record-Herald. He entered the employ of the Lee Syndicate in 1904 as circulation manager of the Illinois field of the Davenport Times, with headquarters at Rock Island, and relinquished that position to take part in the reorganization of The Tribune, of which he became a stockholder. Mr. Burgess is a recognized authority on cir- culation, his writings on that subject having. attracted wide attention in newspaper circles. Upon the reorganization of The Tribune, W. V. Kidder, city editor since the organization of the newspaper, was re- elected to that position, and retained the post until his resignation in 1910, at which time he was succeeded by H. B. Robertson, formerly of the Minneapolis Journal. In July, 1913, Mr. Robertson resigned, Mark R. Byers succeeding to the position.
For more than a year prior to its purchase by the Lee Syndicate, The Tribune had espoused the political movement fathered by the Hon. Robert M. La Follette, and it has since that time maintained its sup- port of the general purposes of the movement, although also main- taining a position of general independence.
On April 6, 1907, The Tribune moved from its old quarters at No. 121 Main street to its new home, 201-203 South Fifth street. The plant had been provided with entirely new equipment, including a twenty- four-page latest model Goss perfecting press with the Kohler system of electrical control, and under the impulse of the new business methods adopted by Mr. Burgess soon took the place which it now occupies as a leader in Wisconsin journalism.
THEO. KNAPSTEIN. One of the sterling German-American families of Wisconsin is that of Knapstein, whose residence in the state goes back almost sixty years. Theo. Knapstein was a boy when the family moved to this state, and for more than forty years his residence and business activities have been at New London. In that time he has witnessed the growth of New London from a frontier community to one of the important industrial centers of the state, and through his own energies has performed a big share of that progress and develop- ment. He is the president of the Knapstein Brewing Company at New London, and has had more to do with the development of that local industry than any other one man. His record of public service is also noteworthy, and he has been honored again and again in his home city and has long been one of the Democratic stalwarts of the state.
Theo. Knapstein was born in Germany, Nov. 12, 1848, a son of Mathias Knapstein. In 1854, when the son was six years of age,
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Mathias Knapstein moved his family to the United States and found a home on a farm in the town of Greenville in Outagamie county, Wis- consin, where in time he was known as one of the well-to-do farmers. It was on his father's farm that Theo. Knapstein spent the greater part of his youth. He is one of the comparatively young men now active in affairs, who attended an old-fashioned log cabin school, but his period of schooling was ended when he was fifteen years of age. It has always been a matter of regret with Mr. Knapstein that his early education was thus abbreviated, but reading, travel and asso- ciation with the business world have largely made up for such early deficiencies. At the age of thirteen he was following a plow across the fields on his father's farm, and was employed by the senior Knap- stein until he reached his majority. Then at the age of twenty-one he arrived at New London, then a small village located in the heart of the lumber industry of central Wisconsin. With Messrs. Becker and Beyer he got his first interest in the brewing business, the partners buying a little frame plant which for some time had been conducted by Joe Lechner. The transaction involved a total sum of five thousand dollars, and Mr. Knapstein was able to contribute only fifteen hun- dred dollars, a sum which he had borrowed from his father. The business was carried under the name of Becker, Beyer & Company, and much might be said concerning the methods of manufacture fol- lowed by the firm in those early days. All the work was done by hand, and modern ice-making machinery was not even dreamed of. Later Mr. Knapstein and his brother Henry took over the interests of Becker & Beyer, after the death of the former, and the Knapstein Brothers conducted the brewery until 1908, in which year Henry with- drew. In the same year was organized the Knapstein Brewery Com- pany, the present title, Mr. Theo. Knapstein taking in his son. The business was incorporated at fifty thousand dollars with the follow- ing officers : Theo. Knapstein, president; H. T. Knapstein, vice-presi- dent; M. W. Knapstein, secretary and treasurer; while Wm. T. Knap- stein, one of the directors is the brewmaster and has done much towards increasing the popularity of the Knapstein Brew. Their beers are now fast taking place among the brands for which Wisconsin is noted. The plant has a daily capacity of sixty barrels or about twenty thousand annually. Many improvements have been introduced during the forty years of Mr. Knapstein's interest and ownership, and the present industry is conducted in an entirely new set of brick build- ings, equipped with the latest modern machinery. Near the brewery Mr. Theo. Knapstein. has erected a fine large brick residence, and the site of his home was, when he first knew New London, a thicket of underbrush.
The Knapstein family have always been prominent in politics. Theo. Knapstein was many years ago a member of the village board
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of New London, and later served on the city council, and for two terms was mayor. He was elected on the Democratic ticket to the state legislature in 1889, and was reelected in 1891. He was a mem- ber of the Assembly when there were twenty-nine Democratic mem- bers, in the year of the Democratic "landslide" in Wisconsin. He was also one of the meager minority on the Democratic side when there were twenty-nine Republican members of the house. Mr. Knapstein also held the office of postmaster at New London during the second Cleveland administration, being succeeded in the office by James C. Freeman.
In September, 1879, Mr. Knapstein married Frances Werner, a na- tive of Wisconsin. To their marriage have been born twelve children, noted as follows: Margaret, is the wife of Isaac Poepke, and their children are Frances, Irene, William, and Margaret ; Lena, is the wife of John Croak; Mathias W., married Eleanor Ostermier, and their children are Edwin, Mary, George and Lewis; Frances is the wife of Frank Hetzer, and their children are Lucile, Margaret, Edward, Dorothy and Catherine; Henrietta is the wife of Leonard Heuer, and the mother of Helen and Harold; Miss Irene; Henry, who married Josephine Simon, and has three children, Simon, Magdalene and Ger- trude; William ; John; Theo., Jr .; Raymond; and Loraine.
Mr. Knapstein and family are members of the Catholic church, of the Church of the Most Precious Blood, in New London. One of his brothers is a Catholic clergyman. Mr. Knapstein is also a member of the Catholic Knights of Wisconsin. His career has been that of a self- made man, as is evident from the previous brief review of his life. He possesses a most genial nature, is a good mixer among all classes, and is both popular and public-spirited. While he himself was lim- ited as to his early education, he has taken particular pride in giving his children the advantages of the best schools in the state, and has not only prospered himself, but has enabled other people to live better.
ISAAC J. DAHLE. A young man of admirable business ability and one who had made a splendid record in the field of life insurance opera- tions is Isaac James Dahle, of Milwaukee, who is agency director for Milwaukee and eastern Wisconsin of the Central Life Assurance Society of the United States, the home office of which is in the city of Des Moines, Iowa, and the Milwaukee office of which is in suite 500, Ma- jestic Building. An idea of the effective work and fine executive abil- ity manifested by Mr. Dahle as representative of the company men- tioned is afforded when it is stated that for the year 1912 he led all other agents of the corporation in the amount of paid-for business. He set a record for himself in the first month of his connection with the Central Life Assurance Society, as he headed the list of all its agents
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throughout the United States in the amount of business secured and underwritten within that month.
Mr. Dahle is a native of Wisconsin and a representative of one of the well known and highly honored families of the state, his father being a distinguished citizen of Dane county, within the borders of which is situated the beautiful little capital city of Madison. Mr. Dahle was born in the village of Mount Vernon, that county, in Feb- ruary, 1883, and is a son of Hon. Herman B. and Anne M. (Kittleson) Dahle, who now reside at Mount Horeb, that county, where the father is a prominent merchant and banker. Hon. Herman B. Dahle is a man of fine ability and high civic ideals and has wielded much influence in public affairs in Wisconsin, as shown by the fact that he has served in various positions of public trust, including that of representative in congress. Isaac James Dahle was one of a family of two sons and six daughters, all of whom are living, and after availing himelf of the advantages of the public schools of his native county he there continued his studies in Mount Horeb Academy, in which he was graduated as a member of the class of 1898. In 1900 he was graduated in the Wis- consin Academy, at Madison, and he then entered the great University . of Wisconsin, in the same city, in which institution he was graduated as a member of the class of 1904 and from which he received the degree of Bachelor of Arts. He is affiliated with the Delta Tau Delta college fraternity, and at Madison he holds membership in the Commercial Club and the Yellow Helmet Club. During his last two years in the university he was a member of its baseball team and he also took a lively interest in other university athletics.
After his graduation Mr. Dahle went to Minneapolis, Minnesota, where he held the position of western sales manager for the Sheffield King Milling Company for two years. During the following year he was connected with the Russell Miller Milling Company. of the same city, and he then became a stockholder of the Northwestern Milling Company, of Little Falls, Minnesota, for which he was western sales manager. At the expiration of one year he sold his interest in the business and removed, in 1909, to Milwaukee, where he opened the first local office of the Central Life Assurance Society, with the affairs of which he has since continued to be actively identified, as director of its agencies and business in Milwaukee and eastern Wisconsin. Spirited and progressive in his attitude, Mr. Dahle has pursued vigorous poli- cies and been indefatigable in his efforts in this connection, and, as noted in the opening paragraph of this sketch, he heads the honor list of the society in the amount of business obtained for the year 1912, this implying precedence over all other representatives of the company throughout the Union. He also has the distinction of being president of the Central Life Agents' Association of Wisconsin, and other officers of this vital association are as here noted: George H. Clarke, vice-
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president; Lewis Lundstrum, secretary and treasurer; and A. C. Lar- sen and C. W. Kelley, members of executive committee, of which the former is chairman.
Mr. Dahle in his home city is a popular member of each the Mil- waukee Athletic Club, the Blue Mound Country Club and the Scandi- navian Club, besides which he is a member of the Odin Club in the city of Minneapolis. He is still a bachelor and he is a popular factor in both business and social circles in the beautiful metropolis of his native state.
It may be stated that of all old-line, legal-reserve life insurance companies maintaining headquarters outside of Wisconsin the Central Life Assurance Society controls in this state a larger business than any other, and its reputation is such as to constitute its own best adver- tising. The full reserve on every policy is secured by a deposit of ap- proved securities with the state of Iowa, and the officers of the corpora- tion are men of the highest standing in the business world. George B. Peak is president; William L. Shepard, vice-president; H. G. Everett, secretary ; Homer Miller, treasurer; O. C. Miller, assistant secretary. The company was organized and incorporated in 1905 and has been doing business in Wisconsin for nearly a decade past. From an effec- tive circular recently issued by the Central Life Assurance Society are taken the following pertinent extracts :
" All amounts under any provision are fully secured by the deposit of approved securities in the safety vaults of the state of Iowa and held by the state in trust for the fulfillment of all contracts, thus making the investment at all times as safe as a government bond. The standard policy, secured, as provided by the Iowa laws, is the clearest expression of perfect insurance."
SUSAN JENNETTE SMITH, At the time of her death Susan J. Smith held the distinction of having resided in Milwaukee for a longer con- tinuous period than any other person then living. A child of three years at the time the family emigrated to this state, nearly eighty years ago, she represented the best and most highly honored pioneer stock of the Wisconsin metropolis. She was on the type of the strong and yet gentle woman of pioneer training and discipline, and her life was veritably a vitalized beatitude. At her home at 563 Maryland avenue, in Milwaukee, on the morning of November 20, 1912, Susan Jennette Smith passed peacefully away after a residence in the city for seventy- seven years. Her death was a source of personal loss and bereavement to all who had come within the sphere of her benign influence. In the later years of her life she represented "old age as it should be," and her memory will be revered by those whose privilege it was to know her only in this stage of her gracious life, as well as by those who knew her in her earlier and more active years. For the memorial tributes
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here presented, the publishers are largely indebted to the estimates and character sketch prepared by Judge Joseph G. Donnelly, now presiding as chief jurist of the civil court of Milwaukee county, and read before the meeting of the Old Settlers Club of Milwaukee, of which Mrs. Smith had been a loved and valued member.
Mrs. Susan J. Smith was born at Saranac, Clinton county, New York, on the twenty-fourth of March, 1832, and was a daughter of Thomas and Susanna (Demeret) Hoyt. Mrs. Smith was a lineal descend- ant of Simon Hoyt, one of the seven original founders of Boston, Massa- chusetts. The Hoyts like nearly all families in the early New England days, were blessed with many sturdy sons, and representatives of the name acquired themselves well in connection with civic and industrial development and progress in the colonial era, besides giving patriot soldiers to the early colonial wars and the Revolution. After 1638, the family branched out from Massachusetts into other New England colonies, and it is a matter of record that William Hoyt, great-great- grandfather of Mrs. Smith, was among the first to join the Patriot ranks from Exeter, New Hampshire, in the war of the Revolution, and that his gallant life was sacrificed in the battle of Bennington, in 1777. His son Richard was a private in Colonel Robinson's regiment in the war of 1812, and the pension paper of this son is now in the possession of Judge Joseph G. Donnelly of Milwaukee. This interesting document bears the signature of John C. Calhoun, who was then secretary of war.
Thomas Hoyt, father of Mrs. Smith, was an officer in the war of 1812. He was born in New Hampshire, as was also his wife, and they reared a family of eight children. His sister Mercy became the mother- of William Tecumseh Sherman, the distinguished union general in the Civil war. In 1829 Thomas Hoyt removed from New Hampshire to Saranac, Clinton county, New York, and a few years later became one of the pioneers of the west. Accompanied by his wife and their three sons and four daughters, he set forth with team and wagon on the long overland trip to Chicago, at which point they arrived late in the autumn of 1834. Chicago at that time was a mere frontier village, and Mr. Hoyt took up a land claim on what is now the very center of the retail business district, within what is locally designated as the "Loop Dis- triet," included with the loop of the elevated railway structure. The devoted wife and mother died a few months later and the bereaved hus- hand longing to be with his kinsfolk, disposed of his Chicago land, and brought his family to Milwaukee, where Samuel Brown, who had mar- ried Clarissa Hoyt, a daughter of Thomas Hoyt, in Chicago, had estab- lished a home. Mr. Brown became one of the prominent and influential citizens of the Wisconsin metropolis, and his son Thomas R. was twice elected mayor of Milwaukee.
On his arrival in Milwaukee, in April 1835, Thomas Hoyt located for each of his three sons a quarter section of land on the outskirts of
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the little city, and he erected for himself a home in what is now Sher- man Park. Here he died in 1839, and his remains were laid to rest on his farm. When Forest Home Cemetery was established, his remains were removed and it is said that this was the first interment to be made in that beautiful God's acre.
Three years of age when the family was established in Milwaukee, on the death of her father, Susan J. Hoyt was taken into the home of her sister Hannah, wife of John Bowen, whose homestead farm was situated on the Lisbon Road, a short distance from the city. There still remain a few old settlers who remember Mr. Bowen, and Judge Donnelly has a prized heirloom in the form of a badge that was worn by this sterling citizen, denoting his membership in the old Pioneer Club, the badge bearing the date 1835. Concerning this pioneer, Judge Donnelly has written as follows:
"Like most of our early pioneers, John Bowen was a man of strong character, and he had an interesting history. When a lad of fourteen he left his home in the east, and getting as far as St. Louis, joined a band of hunters and trappers, among whom was the famous Kit Car- son. Only rarely in later years would the old gentleman talk of his experience, but more than once at my home he related incidents of his wild life on the western plains, where, thousands of miles from civilization, and in the midst of hostile Indians, he pursued his calling of hunter and trapper. He was the first white man to penetrate the black hills, and in 1827 he brought back to St. Louis, specimens of gold quartz which he found there. The following year he sought to reach the place of his discovery but failed. Weary at last of wandering and adventure, he finally came to Milwaukee in 1835, and after his marriage to Hannah Hoyt settled on his farm of one hundred and six acres where he followed the quiet industrious life of a farmer until his death in 1883. John Bowen was a manly man-brave, gentle, generous. He and his good wife, destined to be childless themselves, took little Susan Jennette Hoyt to their home. They reared the orphan tenderly and faithfully, but it was necessary for the little one to have an edu- cation and be nearer school, so during her school days, she lived in the home of Samuel Brown, who had married another of the sisters, and who lived on Fond du Lac avenue. She attended the first school started on the east side of her' city. Some of our older pioneers today may have been among her later classmates, and if so, doubtless remem- ber her as Jennette Hoyt, reputed the prettiest girl in the school, and per- haps the prettiest in Milwaukee."
On the eighteenth of August, 1850, when she was eighteen years of age, Susan J. Hoyt became the wife of William Avery Smith, who was also of Revolutionary ancestry, and whose father was one of the earliest settlers of Milwaukee. The young couple established their home on a
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tract of land adjoining the Bowen farm, and they became the parents of five children-Augusta, Avery, Thomas, Clara and Lois.
William Avery Smith had sailed the great lakes from boyhood, and was a captain in the service at the age of eighteen. He was in command of a vessel from the time of his marriage until he met his death as the result of an accident in 1870. The brave and devoted young widow ear- nestly assumed the duty of rearing and educating her fatherless chil- dren. A few years later her elder son, who had reached manhood, and was aiding in the support of the family, met, like his father, an accidental death. This double bereavement would have shaken the faith and weakened the spirit of an ordinary woman, but not so with Mrs. Smith, who was sustained by resolute purpose and abiding faith in the Power that rules human destiny. She bore her sorrows with fortitude and resignation. She continued her life of toil for her children, and was known for her thrift and tireless industry. She kept her family circle unbroken, and gave to each of her children not only maintenance, but also good educational advantages, and to the end of her long and noble life held their deep and filial love and solicitude, as well as the high regard of all who knew her.
From Judge Donnelly's earnest and loving tribute to Mrs. Smith, who was near and dear to him, quotation without change of consequence is made as follows: "Mrs. Smith saw Milwaukee grow from a few scat- tered cabins to a great metropolis. She was proud of its growth, but she often lamented that its development and progress in a material way had destroyed much of its early beauty. The great woods that crowned our crescent shore, the pure stream that ran its crystal course to the lake, the boys and girls, men and women, who were all social equals and shared each other's joys and sorrows -. these were the memories of her girlhood, the memories she cherished. Like memories come to us all, and while we cherish them, too often they serve to sadden the even- ing of life. Let me supplement this brief record of the life of Susan Jennette Smith, with my personal tribute to her memory .. I first met her in 1875, and since 1878, when her youngest daughter, Lois, became my wife, I have known her in the closeness of family ties. She was a typical woman of Puritan stock, a woman of warm heart, level head and clear conscience. Work to her was not merely a duty, it was an instinet of her nature. Long after the time when it was necessary and when she was amply able to provide herself with the luxuries of life, even at the age of eighty, she was still the housewife-early to bed, early to rise, very busy, ever alert, scrupulous, enforcing order and cleanliness and keeping her home so that it was a pride and pleasure to enter it. She was singularly disinclined to publicity. During the home-coming festivities a few years since, when the old settlers were being made much of and daily heralded in our press, she shrank from seeing her name in print and expressly forbade any mention of her.
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