USA > Wisconsin > Wisconsin, its story and biography, 1848-1913, Volumr VI > Part 19
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in the vicinity of Baraboo. With a capital stock of one hundred thou- sand dollars, the bank offers all the advantages of a strong progressive institution, and its facilities are such that every accommodation con- sistent with prudent and conservative management is offered to its patrons. The First National is an active depository of the United States Government. At the end of the first year, after the reorganiza- tion in 1905, the total resources of the bank were a little more than three hundred thousand dollars, while at the end of seven years, accord- ing to a statement made to the comptroller in February, 1913, the total resources were nearly a million dollars, lacking about forty thousand dollars. The surplus and profits are over twenty thousand dollars, and the aggregate of deposits are nearly seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars. The officers are T. W. English, president; D. M. Kelly, vice president; M. H. Mould, cashier; T. M. Mould and J. J. Pfannstiehl, assistant cashiers.
Mr. M. H. Mould was born February 14, 1852, in Herkimer county, New York, a son of Matthew and Jane (Islip) Mould. Both his parents were natives of England, and the father came to America in 1847 with his wife and one child, locating in Herkimer county, New York. There for ten years he was engaged in carriage making, a trade he had ac- quired during his residence in England. From western New York he moved to Baraboo, Wisconsin, in 1857, thus becoming one of the pio- neers in Sauk county. The late Matthew Mould is remembered as one of the earliest daguerreotype artists in this section of Wisconsin. Many of the old daguerreotypes finished by him are still to be seen in the homes of the older families. He was an expert in the art, and many samples of his work took first premium when exhibited in the county fairs. He lived in Sauk county until his death in 1890 and his widow is still living, being now eighty-five years of age. Matthew Mould was at one time president of the village of Baraboo, and during his life had the confidence and friendship of the entire community. There were six children, five of whom are yet living, and the Baraboo banker was the third in order of birth.
Mr. Mould's regular attendance at the common schools was termi- nated when he was fourteen years of age, and from that time forward he got only such education as could be derived from self application in the intervals of hard work. Two years of his boyhood were spent in a brick yard. His first independent venture was in partnership with a Mr. Owens, under the firm name of Owens and Mould in the book and stationery trade. That enterprise was carried on during 1873-74, and from the latter year Mr. Mould was in business under his own name, up to 1890. In that year he became associated with Mr. Buchley, under the style of Mould & Buchley. The business was continued until 1901. In that year Mr. Mould became president of the First National Bank
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of Baraboo, and remained at the head of the institution until the reor- ganization in 1905.
Mr. Mould has been interested in several business enterprises out- side of his mercantile and banking career, and has aided everything for the advancement of the city. Public matters have received his regular cooperation, and during the first Cleveland administration he held the office of postmaster during 1885-86. From 1890 to 1891 he was city treasurer, and served one term as mayor of Baraboo. At the present time his civic service consists in his membership with the water commission, having been a member since its organization and also as member of the police and fire commissioners, having been on that board since the organization. Mr. Mould was the first exalted ruler of the local lodge of Elks, having been elected at the installation of the order in Baraboo.
On June 4, 1874, in Baraboo, he married Miss Jennie Buckley, a . daughter of Thomas and Priscilla Buckley. Of their six children, four are now living, namely : Jennie, Arthur N., A. G., and T. B.
VIRGIL H. CADY. In 1908 Virgil H. Cady, a young lawyer of Bara- boo, had the distinction of breaking a continuous record of Republican representation from the First District of Sauk county, and was the first Democrat elected in eighteen years to the legislature. He received nineteen hundred and sixty votes to fourteen hundred and seventy-four votes cast for his Republican opponent, who was standing for reelec- tion. These figures become the more forcible when it is recalled that Mr. Taft's majority in the same district was over one thousand. Mr. Cady belongs to one of the pioneer families of central Wisconsin, his father having located in Sauk county the same year in which Wis- consin territory became a state.
Virgil H. Cady was born on Christmas Day of 1876, in the town of Excelsior, Sauk county, a son of William C. and Emma (Huntington) Cady. His father was born in Berkshire county, Massachusetts. In 1847 the family came west, and after living about one year in Wal- worth county moved to the town of Excelsior in Sauk county in 1848, where the father took up a homestead from the government, and on that farm William C. Cady lived and prospered throughout his long and active career. In July, 1903, he moved to Milwaukee, and from 1888 to 1892 had been a resident of Baraboo. William C. Cady was twice married, his first wife being Miss Maria Gillett, their marriage occurring in Walworth county. She died in 1866. Mrs. Cady was the mother of four children, two of whom are now living. In October, 1868, in Bara- boo, William C. Cady married Emma Huntington, who became the mother of five children, namely: Samuel H., born February 4, 1870; Ernest, born May 23, 1873; Anna L. Sawyer, born November 4, 1874: Virgil H. and Alice E. Heuer, born May 26, 1880.
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William C. Cady died April 28, 1911. On July 18, 1902, William C. Cady celebrated his eightieth birthday, at which time all his children were present to do him honor. At the time of his death he owned two hundred and forty acres of choice land in Sauk county and outside of his material accumulations his life was in many ways a benefit and a stimulating influence to his fellow men. Possessing more than ordinary education, his information on all subjects was very broad. In politics he was a Democrat and a Baptist in religion and among his public services should be mentioned his chairmanship of the board of super- visors, his service as assessor and treasurer of his township. The grand- father of Virgil H. Cady was a soldier in the Mexican war. His name was Daniel Cady.
Virgil H. Cady received a common and high school education. Dur- ing his high school career at Baraboo he established and published an independent high school journal known as 'The Review," during 1895 and 1896. From 1899 to 1901 his law studies were carried on at Bara- boo and in December of the latter year he was admitted to practice before the State Board of Examiners at Milwaukee. His entire profes- sional career has been spent at Baraboo. In 1908 he was nominated for member of assembly from the first district of Sauk county and served during the term 1909-11. In the legislature he was on the judi- ciary committee and championed several important bills that were made into laws, and showed himself a progressive worker for the public in- terest. In 1910 Mr. Cady was elected city attorney of Baraboo, and he still holds that position.
On July 14, 1903, at Madison, Mr. Cady married Miss Margaret Pilley. They are the parents of one son, Alton, born May 10, 1904, and named in honor of Judge Alton Parker, at that time candidate of the Democratic party for the office of president.
WILLIAM O. VILTER. Definite prestige pertains to Mr. Vilter as one of the vital and progressive business men and loyal citizens who have contributed definitely and worthily to the industrial precedence of the Wisconsin metropolis, where he is secretary and treasurer of The Vilter Manufacturing Company, builders of ice-making and refrigerating machinery, improved Corliss engines, machinery for brewers and bot- tlers and varied lines of special machinery. The plant of the company is one of the most extensive of the kind in the United States and its products are sold in all sections of the country. The corporation has built up a reputation that constitutes its most effective commercial asset and he whose name introduces this paragraph has been a resourceful and valued factor in the upbuilding of the large and important enterprise, his status as a man of affairs and as one of the representative citizens of Milwaukee entitling him to specific consid- eration in this history of Wisconsin.
William O. Vilter was born in Fedderwarden, grand duchy of Voi. VI-11
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Oldenburg, Germany, on the 12th of February, 1862, and is a son of Christian and Elise (Meiners) Oltmanns, concerning whom more specific mention is made on other pages of this work, in the review of the career of their elder son, Theodore O. Vilter, who is president of The Vilter Manufacturing Company. In the sketch of its presi- dent's career also is given adequate detail concerning this representa- tive Milwaukee industrial corporation. The schools of his native place afforded William O. Vilter his rudimentary education and he was nine years of age at the time of the family immigration to America, the new home being established in Milwaukee, where he continued his studies in the public schools of the Seventh ward and those of the Fourth ward, after which he entered the excellent German-English Academy of Milwaukee, in which he completed a thorough course and was graduated as a member of the class of 1879. Soon afterward he initiated his identification with practical business affairs by entering the employ of .William Frankfurth & Co., hardware dealers, the estab- lishment of which was situated at the corner of Third and Chestnut streets. About one year later he assumed a position in the employ of the representative real-estate dealer, Edward Barber, with whom he continued for two years. He made good use of the experience gained in these connections, and on the 1st of April, 1882, he became book- keeper and correspondent for the firm of Weisel & Vilter, of which his honored father was junior member. When, in the year 1886, the busi- ness was incorporated under the title of The Weisel & Vilter Manu- facturing Company he became secretary of the company. His father died in the year 1888 and he was then made treasurer of the corpora- tion, the while he retained also the office of secretary, of which dual post he has remained the able and valued incumbent during the long intervening years. The title of the corporation was changed to The Vilter Manufacturing Company in March, 1893, and the enterprise dates its inception back to the year 1867, so that it merits consideration as one of the pioneer industries of Milwaukee, the name and fame of which city it has aided in exploiting. Mr. Vilter has been assiduous in his application to business, has shown much executive and admin- istrative ability and has been definitely influential in the develop- ment of the extensive and substantial trade controlled by the cor- poration of which he is secretary and treasurer, his brother Theodore O. being president of the company, and Edward F. Goes being vice- president.
In the city that has been his home since his boyhood days Mr. Vilter has secure place in popular confidence and esteem and has identi- fied himself closely and worthily with both civic and business inter- ests. His loyalty to Milwaukee has been shown in deeds as well as words and he is distinctively one of its representative business men, besides being a popular figure in connection with social activities.
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In politics Mr. Vilter maintains an independent attitude and gives his support to the men and measures meeting the approval of his judg- ment, irrespective of partisan lines. He has been an alert and influen- tial member of the Milwaukee Merchants & Manufacturers' Association and served with special ability as a member of its committee on manu- factures, a position of which he continued the incumbent for several years, within which he was chairman of the committee for two terms. He has been a director of the Citizens' Business League for the past decade, and as such he represented the organization as a member of the entertainment committee which had charge of the reception of the investigating committee which visited Milwaukee during the week of May 19, 1913, for the purpose of looking over the old state fair grounds, the latter committee having .also given due inspection to grounds in other places in the state, as an attempt was being made to secure elsewhere the annual state fairs. The claims of Milwaukee were so efficiently presented, however, by representative citizens that the state fair was retained to the Wisconsin metropolis, as it properly should be. Mr. Vilter has also served as president of the Milwaukee Manufacturers & Dealers' Club and has otherwise shown himself deeply interested in all that touches the social and material welfare and progress of his home city. He is interested in the newly organized Milwaukee Western Electric Railway Co. and a member of the Board of Directors and Executive Committee. He holds membership in the Milwaukee Musical Society, with which he has been identified for a quarter of a century ; he was a member of the Milwaukee Turnverein for more than thirty years; he is a charter member and was one of the incorporators of the Pine Lake Yacht Club ; and he is likewise a popu- lar member of the Milwaukee Automobile Club, the Milwaukee Art Society, and the Deutscher Club. Both he and his wife were raised in the Lutheran faith.
On the 12th of October, 1910, was solemnized the marriage of Mr. Vilter to Miss Elfriede Best, who was born and reared in Milwaukee and who has been a popular figure in representative social affairs in her native city. She is a daughter of Emil Best, a well known and highly honored pioneer citizen of Milwaukee, where he has long been interested in and actively associated with the Pabst Brewing Com- pany. Mr. and Mrs. Vilter have a fine little son, William B., who was born on the 16th of March, 1912. Their home is located at 572 Mar- shall street and is known for its genial hospitality, with Mrs. Vilter as it gracious chatelaine.
Milwaukee, as well as the state in general, owes much to its loyal and representative citizens of German birth or lineage, and the reader of the pages of this publication can not fail to realize the truth of this statement, for among the strongest and best of the citizens repre- sented is found a large and valued quota of those who claim the fine
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old Emipre of Germany as the place of their nativity or as the home of their ancestors. Mr. Vilter is a popular and valued representative of the German element in the Wisconsin metropolis and, reared under American institutions and advantages, his loyalty can not be exceeded by that of any native son of the United States.
JACOB VAN ORDEN. One of the oldest and one of the strongest banks in south central Wisconsin is the Bank of Baraboo. Officially this bank claims a continuous existence of forty years, from its estab- lishment in 1873. As a matter of exact fact, the history of the bank goes back much further. Simeon Mills and Terrell Thomas, as a stock company, owned and operated a banking institution at Baraboo from 1856 to 1873. Their business was succeeded by the First National Bank of Baraboo, and then in 1880 the Bank of Baraboo was reorgan- ized under a state charter with Mr. George Mertens as president, and J. Van Orden as cashier. Within a year after the establishment of the bank under a national charter, Mr. Van Orden entered the institution in a nominal capacity which might perhaps best be described as a gen- eral utility boy or clerk, and his relationship with the institution has been continuous for forty years. From a report made to the State Commissioner of Banking in June, 1913, the resources of the Bank of Baraboo are revealed as aggregating nearly two million of dollars, to be exact, $1,827,396.86. At that date the bank held in deposits from its customers over a million and a half dollars, while its capital stock is one hundred thousand dollars, its surplus, thirty thousand dollars, and undivided profits more than twenty thousand dollars. The officers and directors of the Bank of Baraboo are: H. Grotophorst, president ; C. W. Whitman, vice president; J. Van Orden, cashier ; E. P. McFet- ridge ; J. B. Donovan; and L. S. Van Orden, assistant cashier. Jacob Van Orden was born August 13, 1856, in Neosho, Dodge county, Wis- consin. His father, Lucas S. Van Orden, a native of New York State, came alone to Wisconsin in 1849, the year after the admission of the territory to the Union. After a short time spent in Milwaukee, he moved to Neosho in Dodge county, where his name belongs among the early settlers. It was his distinction to have erected the first flour mills in Neosho, and throughout his life he remained a much respected and honorable business man. At one time he held the office of Register of Deeds for two years. His death occurred in 1858. His wife was a native of Ohio, and is still living at the age of seventy-seven.
Jacob Van Orden, the only child of his parents, was educated in the district schools, and spent three years as a student in Ripon Col- lege. He was eighteen years old, when in 1874, he came to Baraboo and found employment with the First National Bank, as it was then called. The duties devolving upon him at first comprised sweeping out the bank in the morning, running errands, and any other work that
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might be required by his superiors. He had a definite aim in entering the bank, and that was to become a banker himself. His ability to aid him, and close attention to details, and a ready industry, he soon gained the confidence of all connected with the institution, and at the end of six years was promoted to the position of cashier in the reorganized Bank of Baraboo. His service as cashier has now been continuous for more than thirty years, and is more important than the title would indicate, since Mr. Van Orden has for a long period been the active manager of the bank.
His own career as a banker has been one of success. In an article contributed by him recently to "The Wisconsin Banker," Mr. Van Orden quoted the words of one of Wisconsin's venerable bankers as to what constitutes a good banker, the reply to that question being : "First, ability; second, integrity; third, capital." Those qualifications his friends would quickly attribute to Mr. Van Orden himself. As a brief summing up of the elements of success in banking, another short para- graph from the same article deserves quotation : "Careful study must convince us that successful banking and a successful bank are dependent upon the man or men in active charge of the institution. Its policy, whether wise or unwise, whether far-sighted or short-sighted, popular or unpopular, profitable or unprofitable, is primarily the result of the labor of the officer in charge. He cannot and should not avoid the re- sponsibility. Neither can he be rightfully denied the credit."
Mr. Van Orden is one of the foremost men in public spirit in Sauk county. He is much interested in historical and archeological matters, and it was due to his effective enterprise and his liberal contribution of necessary expenses that one of the most interesting of the early Indian remains of Wisconsin has been preserved for all times to the public. There are a number of mounds in different sections of the state, erected by the prehistoric inhabitants, and many of them in super- ficial shape represent the forms of different animals, but it is very rare when a mound is found delineating the human figure. Two of such mounds were in Sauk county, one of them having been obliterated by cultivation. Another, four and a half miles northeast of Baraboo, had escaped the plow and other implements of civilized man, though a public road had cut through the portion of the mound containing the figure of the legs. In order to preserve the acre and a half of land including the mound, the Sauk County Historical Society and the State Archeological Society had endeavored to enlist popular subscription toward the purchase of the land from its owner and as a result of a campaign this historical site has finally been preserved and fenced in as a prominent memorial to the aboriginal inhabitants of Wisconsin. On a large granite stone near the mound is now affixed a bronze tablet containing in one panel the outline of the figure originally represented by the mound, while the central panel, which Mr. Van Orden paid for,
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contains this inscription : "Manmound Park. Wisconsin Archeological Society. Sauk County Historical Society. Landmark Committee; W. F. W. C. 1908." In the right-hand panel are the following words: "Mound located and platted by W. H. Canfield in 1859. Length 214 feet, width at shoulders 48 feet."
Mr. Van Orden is a thirty-second degree Mason, is a member of the Baraboo Commercial Club, in politics is independent, and has been junior warden of Trinity Episcopal Church, Baraboo, for 20 years. He has always been a liberal supporter to the worthy enterprises under- taken in both city and county.
On January 14, 1880, he married at Waupun, Wisconsin, Miss Martha Atwood. Mrs. Van Orden was also educated in Ripon College. Their two children are: Lucas S., born in December, 1881, and Mary Louise, born in October, 1883.
HON. FRANK AVERY. Now eighty-three years of age, still active and walking the streets of Baraboo, attending to business affairs, Hon. Frank Avery is one of the last survivors of the old guard of pioneer settlers in this thriving center of population and business in central Wisconsin. He knew Baraboo when it was a village, surrounded by dense woods, and his reminiscences form the most valuable oral history of this community from its early days to the present. Along with a career of close attention to business he has been honored with many places of trust, both in the community and in the state, and no man in Sauk county is held in higher esteem than Frank Avery.
Born November 17, 1830, his birthplace was at Tenterdern, in County Kent, England. His parents were Thomas and Mary (Boorman) Avery. Thomas Avery came to Wisconsin in 1864, and died in Bara- boo on April 13, 1885. He was a shoemaker by occupation, having followed a trade in which his father had also earned a livelihood for the family.
Frank Avery was still in his teens when he became a resident of America. His early boyhood was spent in the city of London, and when only eight years of age he first saw Queen Victoria, who was then a comparatively young woman and had been crowned only the year before. That memory of the gracious Queen of England has always remained one of the most vivid impressions of his lifetime. In 1853 Mr. Avery located at Syracuse, New York, and two years later, in 1855, he came west and found a home at Janesville, Wisconsin. As his father and grandfather had done before him, he had acquired the trade of shoemaker, and it was that occupation which provided him his means of support and his capital for many years. After a brief residence at Janesville, Mr. Avery moved to Baraboo. Only a few houses stood on the site and the greater part of the land now contained within the city limits was then covered with heavy timber. In that pioneer lo-
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cality he opened a little shop and began making boots and shoes for the settlers. His business as a boot and shoe maker and dealer continued for more than thirty years. During all the years of the city's growth from its primitive conditions to the present Mr. Avery has taken a keen interest, and his services have often been of material benefit in advanc- ing local improvements. When he first settled there he not only knew personally every inhabitant and called them by name but could easily enumerate the entire local population in a few minutes' time. Since then the village has become a city of nearly eight thousand inhabitants, and while the majority know him, he is no longer able to call the name of all fellow citizens. In politics Mr. Avery has been a Republican all his active career, and his first vote was cast for John C. Fremont in 1856. He is one of the few men in Sauk county whose Republicanism goes back to the founding of the party. His public service has com- prised nearly every official position in the gift of his neighbors and friends. During the early days he was president and trustee of the village of Baraboo. In 1882 he was elected alderman, and in 1898 be- came mayor of the city. For ten years he was on the county board of supervisors. In 1887 the county elected him to the lower house of the legislature, in which he was appointed chairman of the committee on labor and manufacture. While at the head of that committee he was elected to the state senate in 1889 on the parole system of prisoners, which was carried through and became effective. The service of Mr. Avery in the lower house was during the governship of Jerry Rusk, and he was in the senate while Mr. Hoard occupied the gubernatorial chair. In 1890 Mr. Avery engaged in the insurance business and in that con- nection has also transacted a large amount of administration of estates, his long and honorable business record giving him a place of confidence such as has been well deserved by his long years of integrity and hon- orable dealing. In spite of his age Mr. Avery is still found at his office nearly every day, is hale and hearty, and likes to talk about his early life in Wisconsin and what happened many years ago, when Baraboo was only a village.
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