EARLY SETTLERS (CONTINUED)
Pages 1082-1141
"HISTORY OF WABASHA COUNTY"
Compiled by Dr. L. H. Bunnell
Published Chicago by H. H. Hill, Publishers, 1884
Republished Currently by Higginson Books
Landon & Burchard (page 1083), dealers in drugs, groceries, etc., succeeded A. Y. Felton in the year 1874, under the name of C. O. Landon & Co., in August, 1877, comprising C. O. Landon, C. D. Burdhard and E. S. Case. In August, 1877, C. D. Burchard bought E. S. Case's interest, leaving the firm Landon & Burchard. During the spring of the same year G. C. Landon, son of C. O., entered the business as clerk, and in May 1, 1883, assuming his father's interest, became partner in the firm as it now stands, Landon & Burchard.
Luger Furniture Company (page 1088), office and salesroom on the south side of Main street, three doors from Alleghaney. This business, now conducted as a joint stock company, employing large capital and scores of workmen was started in a very quiet way, by Ferdinand and John Luger, in 1861, at which time they started a small shop, doing hand-work, and supplying the retail trade of this section of the county. From this small beginning the industry has grown, enlarging from year to year as capital increased and demands for good were created, until they have reached their present proportions, and are justly rated the largest furniture manufactory in southern Minnesota. The original shop was located on the east side of Pembroke, just north of the alley between Main and Second streets, and was afterward removed a few doors south of that location, a larger shop built and machinery driven by horse-power employed. From Pembroke street a change was made to Main street, north side, just west of the Wabasha bank, and in this location they remained until 1872, when their present manufactory was built on block 28, original town plat of Wabasha. Ten years afterward, March 15, 1882, the Luger Furniture Company was organized. This is a joint stock concern, capital one hundred thousand dollars, under the following management: president, Ferdinand Luger; secretary and treasurer, F. J. Luger; superintendent, John Luger. The manufactory proper is a three-story frame structure, 35x100 feet, amply supplied with improved machinery for performing their work economically and with dispatch. The engine and boiler house, 24x40 feet, is furnished with an engine of thirty-five horsepower, the fuel for driving which is principally furnished from the refuse of the factory, except during the winter season, when a greater supply of steam is needed for heating purposes. The finishing room is 32x50 and the wareroom 144x32 feet. The business consists in the manufacture of all kinds of common furniture, chairs and bedsteads being their specialties. One of the principal markets for their goods is at Fargo, Dakota, where they have a warehouse and salesroom, for the distribution of their products throughout that section of the northwest. They have also a branch office at Moorhead, in this state. The business at that point is under the management of Ferdinand Luger, president of the company. The number of hands employed at the manufactory is from fifty to sixty, and the value of their manufactured products about two hundred and fifty thousand dollars per annum. Their supplies of hard and soft maple, butternut, oak, elm and basswood are drawn from the valley of the Chippewa. Their walnut is obtained in Iowa. The retail salesroom and office on Main street is 25x60 feet, and they occupy the entire second story of the block, the whole affording forty-five hundred square feet of floor room. The secretary of the company, F. J. Luger, has an office comfortably fitted up in the rear of the salesroom, and the retail department of their business at this point is under his charge.
Plainview Creamery (page 1098). One of the latest business enterprises of the wide awake town of Plainview is the creamery at the west end of the business center. A. Y. Felton, manager and sole owner, started this venture with four teams and two inside factory hands in the spring of 1881, for the making of creamery butter; and in the fall of the same year added his additional interest as dealer in dairy butter and eggs. By careful management and liberal dealings in trade he has been able to increase his number of teams to six, which are employed in the daily hauling of cream from the neighboring farmers. From five to six hundred inches is the average daily collection, and even as high as seven hundred was the return of one single day. For the greater part of the butter here made a ready market is found at reasonably good prices in St. Paul, Minneapolis and the Northwest, the eastern markets receiving the balance. Mr. Felton originally came from Vermont, in 1861, and immediately on his arrival in Plainview clerked for Ozias Willcox, and continued in his employ until 1866. He subsequently succeeded Crowley & Co. in the drug business, which he retained until 1874.
Wabasha Mill Company, owned by J. G. Laurence
whose biography is on this site
Pepin Brewery (page 1117), located in Morres addition to the village of Read's Landing. This property comprises what is generally known as the Burkhardt breweries. The lower one, a frame structure, built by Charles Leslie in 1856; the upper one, a stone building, erected some twenty years since by Michael Ulmer, the whole property coming into possession of the Burkhardts about the time the war (Civil War) closed. Manufacture has been lately confined to the lower brewery, but the location proving too low for the high water of 1883, which flooded their cellars to the depth of eight feet. They are now, August, 1883, fitting up the upper brewery for business, by erecting new dry kilns, and engine and boiler house. This brewery is 40 x 100 feet, three stories, solid stone, and provided with vaults, having a storage capacity of two thousand barrels. The product of their first year's brewage was six hundred barrels; last year, fifteen hundred barrels, an increase over previous year of thirty-three percent. The product of the brewery is marketed at home, little or none being shipped. Their real estate comprises a tract of about twenty-seven acres, on which they have a brick yard of over twenty years' establishment, where they manufacture from two hundred and fifty thousand to three hundred thousand a year. The brewery business employs five hands and two teams, and is steadily increasing. The proprietors are G. & G. Burkhardt.
Jewell & Schmidt (page 1125), hardware, corner of Main and Alleghaney streets. This house is the successor of that established in 1858 by Egbert & Robinson, on the corner of Walnut and Second streets. Mr. Egbert soon afterward became sole proprietor, removed his business to the corner now occupied by Jewell & Schmidt; took in H. M. Dugan as partner, and continued trade until 1867; when he sold out to H. H. Jewell, who, in the previous year, had opened a hardware store near the corner of Main and Pembroke streets. Mr. Jewell consolidated the stocks, at the corner of Main and Alleghaney streets, did business there for one year with Mr. Dugan as partner, then purchased his interest, and as sole proprietor continued trade until November 1, 1882, when he sold out to the present firm and retired from business. Mr. Jewell purchased the lots on which the present structure stands in 1868, but continued business in the old Egbert building until the spring of 1880, when the old frame was removed to the west side of the lot, where it now does duty as a warehouse, and the present hardware house was built. The lot fronts sixty feet on Main street and one hundred and three feet on Alleghaney; the new building has a frontage of twenty-five feet on Main and sixty on Alleghaney, with entrances on both. It is a substantial, ornate, two-story brick, solid stone basement, sills and center-caps. The salesroom 24x60, with an iron and glass front, is well arranged for business; opening into the tinshop in the rear, 20x35 feet; into the iron and nail room, 9x40 feet, and into a broad passageway from which the basement and upper storerooms are reached. The structure cost five thousand dollars, and was completed and occupied September 1, 1880. The basement is used for storage, and the upper story for offices and the rooms of the Ladies' Library Association. The stock of the house embraces a full line of shelf and heavy hardware, iron, steel, nails, tinware, barbed wire and farmers' tools. The tinshop is under the direction of foreman Dieterle, who has been in charge of the manufacturing department during all the firm changes, for the past twenty-nine years. The present firm are H. B. Jewell and Julius Schmidt, and they were both in the employ of the old house of H. H. Jewell for several years before they succeeded to its management.
Hon. P. H. Rahilly; Andrew J. Fowler; G. C. Landon; Andrew J. Taft; Peter Clemens; William H. Warring; Julius Fricke; S. S. Kepler; Haery Burkhardt; D. M. McKenzie; Uriah Whaley; John L. Safford; William Foreman; Hon. Francis W. Knapp; Wesley Kinney; Lucius Kinney; John McBride; Charles W. Smyth; Daniel C. Corwin; Patrick Shields; Ira J. Humphrey; Charles O. Landon; William Janti; William A. Johnson; George Howe; Marcus Morton Inoraham; Frank A. Burdett; J. C. Bartlett; George S. La Rue; George Stratton; Samuel Hall; Hon. William S. Baxter; Christian Umbreit; Willard W. Dean; Richard Bullock; Amos Barnes; Fitz Gerald Slocum; J. G. Laurence; Capt. Daniel Davison; Herman Dieterle; W. S. McArthur; L. & J. Affeld; Alexander Gray; James Gray; Parley Brown; Charles La Rue; James F. Rogers; Van Ransalaer Lee; Frank A. Wells; George Hebbeln; Robert White; James Munro; Jeremiah Baldwin; Peter Gibson; Frederick B. Wahler; Jacob Kopp; George Hibner; John Schmidt; Louis Young; Henry Davis Stocker; Augustus Basey; A. H. Bright; Rev. Nelson Moon; Clements Konnig; Jacob Gengnagle; H. B. Jewell; Julius Schmidt; Ira W. Belden; Henry Schmidt; James H. Emery; Jacob Haessig; Robert R. Gray; Clarence A. Hubbard; Chauncey C. Cornwell; George H. Grannis; Andrew Marshall; James G. Richardson; William D. Angell; Ira Crane; Charles Elwood Crane; James C. Hassinger; David L. Philley; Elam Black; William Wallace Black; Ralph W. Black; Charles A. Arnold; John Megers; John N. Megers; Nicholas J. Majerus; Ira W.Belden; Augustus W. Mathews; Lewis B. Mathews and Jacob Yotta.
