SOURCE:  A history of the northern peninsula of Michigan and its people
Author: Sawyer, Alvah L. (Alvah Littlefield), 1854-1925.
Collection: Michigan County Histories Pages 679-681

Adolph E. GUENSBURG - One of the extensive and ably conducted mercantile establishments that lends materially to the prestige of Menominee as a city of many metropolitan attractions and facilities is the Grand department store, owned and operated by the firm of A. E. & E. Guensburg. The firm handles dry goods, cloaks, millinery, carpets, clothing, furnishing goods, shoes, household goods, etc., and the establishment is one of the most attractive mercantile places in Menominee Valley. Basing their operations upon fair dealing and honorable business methods, the firm has built up a trade of wide scope and importance and its members are among the reliable and progressive business men and popular citizens of this section of the state.

Adolph E. Guensburg, senior member of this firm, was born near the city of Prague, Bohemia, on the 27th of March, 1858, and is a son of Herman and Eleanora (Neuman) Guensburg, both of whom passed the most part of their lives in Bohemia, where the father's vocation was that of a merchant. He whose name initiates this article is indebted to the schools of his native land for his early educational training and at the age of seventeen years he severed the ties that bound him to home and fatherland and emigrated to America, where he believed superior opportunities were afforded for the gaining of independence and definite success through personal effort. He landed in New York city on the 6th of July, 1875, and shortly afterward he came west to Wisconsin and located in the city of Oconto, which was then a village, where he engaged in the manufacture of cigars. He was identified with this line of enterprise about seven months, at the expiration of which he sold his interest to his partner, Joseph Law, and he then removed to Hancock, in the upper peninsula of Michigan, where he secured the position of bookkeeper in a wholesale and retail meat market of Baer Brothers, with which firm he remained for a period of three years. At the expiration of this time he engaged in the produce commission business in the city of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and about six months later, in 1880, he opened a general store at Florence, that state, where he continued in successful business until 1893. Within this interval he also identified himself with other and numerous business interests and for a time had an office in Chicago. He operated particularly in the handling and exploiting of various patent rights. In 1883-93 he devoted much time and attention to the development of iron mining interests in Northern Wisconsin and Michigan and became one of the organizers of the Caledonia Mining Company, of which he was secretary and treasurer. The interests of this corporation were later taken by the Mansfield Mining Company. The properties at present are owned by the Oliver Mining Company. Mr. Guensburg and others located and initiated the Bohemia Exploration, also at the order of the Mansfield Mining Company, in Iron county, Michigan. They were compelled to shut the dam at that point in order to move the machinery across the Michigamme River, and when the river bed was nearly done some men employed at the Caledonia discovered a deposit of iron in the bank of the river on the Caledonia side and the subject of this review was the third to discover the free iron ore, in 1891. Mr. Guensburg was also manager of several other mining companies, operating in Iron and Dickinson counties, Michigan, Florence county, Wisconsin, and in the state of Washington. In addition to the large and well-equipped general store at Florence, Wisconsin, Mr. Guensburg also maintained branch stores at Crystal Falls and Iron River, Michigan. He disposed of the last branch establishments in 1893, in which year he removed to Menominee and established a department store. In 1893 the title of the Grand Department Store was adopted, and in the conducting of the same Mr. Guensburg is associated with his younger brother, Emil, of whom specific mention is made on other pages of this work. This is one of the largest department stores in the entire upper peninsula of Michigan, and its trade is drawn from a wide section of the country normally tributary to the twin cities of Menominee and Marinette. While a resident of Florence, Wisconsin, Mr. Guensburg was a member of the directorate of the Florence State Bank, and was the owner of a large amount of valuable timber land in Florence county, Wisconsin, and in Forest, Gogebic, Houghton and Iron Counties, Michigan. He is at present one of the stockholders in the Menominee River Sugar Company, whose finely equipped plant is located in the city of Menominee. At all times Mr. Guensburg shows a lively interest and is ready to lend his co-operation in the promotion and support of industrial and commercial enterprises that tend to conserve the progress and upbuilding of his home city. He is known as an enterprising business man and essentially loyal citizen and he commands unqualified esteem in the community in which he has elected to center his interests.

Mr. Guensburg was one of the organizers of the Menominee Commercial Club, of which he was the first treasurer, and he is now a member of this fine civic organization. He was the first to be initiated in Florence Lodge, Free and Accepted Masons, at Florence, Wisconsin. He has attained to the thirty-second degree in the Ancient Accepted Scottish Rite Masons, in which he holds membership in Michigan Sovereign Consistory, Sublime Princes of the Royal Secret, in the city of Detroit, where he is also affiliated with Mosleni Temple, Ancient Arabic Order of the Nobles of the Mystic Shrine. In politics he is a staunch Republican.