Winnebago County, Wisconsin - Chapter 47, 1880

Chapter 47

HERE are three banks, the First National, the Union National and the Commercial. The last is not a bank of issue. The average deposits of the First National are $500,000.

Dry Goods Houses

DRY GOODS HOUSES. In nothing has Oshkosh made greater advancement since the fire than in that of enlarging the facilities for the dry goods trade. The magnificent store of Wm. Hill & Co., of which a view is given in this work, is a palace store in finish and proportion. It has a frontage of forty feet and is a hundred and ten in depth. The interior presents a grand and imposing display with its lofty ceiling and r4ch and elaborate finish, and mammoth stock of elegant goods in endless profusion. Carsvvell & Hughes is another splendid establishment, doing an immense business. D. R. Forbes, A. Leach, Josslyn Brothers andj ones Brothers, also make an imposing display. These elegantstores with plate glass windows rival in appearance the finest stores in metropolitan cities. They are divided into departments devoted to the various branches of the trade, and are filled with goods from the basement to the second story. The inducements they hold out to purchasers in quantity, variety and price of goods, draws a large patronage from the suburban towns and villages, and Oshkosh now has the facilities for competing successfully with the larger cities in prices. Every style and quality of dress goods, and fancy and domestic goods are in large stock and sold at the closest figures of the central markets of the trade. There are six stores dealing exclusively in dry goods, and taken collectively they are a credit to the city. The carpet warerooms, especially, are not excelled in the State.

There are four leading millinery and fancy dry goods stores, elegant establishments, carrying large stocks of fashionable goods in great variety.

Clothing Houses Hardware Houses

From an early day Oshkosh has been a great center for the clothing trade for a large stretch of country, and has been famous as the place to buy clothing at the lowest figures. The very best of business men have long been engaged herein that line, and long experience and ample capital has enabled them to ofter their customers the greatest advantages in purchases. They have now enlarged their facilities, and the great number of first-class firms in this city aft"ord a wide range to the purchaser. The most recherche fit and style are made to order; artistic cutters are employed, and all varieties of cloths are held in large stock. The manufacture of clothing in this city is an industry of no small proportions. It furnishes work to a large number and adds greatly to the business of the place. HARDWARE HOUSES.

There are twelve stores under the above head. The large amount of machiner\- running in Oshkosh and in the "Up-River" country has made Oshkosh the center of a large trade in iron and mill-furnishing goods and mill machinery, and there are consequently some heavy houses here, of large capital and with ample facilities for this special trade, and there is not another place of the size of Oshkosh that does a larger business in this line. In hardware, nails, stoves, iron and tin-ware, the business is also large, and the several firms are augmenting their trade.

.BOOT AND SHOE STORES. There are thirteen of these stores, exclusive of the smaller shops. A number of them are large concerns, doing a heavy business, some of them wholesale, with large stock in great variety.

There are sixty odd grocery stores. The leading houses in this line occupy some of the handsomest stores on the street, and which are filled up with large stocks. All the luxuries of the eastern and southern markets, in their season, including fruits, shell-fish and other delicacies, are kept on sale, making a most tempting display. The market gardens of the vicinity also furnish fruits and vegetables.

Drug Stores

The number of these is ten, and there is not to be found in the City more beautiful fronts than those of some of the drug stores which ornament Main Street. These stores are models of elegance in all their appointments.

Music Stores

Two of these, with a large stock of pianos, organs and a general assortment of musical instruments and merchandise. These stores make a fine display of instruments, and are conducted by gentlemen of experience in the trade.

Miscellaneous

Two dealers in brick, lime and stone. This is a large business in Oshkosh. One of those firms. Cook, Brown & Co., docs an annual business of $70,000.

Manufactures Of Oshkosh Foundries And Machine-Shops

FOUNDRIES AND MACHINE-SHOPS. C. C. Paige, John F. Morse, Perry Ransom, Chas. Avery. These establishments manufacture steam engines, circular mills, portable engines, mill machinery and castings of various kinds.

Steam Boiler Works Sash, Door And Blind Factories

SASH, DOOR AND BLIND FACTORIES. Foster & Jones, R. McMillen & Co., Conlee Brothers, G. M. Williamson & Co., J. P. Gould, Hume & Washburn. These large establishments employ, in the aggregate, four hundred and fifty hands.

These factories manufacture yearly 360,000 doors, 700,000 windows and 150,000 pairs of blinds. Their daily capacity is 1,200 doors, 2,500 windows, and 600 pairs of blinds. This is the largest manufacture of doors and windows in any one place in the United States. They also manufacture wood mouldings to the value of $100,000 per annum, and dress large quantities of lumber. The yearly aggregate value of their manufactures is $625,000.

Star Match Works

Parsons, Neville and Goodfellow. Number of hands employed, one hundred; and the force is to be increased when an additional building nowincourse of construction, is completed. This firm commenced fitting up their workslast March, and before six months elapsed they had manufactured over one thousand vehicles. These arc shipped by the car-load to various places where they find a ready sale.

Brick And Lime Works

BRICK AND LIME WORKS. Cook, Brown & Co. employ a large force of men, and run one steamer and a sail vessel of their own in their business, and employ two other sail crafts.

Oskosh Soap Works

OSKOSH SOAP WORKS. J. R. Loper, manufactures a popular brand of soap in large quantities. BREWERIES. There are five of these whose products aggregate a large amount.

Lumber Manufacturers

There are two of these and a large business is done in the building of steamboats, yachts and sail vessels, and in the repairs on the same. LUMBER MANUFACTURERS.

Shingle Manufacturers

The lumber business of Oshkosh is an industry of vast proportions. In prosperous seasons, from a hundred to a hundred and fifty million feet of logs have been manufactured into lumber and shingles. The log crop this year on the - Wolf and its tributaries is esti- mated at one hundred and twenty millions of feet. This will furnish an ample supply for our mills and sash and door factories which are now beginning to recover from the depression that for the past two years has affected all branches of business. The advance in the price of lumber is also stimulating production, and Oshkosh has taken a new start in the race of progress and begins to assume her old-time appearance of business and manufacturing activity.

The prediction that the railroads which are being built into the pine forests would facilitate the production of pine lumber in the upriver country to an extent disastrous to our lumber industry, has proved groundless, for it was soon ascertained by practical experience, which is the best teacher, that the timber can be more profitably manufactured in Oshkosh than in the woods, for many reasons, some of which are that the lumber, when sawed, mustbe moved by rail over the same distance that Oshkosh is from the pineries in transporting it to market, so that if the logs be brought by rail to this place, the lumber is practically moved that distance toward its ultimate market The transportation of the offal, or material wasted in sawing, is no additional expense; for the slabs and even the sawdust have a cash value, and are worth more than the cost of transportation. Another thing, the proximity to machine-shops, affording the best facilities for promptly repairing mill machinery, is a great advantage. Oshkosh, too, has long been the great lumber center of central Wisconsin, and it has its established lines of trade and offers greater inducements to purchasers in quantity and variety, and in the number of mills. Outside purchasers often find it difficult to get long timber, joist, scantling and other dimension stuff. Here they know that they can readily have their orders filled by reliable firms who have every facility. The place also manufactures the largest quantity of doors, sash, blinds and dressed lumber, of any place inthc Northwest. In fact, everything can be furnished for a building from raw material to a cornice - inside finish, brackets, mouldings, etc., all ready to be nailed in their places. Consequently, the purchaser by carloads will go where he can get his whole bill readily filled.

Confidence in the future is shown in the fact that in late j'ears several of the mills which were burnt have been replaced by larger ones, viz: Campbell & Libby 's, Morgan Brothers and Geo. W. Pratt's, just constructed. In passing, attention may be called to the fact that several who have gone from here to other points have been disappointed, and have learned to justly appreciate the local advantages of this place. One of our heavy shingle manufacturers who tried his fortune at another place, was glad to get back and rebuild his shingle mill here, and has since been doing a successful business. It is true that the interests of Oshkosh were criminally neglected by those who ought to have known better than to have looked on while railroads were being built from other points to tap the pineries and cutting off her supplies; but she has awakened from her lethargic indifference and the prize threatening to slip from her grasp has been secured through connection with the Milwaukee,Lake Shore & Western Railroad. This road will be finished early this winter and gives direct connection with the other roads tapping the pineries, thus securing ready access to pine lands remote from dri\'ing streams, and to a new source of supply for our mills and sash and door factories.

The favorable weather of last winter for logging has furnished a large supply of logs and will bring the lumber business here, up to something like its old-time proportions. Other manufactories are being enlarged and new ones established. Oshkosh is therefore started once more on the high road ofprosperity, and the outlook for the future is hopeful.

Importance And Facilities Ofoskosh As A. Manufacturing Center

No place ever obtained a more sudden celebrity as a manufacturing point than Oshkosh, which, from a little obscure village in 1852, with three or four saw-mills, arose in the short space often years, to the distinction of being one of the greatest lumber manufacturi879] ing centers in the Northwest, with twenty odd saw-mills, producing over one hundred million feet of lumber per annum - sufficient with her shingles, sash and doors, to load fifteen thousand railroad cars, and aggregating, with the lumber products, a value of over two million dollars.

This immense business and that incidental to it, the manufacture and repairing of steam machinery, the building of steam tugboats, the shipping of lumber, the manufacture of sash, doors and dressed lumber, the products of the iron foundries, and machine shops, the traffic of the resident population, and the farming community, and the trade and travel by railroad and steamboat lines, have made Oshkosh the liveliest center in the state outside of Milwaukee.

The din of the machinery of her mills and factories, with their sixty steam engines, the steamboats and sail craft plying the lakes and rivers, the long lines of railroad trains bearing abroad the products of her manufactures, and her crowded thoroughfares, combine in a scene of business life and activity that is no where surpassed in this country by any city of its size.

The first branch of manufacturing here was naturally that of pine lumber, and the machinery incident to its production. The unsurpassed facilities for remunerative business in that line rapidly absorbed the chief capital of a new community like that of Oshkosh, to the exclusion of other manufactures; but it has created a wealth here, and established a manufacturing prestige of success and practical experience that must ensure confidence in entering the new fields of manufacturing enterprise that are now awaiting her occupancy. The first work in her destiny was to make available the immense pine lumber resources. This work has been partially accomplished, and now a step in advance is marked by the greatly increased manufactures of sash and doors, which has become the leading branch of our industries. Glazed sash is another, which, from a small beginning, is rapidly developing into importance.

Oshkosh has the most ample resources and enduring facilities, for manufactures of hardwood material. Her proximity to the source of supply, with her central location, and the great market ground of the rich agricultural territory, which stretches from here away to the south, and west, gives local advantages which promise the most hopeful manufacturing future for this city.