The Lost Brewery of Chippewa Falls

Breweries often figure prominently in the history of our communities, especially in places like Wisconsin.  Sometimes the history is easily seen.  Breweries were often substantial both in physical structures and in the impact they had on their towns and cities.  A few hardy survivors are still in operation in their original versions.  

But sometimes the history of a brewery can be elusive.  

Consider Chippewa Falls, Wisconsin.

Of course everyone knows about Leinenkugels.  And if you are any kind of a local history buff at least the basics of the enigmatic F.X. Schmidmeyer brewery are known to you.  But what about the third brewery?   

It was while going back over the Schmidmeyer story, sifting for any additional scraps of info that I ran across a few brief mentions of what I have come to consider "The Lost Brewery".

My first hint was this brief item in the Chippewa Falls Herald from May 29th, 1872.

"The Spring Street bridge across Duncan Creek is now in a passable condition.  It leadeth to Messers. Mitchell and Ming's brewery and hence is likely traveled considerably."

But in the very same edition we find this notice:

"Dissolving partnership known as The Union Brewery Compay.  Mr. Busselman withdraws.  John P. Mitchell and M.J. Cummings carry on."

Another notice turns up in the December 10, 1873 edition of the same publication:

"DISSOLUTION NOTICE. The partnership heretofore existing between Peter Mairet and Fred Schmidt in the Brewery business is this day dissolved by mutual consent.  Mr. Schmidt will pay all debts and collect the bills due."

Although the location is not mentioned and the names have changed, this is the same brewery mentioned the year before.  The link that connects them was this brief note in the Chippewa Herald on November 14, 1873:

"The brewery on Spring street across Duncan Creek is now open and manufacturing beer.  Peter Mairet and ________ Smith are proprietors."

This of course was just a month before the announcement that the business had gone under.

Lets start with a picture, presumably of the brewery.  It is from an 1874 Illustrated View of Chippewa Falls.  Just over the Spring Street bridge we find...

The structure marked with the red arrow sure looks like a brewery.  It is built into the hillside where there was likely a storage cave.  And it has the typical multi story configuration breweries found useful; letting gravity do much of the work of shifting raw materials in the manufacturing process.  It is unidentified on this map.

So what to make of this?

Oddly you sometimes find that failed enterprises leave a wealth of information behind.  Bankruptcy proceedings, legal wranglings with all their juicy paperwork. But what little I have been able to figure out so far on the "Mitchell and Ming" brewery is as follows.

"Ming" has to be a chummy nick name for Cummings, specifically Matthew J. Cummings.  He was from Ireland, an early businessman who helped build the Catholic Church that loomed (judgmentally?) on the hill above the brewery site.  He also had a planing mill across the creek from the brewery until it washed away in a huge flood in 1884.

Herr Busselman, who dropped out in 1872, was a certain Louis Busselman.  He is listed in the 1870 census as being 42 years old, born in Baden Germany, and having the occupation of "brewer".  It seems possible that the Union brewery arose from an earlier, small scale brewery run by Busselman.  But it could be that he was a brewer in the employ of one of the other two establishments in town.  Names seem to come and go with puzzling frequency in the early brewing industry.  Busselman lived on the site, an 1878 news clipping mentions a fire at his house on Spring Street, across Duncan creek.  I think this defines Busselman as the brewmaster - living on the premises being the norm - and is a point in favor of an earlier starting date for the enterprise.

John P. Mitchell sounds to me like more of an investing partner.  His occupation is listed as "bookkeeper". He came to town early, in the 1850s.  His historical legacy is mostly how often he got elected to various local offices.  County Clerk, Sheriff, etc.

Of Mr. Mairet and Mr. Fred Schmidt I have found little.  Neither seems to have been around for long.  Mairet is not a common name.  So the brief mention I found of a Peter Mairet being married to Luitgarde Schmidt is almost certainly our guy.  I suspect he may have been a Schmidt in law and if so lets hope that union went better than the Union brewery!

I think that was the end of the line for the Union Brewery.  An 1874 City Directory does list "Smith and Son" as brewers on Spring Street.  Smith being the English version of Schmidt it is likely the same guy.  Could the son have been a son in law?  But as to evidence that this was still a going concern at this point I have found nothing.

The site today, standing on the east end of the Spring street bridge.  It is an apartment complex for old folks.  I have of course examined the hill behind and can see no trace of brewery foundations or a storage cave.

So farewell to the Union Brewery, that faltered and failed in the early 1870's.  They may have only brewed a few batches of beer.  

So what went wrong?  

It was a competitive marketplace they were entering.  It is not always best to be the first on the scene, as the declining fortunes of Schmidmeyer and the rising ones of Leinenkugel's proved.  But being third is probably not good.  

And the site was problematic, prone to flooding.  In fact I suspect one reason there are so few signs of earlier structures here is that enthusiastic flood control efforts have raised the ground level.  And of course the usual suspects...under capitalization, production problems, perhaps they had one of the damaging fires that were so typical of the industry.  It is worth mentioning that the fall of 1873 is remembered for a Financial Panic that hit just as the Union Brewery was starting or perhaps restarting production.

You could ask I suppose, why I bother with a detailed history of a forgotten, failed brewery from long ago.  Well, somebody had to do it!  And besides, our heritage is not just a victory parade of those who march proudly into the history books.  For every such laurel crowned titan of local industry there were likely a dozen who gave it their best shot and then vanished from the public eye.  Let's remember them too.

Which will lead me to an even more enigmatic business just a few hundred yards downstream......