[organ music]
ANNOUNCER: The year, about 1840; the place, St. Louis, Prairie du Chien, or
another Mississippi river port; the person, a river man, a traveler, a Marco Polo of the Mississippi and its headwaters.[waterfall sound]
TRAVELER: Now you listen to me. I know what I am talking about. I've been there.
There ain't no better spot in the world for a sawmill. Three rivers to float your logs and, and, and, trees? Trees, man, bigger than a stack on end. Both banks just waiting to be cut off and rolled in. Man, there are so many trees spittin' distance from the banks of them rivers, you could keep a double mill going two years without a team of horses. And, and, and if you wondered about water power, man, you will stop wondering long before you get there. You can hear them falls a half mile away. You'd think it was coming down Rib Hill. 00:01:00That's how the town got its name, from the falls. Big Bull Falls, they call it, after the noise. But even before you hear the falls, you will see Rib Hill. Man, she really sticks up proud like. No matter where you are, if you are looking at Rib Hill, you are looking up at plenty. And right aside the hill is Big Bull Falls, at least like they call it now. It wouldn't surprise me none if it was changed before you got up there. Last time up, I heard some folks call it Wausau.[organ music]
ANNOUNCER: This is Wisconsin Profiles, the recorded series brought to you on
alternate weeks at this time by the Wisconsin College of the Air. Here is your narrator, Ray Stanley.STANLEY: In the profile of Wausau, we are combining the two techniques used thus
far in the series. First, with the help of the Radio Hall Players and the tape recorder, we will reconstruct a few scenes from Wausau's past, letting people 00:02:00from the past tell their stories as they might have told them if confronted with a microphone. Secondly, we will bring you up to date by introducing you to people from the Wausau of the present, people whose voices have been recorded for this program by a state station documentary team. One of the things we generally try to do in a community profile is to highlight the aspects which make that community different from other Wisconsin communities. But we've found that nearly all northern communities have in common something so important that it cannot be ignored. That something is the ghost of the great pine forests. The histories of most northern towns up to a certain point are merely paragraphs, or a page in the history of the lumber industry. But from that point, the histories diverge in ways which come to light when you ask the question, "Why didn't this town collapse when the lumber industry disappeared?" Our program, then, will 00:03:00attempt to do three things: to show how a few important trends got started in Wausau; to bring you some of the flavor of the lumber years; and to reveal why Wausau remained prosperous after the lumber years were over.[organ music]
[sounds of a saw mill]
VOGELMAN: We are standing now in a sawmill operated by Mr. George Stevens on the
east bank of the Wisconsin River at Big Bull Falls. Would you tell us, Mr. Stevens, how many years you have been living here?STEVENS: Oh, it's only five years now. Didn't come here until 1839.
VOGELMAN: 1839, and what was the population of Big Bull Falls at that time?
STEVENS: Well, as a matter of fact, there was no population at all. At least,
00:04:00nobody who lived here all the year round. Even for another year after that, there wasn't anybody here except me and the fellows working for me.VOGELMAN: It was pretty much of a one-man town then, wasn't it?
STEVENS: Oh, I guess you might say so, yes, but I never really thought of it
that way, because I knew there would be more people coming in most any time.VOGELMAN: I see. Well, that leads us to something we are always interested in
learning in the different communities we've visited; namely, what brings people to a community? Why did you come here, Mr. Stevens?STEVENS: Oh, I think, I think nearly everybody here would have about the same
answer to that question. They were talked into it by somebody who lived here or travelled through here. Now me, for instance, I happened to meet a fellow in St. Louis, by the name of Wakely, run a trading post for a while on the river south of here. I was just in from New York, and Wakely was fresh down with a lumber shipment from a mill near his post. Now, he 00:05:00told me about Big Bull Falls. It sounded so good, I came up to take a look and decided to settle down.VOGELMAN: I see. Yes, but what I was getting at was, what are the physical
characteristics of the locality that make it an ideal place to settle down?STEVENS: Oh, it was of course the timber, the pine, and, well, many other things
too. It was a combination of things here that made it perfect. Plenty of water power, and then these three rivers here. You see, we have the Big Rib and the Eau Claire coming into the Wisconsin right here, and that gives you more territory to choose from, where you can cut right near the banks. You don't have the problem of getting the logs to the water. Getting back to the business of talking people into coming here. Just got three fellows from St. Louis to come up here. I expect they will pass the word farther along, and before you know it, one of these days we will have ourselves a city. 00:06:00[organ music]
STANLEY: George Stevens, who founded both Wausau and Stevens Point, is also
credited with launching Wausau's first era of industrial development: the lumber era. The lumber story is familiar to nearly everyone in Wisconsin. It is a story filled with colorful men of ruggedness and riches. And a story seldom free from accusations of short-sighted exploitation. But more about that in the second part of our program, when we will examine the lumber era from a twentieth-century perspective, and see what took place in Wausau when the pine forests were gone. Meanwhile, we will pick up the threads of other developments woven hesitantly into years dominated by the lumber industry. One of these threads, although it existed earlier, made its first appearance in 1867. A man named August Kickbusch was responsible. 00:07:00KICKBUSCH: Nein, nein, these men are not lumberjack. These men do not come all
the way from Germany just to cut trees. No, to cut trees, ja, but only to clear the land to get money for buying horses and plows. Once the land is cleared, and the sun can shine on something besides the tops of trees, then they grow crops of things to eat.VOGELMAN: Of the people you brought with you from Germany, Mr. Kickbusch, are
they all farmers?KICKBUSCH: Ja, ja, most of them are.
VOGELMAN: Well, then it would seem to me that they would choose another part of
the country where difficulties in clearing the land are not as great.KICKBUSCH: Oh, nein, nein, my friend, it is here they are needed. Men
always do better where they are needed. Here, there is opportunity to get money right away by selling logs, and they can work in lumber camps in the winter to get money until the farm is a success. Oh, this is the best place for them, the best, even the land, the--how you say it--the climate, is much like they are 00:08:00used to in the Vaterland.VOGELMAN: Speaking of Germany, I understand you got into trouble with Bismarck
on your last trip over. Would you care to tell us about that?KICKBUSCH: Ah, ja, I am no longer welcome in Germany. The emperor does not take
it kindly when I take seven hundred people away to America. He said to me, to leave, get out, stay out.VOGELMAN: Do you plan to make another trip in spite of his warning?
KICKBUSCH: Oh no, not me. The emperor says that he means--how you say it, he means--
VOGELMAN: He means business?
KICKBUSCH: Ja, ja, ja, ja, the emperor says that he means business. It does not
matter. Others will go that he does not suspect. I'm too busy for travel anyway. And I accomplished already my purpose.[organ music]
STANLEY: August Kickbusch accomplished his purpose, and in doing so made 1867
00:09:00one of the most important years in Marathon County history. For these German farmers were the first to make farming a successful enterprise in the county. They led the way in an occupation which eventually was to surpass the lumber industry in economic importance to Wausau. More about farming later in the program. It may have been about this same time that another type of farming got underway in the Wausau area--a type far more specialized and more unique.TRAPPER: You take this old barrel, here, it's all you need.
VOGELMAN: I see, but what I really wanted to talk with you about--
TRAPPER: Holds water. Old flour barrel will do.
VOGELMAN: Now, I wonder if you would care to say something about--
TRAPPER: You put some water in it.
VOGELMAN: Some water?
TRAPPER: Oh, about a foot maybe.
VOGELMAN: Put water in an old flour barrel? What is all this supposed to--
TRAPPER: Of course, that all depends on what size rocks you got--size rock--if
you got a big rock, you need more water. Rock's got to stick up out of the 00:10:00water. Hmmm, just a little, enough for one rat to sit on.VOGELMAN: Rat?
TRAPPER: Yeah, just one rat, and then you go to the top of the barrel and there
you got a hole. You follow me?VOGELMAN: I'm at the top of the barrel.
TRAPPER: That's right. In a hole the size of a mess plate. Like they use in the
logging camps, can't buy them, but I reckon you can swipe one easy enough. Get a job and quit, take the plate with you.VOGELMAN: Of course.
TRAPPER: Now, you make a little hole on each side, put a wire through the hole--
VOGELMAN: Yes.
TRAPPER: Screen across the hole--
VOGELMAN: The hole in the barrel?
TRAPPER: Yes, so it swings back and forth on the wire. It stays level with the
top of the barrel when it ain't swinging.VOGELMAN: I see.
TRAPPER: Then you bait it.
VOGELMAN: What?
TRAPPER: You put some bait in the middle of it.
VOGELMAN: This is for the rat?
TRAPPER: And maybe a plank alongside for him to crawl up on. You make it easy
for him there, you see. Then that rat comes along, goes for the bait, and the plate turns around and ka-splop! You know what he does then? 00:11:00VOGELMAN: Well, I suppose--
TRAPPER: He sets on the rock, wants to dry off. Then another one goes for the
bait and ker-splop! You know what he does?VOGELMAN: Ker-splop?
TRAPPER: He fights with the other rat for the rock. Wants to sit there hisself.
The fight gets noisy, you see, and the rest of the rats get curious. They all want to see a good fight. By this time you don't need no bait. They come to see the fight, and in they go, ker-splop. Only one can set on that rock, see, so the rest of them all drown. Wipe out the whole colony in one night.VOGELMAN: Except for the big one on the rock, I suppose. What do you do to him?
TRAPPER: Don't know. Never thought of that. Reckon I'd just add some water and
let her set a while.VOGELMAN: Well, that sounds like a pretty good idea. Are there many rats in Wausau?
TRAPPER: Well now, I don't know. I suppose there are, of course, but I haven't
00:12:00heard of any. I haven't seen any.VOGELMAN: Have you ever seen a rat in Wausau?
TRAPPER: By jeepers, come to think of it, I ain't.
VOGELMAN: But anyway, you've got quite a reputation around here for your ideas
in trapping, and for your mink and fox raising. As far as we know, you are the first person in this area to produce fur by farming, so to speak. Would you tell us how you happened to get started fur farming?TRAPPER: For rats?
VOGELMAN: No, well, we don't have very much more time and I think it is rather
important. This business you started, won't you say a few words just how you happened to start fur farming?TRAPPER: Well, when I was a young feller, I used to do a good bit of trapping,
and I just didn't trap in a trap like some folks.VOGELMAN: No?
TRAPPER: I did some thinking about trapping.
VOGELMAN: Oh yeah, so I gathered.
TRAPPER: I was having trouble with mink, losing 'em. Steel trap hurt 'em so
much, they chewed their legs off to get away. So I said to myself, why don't I 00:13:00fix it so as it holds them, but don't hurt 'em. So I ups the size of the trap, and I wraps the jaws, used an old shirt, you see. Well it held them, and they didn't chew their legs off no more. Then one time for the fun of it, I tries the same thing on fox. And what do you know! One morning I finds a young she-fox, just a setting there looking at me sweet like, trap not bothering her at all. I walks right up to her and she don't yip, don't snarl, don't do nothing.VOGELMAN: Hm!
TRAPPER: Pats her on the head, she just whines. [makes whining sounds] Like
that, see.VOGELMAN: Mm hmm.
TRAPPER: What can I do? Can't bust her in the head when she does like that. So I
takes her home. You know what?VOGELMAN: What?
TRAPPER: One month later--little foxes.
VOGELMAN: And that's how you got started?
TRAPPER: Yeah, five of 'em, cute as pie. That got me started. Pretty soon I was
growing mink, too. Now I'm set. Why should a feller run his fool head off 00:14:00trapping out in the woods, when he can grow 'em in his own back yard?[organ music]
STANLEY: The preceding episode does not necessarily have any foundation in fact,
but that might be how fur farming got started. We know it did start, and it did grow to become an important part of Wausau's rural economy; an important part of the nation's fur economy. We will follow up on that later on in the program, and that, incidentally, is where Soviet Russia will get into the act. In our next episode, we will pick up the beginnings of an industry which is more truly unique to Wausau than anything else we touch upon in the program. The year is 1875.[organ music]
VOGELMAN: We are talking now with Mr. L. S. Cohn, one of the pioneer lumbermen
00:15:00in the Wausau area. According to what many people have told us, Mr. Cohn, you're branching out a little from lumbering. Would you tell us something about your new plans?COHN: New plans, huh? Well, I don't know. I think they got mighty old since
yesterday. They practically died a natural death.VOGELMAN: I'm not sure I follow you on that. You mean you are closing up your quarry?
COHN: Well, actually, I never got started. I did a little blasting, but only to
make sure the vein was only more than just a few feet deep.VOGELMAN: And it wasn't?
COHN: Oh yes, it was. It went down twenty feet and there was no apparent end.
Then I made the mistake of consulting the experts. This little sample here, this sample from the quarry I sent to Mark and Company in Joliet, Illinois. Supposed to know all there is to know about granite, and I got it back yesterday with word that, well, nothing good.VOGELMAN: You mean the granite?
COHN: Well, the granite is good all right. In fact, it is too good in their
opinion, so good that I can't possibly hope to find a workable vein. It is the 00:16:00best granite they have ever seen, and for that reason they think I can't hope to find a workable vein.VOGELMAN: But the fact that you have gone down--
COHN: That doesn't prove a thing, actually. To be worthwhile it should go
100-200 feet anyway.VOGELMAN: Then you are going to drop the project.
COHN: No, I'm afraid I'm not going to drop it. I will be taking a chance, but
with the lumber supply running out, we got to take chances.VOGELMAN: Lumber supply running out? Well, that's an unusual attitude. The
general opinion around here seems to be that the timber is inexhaustible.COHN: Well, we are cheating ourselves out of a future if we think that. The easy
lumbering around here is done with already. We are pushing back farther every year. I've got logs coming in from places I've never seen right now. Give us another twenty years, maybe more, and then we've to start--rather, we've got to start right now looking for other things to do. Otherwise, when the pine is gone, Wausau will go too. That is why I'm taking a chance with granite. Other people will have to do the same sort of thing, or before they know it, there won't be any Wausau.[organ music]
00:17:00STANLEY: Mr. L. S. Cohn started two important trends when he ignored the opinion
of experts and opened the granite quarry--he started the trend away from lumbering toward more stable industries, and he started the utilization of what was to prove one of Marathon County's most abundant resources. We will follow up on that later when we meet the manager of one of America's leading granite monument plants. For our next episode, we move forward in time twenty-five years to March 31, 1900, a date which marks another turning point away from the lumber industry.[sound of newspaper presses]
VOGELMAN: We are speaking to you now from the plant of the Central Wisconsin,
Wausau's first newspaper. Standing beside us is Mr. R. H. Johnson, editor and publisher. We came here to talk about newspapers, but we found that everyone 00:18:00seems to be excited about something else. In the background we can hear the printing press, but it seems that this particular sound is considerably more important today than it has ever been previously in Wausau. Mr. Johnson, would you tell us what makes the difference?JOHNSON: Yes, wouldn't it be all right if you just read it from the paper here?
We've got it all written up.VOGELMAN: But we'd like to hear it from you. Why don't you read it to us? Here,
let's see. If you just read us this first paragraph here. Would you do that?JOHNSON: I suppose so, if that is what you want. The Central this week comes to
its readers printed on paper manufactured by the Wausau Paper Mills Company, the first product of its mammoth plants. The completion of these splendid paper mills is worthy of more than a passing mention, as it is one of the most 00:19:00important of Wausau's industries, and marks the opening of a new era of development.VOGELMAN: And, why, in your opinion, is the opening of Wausau's paper mill so
important to the city?JOHNSON: Well, it's--we are about past our peak in lumbering now, you know. I
think we hit our peak here a few years ago. There are more mills now, but they're not turning out as much lumber. It's costing a good deal more to produce it. They have to go farther for good stands, but for this, for paper, there is plenty of pulp wood right around here.VOGELMAN: Does it seem to you then, that paper manufacturing will eventually
replace lumbering In Wausau?JOHNSON: I think so, yes. There is plenty of water power here, and as I was
saying, there is plenty of pulp wood for many years. When the lumbermen went through, they didn't hurt the pulp wood, and well, if we do run out, railroad 00:20:00transportation will be good enough so we can always branch out for supplies.VOGELMAN: You think paper is here to stay then?
JOHNSON: Yes, I think it is. Lumbering might be about over but I think paper is
here to stay.[organ music]
STANLEY: Paper was here to stay. And it turned out to be the most important of
the industries to replace lumber. A few years after the episode announced so proudly in the Central Wisconsin, the Marathon Paper Mills were established, eventually to become one of Wisconsin's leading papermakers. Later on we'll meet Mr. D. C. Everest, president of the Marathon Corporation. The next episode has to do with the growing up of a hill, and its coming of age as Wisconsin's only 00:21:00mountain. The year is 1921, the year Wausau's Kiwanis Club was organized.[general chatter]
VOGELMAN: The Kiwanis have formally decided on their first project, a decision
which may someday be of very great importance to the people of Wausau. As you know, excuse me sir, excuse me for intercepting you this way, but we would like to get your reaction to the plan adopted here tonight. Would you care to--KIWANIAN: Why don't you ask someone who voted for it. There's plenty of 'em. Ask
Parker, it's his idea, not mine certainly.VOGELMAN: Oh, oh yes. I beg your pardon.
KIWANIAN: No, I'm sorry. I didn't mean that. Please disregard what I just said.
You've discovered, I guess, that I don't favor the project. I didn't mean to put it quite so--I didn't mean to be so angry about it.VOGELMAN: That's all right.
KIWANIAN: If you care to go ahead, I think I can be sane about it.
VOGELMAN: We just wanted to get, in the words of a member of the club, a few of
00:22:00the details concerning your purchase of land on Rib Hill, and your plans--what you plan to do with it.KIWANIAN: Rib Hill? It isn't Rib Hill anymore, you know. It's become a mountain.
It hasn't grown an inch in a million years, and by calling it a mountain it becomes a mountain. There I go again, excuse me. Yeah, we did purchase some land on top of the--VOGELMAN: Mountain?
KIWANIAN: Mountain. And we bought from the Gensman estate, three forties and
they donated a forty, so the Kiwanis Club now owns a hundred sixty acres of the most inaccessible land in Marathon County.VOGELMAN: But you have the highest point in the state of Wisconsin.
KIWANIAN: Yes, I suppose we do. That hasn't been actually
proven yet, but I suppose it's the highest.VOGELMAN: What does the Club plan to do with the land?
KIWANIAN: What can we do with it? That was my contention all along. You can't
get to the place. Find only two men--two men, mind you--who have ever been to the top.VOGELMAN: There are no plans for building a road then?
KIWANIAN: Road! We don't even have enough in our treasury to buy three forties,
00:23:00and now the whole thing is completely worthless. It was all done for the sake of something to do, something to keep us together, they say. A project for the sake of a project. One hundred sixty acres of worthless land.[organ music]
STANLEY: The angry Kiwanian in the preceding episode was purely fictitious. We
know only that there was opposition to Charles Parker's plan, and we presented the story through an antagonist instead of a protagonist. You would have a hard time finding the antagonist now. The Kiwanis, the whole city of Wausau, for that matter, is mighty proud of Rib Mountain. Charles Parker was president of the Club in 1921, when the land was purchased. He is still living in Wausau, and a little later we will hear from him what happened to the land. As you've probably noticed, our program up to now has been devoted to showing how things got 00:24:00started in Wausau, to depicting turning points in Wausau's history. Well, this is a turning point in our program. This is where we go back to pick up some loose ends.[organ music]
STANLEY: One of the responsibilities we delegated to this part of the program
was to look back on the lumber exploitation from a twentieth-century perspective. Listen now to an expert in the industrial uses of wood. Mr. D. C. Everest, president of the Marathon Corporation, one of Wisconsin's leading manufacturers of paper.EVEREST: Lumbermen of the nineteenth century have been constantly criticized for
what some termed 'the devastation of the forest." Too many people view what was done in the 1800s in the light of present-day developments. When one stops to 00:25:00think of bringing logs to Wausau to be sawn, and then floating the resulting lumber down the Wisconsin and Mississippi Rivers to such points as St. Louis, there to be sold in the highly competitive market, to people born in the east and Midwest who knew good lumber, you can readily realize that a lumberman could only afford to cut the highest quality of lumber that trees in the forest would produce. Unless one wanted to commit commercial suicide, there was absolutely no sense at the time of attempting to utilize all of the trees, or all of any one tree, which grew in the forest. It was all a part of the economy of the country at the time these men were operating. The long life of the structures built from 00:26:00this selected cutting of quality timber is mute testimony of the soundness of the philosophy of that era.STANLEY: But regardless of the soundness of the lumbering philosophy, many
Wisconsin towns collapsed when the lumbermen were gone. Here, Mr. Everest gives one reason why Wausau didn't do likewise.EVEREST: The thing which kept Wausau in its forward position, and also kept it
from becoming a ghost town as did so many villages built up in the same way, was the fact that the men who had made some money in lumbering were content to remain in Wausau and invest their money in new enterprises, which were also based on the utilization of wood. Paper mills, veneer plants, box plants, sash and door plants and many others, using wood in various forms as a raw material, 00:27:00have superceded the sawmill.STANLEY: The wood-using industries which replaced the sawmill now provide about
half of Wausau's jobs, so the community's future is as closely tied up with wood now as it was in the 1800's. Listen as Mr. Everest describes a few of the factors which assure the future of Wausau's wood-using industries,EVEREST: Today there is almost complete utilization of all species of trees
grown in the forest. Research laboratories are constantly at work on the further utilization of everything the soils of the forest area will produce. Concurrent with this effort, there are innumerable agencies working to rehabilitate the forests of Wisconsin. Federal, state, county, schools and private agencies are doing a wonderful job along this line. Wausau, 00:28:00while it has many industries which contribute greatly to its economic life, will continue its main dependence on wood, the supply of which I now feel is assured. It will come about through the adoption of good forest practices and the treating of timber as a crop, as God intended it to be.[organ music]
STANLEY: Unlike so many lumber areas, especially those farther north, Marathon
County was blessed with some of the best farm land in the state. Earlier on the program, we mentioned the German immigrants who found the county to their liking, and showed the way for other prospective farmers by making a success of 00:29:00the business. They formed a nucleus which multiplied, and now Marathon County ranks first in the United States in the production of American-type cheese and third in the number of milk cows. The first county, incidentally, is Los Angeles, and Wisconsin's Dane County is second. But a more specialized type of farming, and one more unique to Marathon County, is fur farming. Since World War II, the fur growing business has perhaps undergone a more drastic change than any other business in the county. But the change is felt little outside of the business itself. Ten years ago fox was the most lucrative item for most growers. But talk about fox to the fur farmer of today, and the answer would be something like this:BYRON: Well, fox, of course, is more or less a dead issue right now, as far as
fur farming is concerned. We are just lying in wait till it comes back. And mink 00:30:00right now is the most popular fur, and one that is being raised more so than any other one. Fox is just not profitable for the last four, five years.STANLEY: That was Art Byron, who runs a farm at Schofield, just outside of
Wausau. Through the window of the room where Mr. Beyer's voice was recorded, we could see $150,000 worth of pens, empty. This is why they are empty.BYRON: Right after the war the Russians shipped in a tremendous amount
[recording drops out] It broke the fur market in the United States. I don't have the figures [recording drops out], but it was, I believe, over half a million dollars' worth, so you see what that does to our domestic market. 00:31:00STANLEY: Current developments are likely to instill a good deal of bitterness in
the man who finds himself in economic competition with Russia.BYRON: I don't know just why we buy Russian furs, give them dollars and change
in order that someday they can sell it back to us, or lend, or steal or whatever they are going to do. [unintelligible] I believe if you will look at the statistics on it, that over twenty-five percent of their dollar exchange is realized through selling furs to the United States. And the thing is, the Russians, Russia used to be one of the best markets for the luxury furs, that 00:32:00is, real high-priced good furs. But today you can't sell any in Russia. They export them all and they are all produced on state slave labor, so it is kinda tough competition for the fur farmer here who wants to compete with them.STANLEY: Marathon County fur growers have found that mink is the best answer to
foreign competition, so that's where they are directing their efforts. Now, Marathon County is the leading fur growing county in Wisconsin, and Wisconsin furnishes seventy percent of the nation's farm-raised furs.[organ music]
STANLEY: We heard a few minutes ago that one of the reasons for Wausau's
continued prosperity after the decline of lumbering was the reinvestment of lumber profits in other wood-using ventures. But the lumbermen got even farther from their field in some investment, a notable example being L. S. Cohn, who 00:33:00started that granite industry on lumber money. That was in 1875. In 1949, Marathon County Granite Company totaled sales of $1,500,000. We talked with Mr. Hjalmer Olson, secretary and general manager, of the Anderson Brothers and Johnson Company, and asked a leading question: "Why are you located in Wausau?"OLSON: Well, the reason we are located here is because, of course, we are so
close to the granite which is located in Marathon County, and of course, there isn't any other granite in the world any place that can compare with Marathon County's granite.STANLEY: The most convincing testimonial to the quality of Marathon County's
granite comes from a competitor in Canada, a company which boasts of having granite similar to Wausau red granite. Monument dealers buy almost the entire output of the Marathon County quarries. Hardly any of it is used for building. 00:34:00However, another type of Marathon County rock goes into the building industry at the rate of about four hundred thousand tons annually. The company sending it out is the Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing Company. From the quarry at Brokaw, a few miles north of Wausau, they take a rock called graywacke, grind it into small granules which are colored, and sold to manufacturers of asphalt roofing. These granules provide both color and protection for asphalt shingles. Chances are no matter where you live in America, if you have asphalt roofing, you have a little of Marathon County over your head.CANNONAN: To give you some idea of the magnitude of this business, in 1950, we
expect to produce approximately four hundred thousand tons of roofing granules. If you would put all the tonnage into one pile, it would make a pile about a 00:35:00thousand feet in diameter and about three hundred and seventy feet high. Or it would cover approximately one million and a half homes with new roofs. Also, this tonnage, if moved all at one time, would take two hundred and fifty trainloads in eight thousand boxcars. Or it would make a more graphic statement if we took these roofing panels and laid them end to end, it would make a path to the sun and back again, and you would have enough left over to make a path around the earth six hundred times. To come back to earth, we make a lot of roofing panels here in Wausau. 00:36:00STANLEY: That was Mr. Rod Cannonan, branch manager of the Minnesota Mining and
Manufacturing Company. The statistics he gave you might by their very magnitude suggest the fate like the one covered by lumber. We hinted as much to Mr. Cannonan. This was his reply.CANNONAN: Well, we have, as far as the rock is concerned, we have in the
neighborhood of at least a hundred years' rock uncovered, at the present rate of operation, and there is no question in my mind that we could double that if we wanted to.STANLEY: Parts of Marathon County are being scattered all over the nation by the
monument and roofing granules industries. But there is another rock, Marathon County's most prominent rock, that stays behind. Instead of being shipped out to people in other parts of the county, people migrate to the rock. That rock, of course, is Rib Mountain, Wisconsin's highest point. A few minutes ago, we heard 00:37:00how the newly organized Kiwanis Club, under the leadership of Charles Parker, bought four forties of land on top of the mountain. Listen now as Charles Parker, a retired banker, tells what happened to the land bought in 1921.PARKER: After we had acquired this site, the question then arose of what use
could be made of it. About that time, the thought occurred to us if we could get the state to take over our proposition, that eventually would develop along the lines of getting a road which the public could use, and it would become a local picnic grounds. The time came, we did deed our interest to the state, with the 00:38:00provision that a road would be constructed to the summit that could be travelled by the ordinary automobile. I think Rib Mountain is now nationally known, since these developments, which have followed later primarily through the efforts of our local Chamber of Commerce, they have now established a ski slide, and they do have participation coming from many other states around us.STANLEY: That was Charles Parker. And it was Walter Roehl, secretary of the
Wausau Chamber of Commerce, who in 1935 secured aid from the National Park Service and the Wisconsin Conservation Department, to make Rib Mountain a winter 00:39:00sports center. The responsibility for winter sports promotion has now gone to Raymond Bohl, assistant secretary, who now describes what Rib Mountain has to offer.BOHL: Well, the facilities of Rib Mountain include seven ski trails, varying in
length from six hundred feet and one goes close to a mile; that's from the top down to the chill house. Every one is designed to take care of the intermediate, as well as the professional. On the average, we would say that we get a little over ten thousand out-of-town skiers in here every winter. Probably that's a modest figure, but that would take care of our season, which runs usually from December 15 to March 15. And we averaged roughly a thousand skiers for Saturday, and a thousand skiers for Sunday. 00:40:00STANLEY: Ray Bohl's job of promotion involves more than persuading people to
come to Rib Mountain. It involves telling them when to come and when not to come, in terms of ski slide conditions.BOHL: The Chamber of Commerce issues a weekly snow report that's mailed to all
skiers, ski clubs, department stores, railroad stations, radio stations, newspapers and so forth. The report is mailed each Wednesday from our office, and it contains information as to the exact snow conditions at Rib Mountain at that time. We have an on-the-spot check of all the trails and open slopes, and that information is passed on in this report. And anyone that is interested in receiving the report, all they have to do is just drop the Wausau Chamber of Commerce a note, and we will be glad to place them on our mailing list at no charge for the report, and they will receive it each Thursday. 00:41:00STANLEY: Since most skiers are young people, you are probably wondering by this
time, "Can they afford it?" Well, all facilities on the mountain are free, except the ski tow. It's $1.50 a day for adults but only fifty cents a day for people under nineteen. This year, plans are being made to provide a dormitory for young skiers: a hundred twenty-five beds in a steam-heated building; the cost per person, fifty cents a night. Food is served in a restaurant in the ski lodge, again, at prices designed to fit the pocketbooks of students.[organ music]
STANLEY: Our program leaves Rib Mountain now, but it stays with the Chamber of
Commerce and goes back to the topic of industry. We found, among the current projects of the Wausau Chamber of Commerce, what may be the most workable 00:42:00industrial development plan in Wisconsin.ROEHL: From my knowledge of industrial development procedure in Wisconsin, ours
is a little bit different than the average. In most cases, the communities have set up what they call industrial foundations. These are organizations which provide capital for organizations--for plants that wish to come into the community. Our approach has been a little bit different. We buy the land, so that it is available for any organization which wishes to come in, and we sell it to them at our cost. Many times a new plant coming in finds that they are held up by the cost of property when somebody finds out that a large concern wishes to buy. This way, we not only reserve the land for future development, but we are able to sell it to prospective new industries at a modest cost.STANLEY: That was Walter Roehl, executive secretary of the Chamber of Commerce.
00:43:00We've worked with Chamber of Commerce secretaries in most of the communities we visited, and consider Mr. Roehl the most outstanding among them. Outstanding for the amount of printed material on Wausau he was able to produce at a moment's notice, and outstanding for his articulate knowledge of the needs of industry. The industrial development project Mr. Roehl was talking about a moment ago is known as the Schofield Industrial Area: acres of land, owned by the Wausau Chamber of Commerce in the Village of Schofield two miles south of Wausau. As Mr. Roehl said, the land in this area will be sold at cost to industries who wish to locate there. Six concerns have taken advantage of the offer during the five years of its existence. The emphasis is on diversification. All six of the plants are in different lines of endeavor. In this, we find the continuation of the philosophy which kept Wausau out of the economic doldrums after the lumber 00:44:00industry collapsed.ROEHL: Our policy of encouraging diversified industry in the case of the
Schofield Industrial Area is merely a continuation of a trend that we have tried to follow for a good many years. The original founders of Wausau who made their money in the lumbering industry realized that they could not continue to build a city on that basis alone, so they very wisely reinvested their money in diversified industries. So that today, we have five major groups of industries represented in the six [unintelligible] located in the Wausau metropolitan area. For example, paper employs two thousand five hundred people; metalworking, eleven firms, eighteen hundred ninety-one people; woodworking, [unintelligible]at least fifteen hundred people; stone products, five hundred; food, five hundred; and all others, fifteen hundred. This is an 00:45:00indication of extreme diversification, and one which makes for uniform and steady employment in our community. We think this is very healthy, good for everybody, including the workers.STANLEY: Early on our program, we stressed the importance of rivers to the
economy of Wausau. And then we dropped the subject, as though the new diversified economy had eliminated the need for rivers. On the contrary, the river is doing far more work now than it could possibly have done in the lumber days. At that time, the river's energy was confined to the space between its banks. Now, electricity spreads the energy to every member of the community. However, more than electricity was needed to bring the Wisconsin to its present value. The Wisconsin River was unruly and unpredictable. There was either too much of it or too little. The Wisconsin needed a dam, and it got one. The river 00:46:00is now controlled from an office in downtown Wausau. The boss is M. W. Kyler. His organization is the Wisconsin Valley Improvement Company. Essentially this company is a private business version of the TVA. Various power users on the Wisconsin pooled their resources to construct reservoir dams on the headwaters, and now surplus water from flood stages can be stored to keep the flow constant during dry seasons. Power users now buy water from the company on a prorated basis. This service, of course, is not confined to Wausau; plants anywhere on the Wisconsin or its headwaters can benefit from it. They all benefit from a formerly erratic river domesticated by and controlled from the headquarters of the Wisconsin Valley Improvement Company in downtown Wausau.[organ music]
STANLEY: That concludes our Profile of Wausau. It's by no means complete--wasn't
00:47:00intended to be. Our intention was essentially to show the transition of a community from the lumbering days to a prosperous diversified economy, highlighting somewhat, the aspects which make Wausau different from other Wisconsin communities.[organ music]
NARRATOR: The Profile of Wausau was produced by Carl Schmidt, narrated by Ray
Stanley and written by Les Nelson. Music was by Patricia Hazard and the roles from Wausau's past were acted by Tom deTienne, Bob Homme, Ray Stanley and Myron Curry. Roy Vogelman was the on-the-spot reporter. For valuable assistance in the preparation of this program, we wish to thank Dr. Henry D. Einsbach of the University of Wisconsin Extension Center, and Walter Roehl of the Chamber of Commerce. Our thanks also the Wausau Record Herald Company for the centennial 00:48:00edition of their newspaper, which provided material for this profile. This program is one of a series entitled "Wisconsin Profiles," a recorded presentation of the Wisconsin College of the Air.[organ music]