Now you may wonder what this feature has to do with Virgil - keep reading and eventually you'll find out...

Green Bay Lumber Company
Manning Monitor
By Dave Kusel
November 23, 2006

As a person interested in history it is sad to see this old lumber company building get torn down. Lumber companies were a very important part of Manning's early history and the growth into the community it is today. A very good write-up of Manning's lumber yards can be found on page 141 of the 1981 Manning Centennial book. Besides Green Bay, other notable lumber companies in the early years were Wolfe & Nodle, Joyce Lumber, Tank and Hoffmann, Adolph Hinz, and Fielweber brothers Town & Country.

If the Green Bay building could talk it would have an almost endless story to tell since the building has been standing in its present location since 1895. Prior to this the "Gardner Livery Barn" was located at this site. If you have old pictures of Manning scenes the Green Bay building will almost inevitably show up in the picture.

Prior to 1913 the original Milwaukee railroad crossed through the center of Manning on this trestle (shown above) which was located where Rasmussen Lumber Company is today. If you look in the background the Green Bay building is standing. The white sides show that the tin siding was already on the building. It is not known exactly when this tin siding was added. The smoke was coming from a chimney on the backside of the Manning Creamery.

Beginning of the end
On November 14, 2006, the city crew started removing the tin siding from the building. As you can see the original stained wood siding with the business name is showing for the first time in about 100 years.

On the southeast corner of the building the sign 'coal' was painted.

On the west wall facing Elm Street you see the company name and the broken words 'Hard and Soft Coal' painted on the siding. Apparently windows were placed in this wall in later years which removed parts of the wording.

The room in the southwest corner had this shaft and pulley system suspended on the ceiling which was used to drive a table saw.

Sharon (Grimm) had this picture from the 1940s which shows the partial sign GREEN BAY LBR. CO. on the south wall. In the picture are Paul Grimm and his first wife Pauline.

Notes from the 1981 Centennial book
The Green Bay Lumber Company established a yard shortly after the town was incorporated, locating it on the railroad grounds just south of the North Western depot. The lots were purchased from W. Gardner, who had operated a livery barn situated on the chosen site. Up to 1891, F.P. Guild was the manager of the yards and Henry Rohr acted as yard man. In 1891 Rohr took over as manager. In later years Fred Hostedder was manager and following him Barney Neubaum. After Neubaum was transferred, Green Bay decided to liquidate the stock and the business was discontinued.

Gray, Iowa The Green Bay Lumber Company was managed by Frank Murphy - 1920s.

Henry Rohr The history of the Henry Rohr family in Manning dates back to 1885. Henry Rohr had come from his native home in Bredstedt, Schleswig-Holstein, Germany, in 1880 and first settled at Oak Harbor, Ohio.

In 1881, he came to Irwin where he lived until coming to Manning in 1885. Here he established the first shoe repair shop, a trade he had learned in Germany. During the subsequent years, he was a section man on the railroad, a sewing machine agent, and finally a lumberman. In that capacity he served as manager of the Green Bay Lumber Company for almost 40 years before his retirement. The Green Bay Lumber Company did a flourishing business in Manning until the 1960s. The original building still remains at the northeast corner of the intersection of Third and Elm Streets.

Phillip Zerwas worked for a period of time at the Beiter Meat Market in Carroll. He next went to work for the Green Bay Lumber Company in Kirkman. After some years he was offered part ownership in The Manning Telephone Company.

Memories of the old Green Bay lumber building by Virgil Rosonke.
If you ever run into Virgil Rosonke you will probably be told a cute story or a "mind provoking" joke. With the upcoming demolition of the old Green Bay Lumber building Virgil remembered some anecdotal stories about when he worked for Bud Mohr.

Virgil worked for Bud from 1968 to 1975. Virg drove truck and was a yardman for Bud. He also did repairs on some of the buildings. One small storage building needed re-shingling so sometime in 1975 Virgil started the project. One thing that you always hear is to never put off until tomorrow what you can finish today. Well this roofing project seemed to always get interrupted when Virg had to help customers so one thing led to another and Virgil never got the job finished. And to prove this story is true the pictures below show Virgil next to the unfinished shingling job and the unused shingles still laying on the roof waiting to be used -- a 31 year "procrastination job."

The run-away feed truck
Bud Mohr had a trucking business and hauled corn and soybeans for farmers. On one very early winter morning Virgil drove a truck loaded with soybeans up to the front of Bud's feed store on the south side of Third Street across from the old Green Bay building. He put on the emergency brake and went into the store. When he was in there he noticed the lights that were shining from the truck into the store started to move. Of course you probably know where this story is going. Virgil ran out of the store and after the runaway truck. It headed northwest down Third Street toward his pickup on the north side of the street. Virg was trying to get to the driver's side to hop into the truck but it was already next to his pickup. The left mirror of the runaway truck grazed the rack on Virgil's pickup. After that he was able to get the driver's door open, climb in, and put the brakes on just as the truck sheared off the street light pole. This all happened in a matter of seconds. When the guys at Manning Oil gave Virgil a hard time about getting his license at Sears he replied, "had I not gotten into the truck you guys would be working for me."

So there was the truck pinning the light pole against the cement street marker with the overhead wires balancing the pole. 'Now what???' Virgil got on the phone and called Police Chief Marvin Gaer. So Marv put on his pants and drove down to the runaway scene. They looked at the situation and finally Marv said let's get a load binder and chain and wrap the light pole to the cement marker. They did that and Virgil drove the truck away leaving the light pole standing attached to the marker. Marvin vaguely remembered this incident but he said he had lots of times where he was called in the middle of the night and had to put his pants on and go investigate some type of accident report.

If you look closely - the cement street sign is leaning to the northwest with some of the concrete broken from the base. Virgil didn't know if the runaway incident did this or if it was hit by someone else in later years --- but for the moment we'll blame it on Virg's runaway truck. The light pole on the left was obviously replaced with this newer one.

Green Bay Lumber Company memories by Merlin Hass.
Barney Neubaum was the manager at the time. Barney's wife was Ella (the bookeeper) and they had four children who all graduated from MHS: LaJune, Donna, Robert, and Gary. Merlin gave Gary the nickname of "Sparky."

Merlin worked for the Green Bay Lumber Company from 1954-56. He and Willie Hoffman were the yardmen. The coal at that time was stored in a building to the northwest of Green Bay along the railroad tracks near the Dultmeier building owned by the Manning Ag Center today. Merlin & Willie would transfer the 'lump coal' by hand and the 'stoker coal' with a conveyor from the rail car to the coal shed. The coal had to be unloaded in a timely fashion so the railroad company could use the cars for other jobs. Merlin recalls that some "refreshments" were purchased by Barney from Henry Hagedorn's Place and they would "wet their whistles" in the lumber yard after the work was done. The lumber, siding, and cement was transferred to the Green Bay building by truck from the rail cars. The office was in the southeast corner and the lumber was stored in the different storage bins in the main building. Cement was kept in a small building to the northeast. Some of the lumber supplies were purchased wholesale from United Lumber Supply in Atlantic, Iowa, and also delivered by rail cars from various other companies.

Merlin recalls George Eschenbacher, Jr. was hired to re-shingle the roof of the Green Bay lumber building and he did it all by himself sometime in the mid-1950s.

He also recalls two carpentry crews that purchased lumber from Green Bay. One crew was S&W run by Labert Stahl, Sr. and Warren Wegner. Emil & Herman Ruhde also had a carpentry business and purchased supplies at Green Bay. Irwin Henkenliable and Karl Rohr were other carpenters at that time.

In 1956 Merlin decided to change jobs and go work for the Manning Creamery. The district manager for Green Bay "Jap" Etchison (from Mapleton) offered Merlin the management job at the Green Bay Lumber yard in Charter Oak, Iowa, but he declined and went to work for the creamery. Merlin recalls that Manning coach John Beach married Jap's daughter. John coached football from 1954-1958 with a record of 23-20.

Sometime in the late 1960s Green Bay closed its doors and United Builder's Company "UBC" purchased the business and inventory. Around 1968 Wade & Thelma Mohr, owners of McMahon Feed & Seed Store, purchased the empty "UBC" building and lot to use as storage for their business.

While Merlin Hass was working at Green Bay he noted that Howard Randulf from Guthrie Center, Iowa, purchased the Priebe Company located just north of the lumberyard and operated it for several years. Chuck Loftus and Leonard Frahm managed it for Howard.

Merlin could not remember who was the previous Green Bay yardman. He thought possibly a Hunter so if anyone has more information about the Green Bay history please let me know.