J.M. Kuebler Company
J.M. Kuebler
John M. Kuebler moved to Wausau from Fond du Lac in 1881, where he had learned the woodworking trade. Although he initially worked at Kickbusch’s small sash plant and door factory (his first wife was Kickbusch's daughter Anna), after the Kickbusch plant burned down in 1882, Kuebler went to work for Curtis & Yale, where he became superintendent in 1886 (after 4 years).1
^ John M. Kuebler from around the turn of the twentieth century.
In 1911, Kuebler took an opportunity to start his own company. Kuebler purchased the Werheim Manufacturing Company, and started the J.M. Kuebler Company. Initially Kuebler owned the company in partnership with his friend George Silbernagel and brother-in-law, John M. Lull. But in 1924, George Silbernagel left to start his own company and Lull left to join National Savings and Loan in 1925.
^ Even with the development of a standardized window with weatherstripping and other features, the bulk of Kuelber's business came from orders for windows of various sizes and specifications, as evidenced by this booklet from Kuebler giving price lists.
Just as Kuebler grew his business in the early decades of the new century, an eventual need for more space gradually led to some expansions and renovations of the facilities to create a compound just north of downtown Wausau.
The J.M. Kuebler Company without J.M. Kuebler
On the morning of his 77th birthday, John Kuebler was struck with a heart attack on the floor of his factory, and was dead before he could be brought to Memorial Hospital.
His son (George) Ben Kuebler inherited the company in 1941 after his father's passing, and he ran the company for a few years before selling it to Joseph L. Usow in 1945. Joseph Usow had moved to area in 1933 and soon became owner of Marathon Rubber Products. And anticipating a boom in building after the end of WWII, he purchased the Kuebler window business. Usow and his sister Bernice Cohan would start a modernizing campaign for the business, and would eventually rename the company Marathon Mill Work.2
Sources
1. Some sources, such as Louis Marchetti's History of Marathon County and Representative Citizens (863) and Kuebler's 1941 obituary in the Wausau Daily Herald, skip over Kuebler's time with Kickbusch's door and sash company.
#. Need citation
2. “Marathon Millwork Employes’ Payroll Has Grown Rapidly” WDH (1 Feb 1964) 9.