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Sesquicentennial Interview: Fred Wahr

When: 1974

This interview was conducted in 1974 as part of the I Remember When television series produced by the Ann Arbor Public Library.

Transcript

  • [00:00:11] TED TROST: Professor Wahr. Who were the earliest German settlers to come into Washtenaw County?
  • [00:00:20] FRED WAHR: The first German on record that I have read about was a man named Conrad Bissinger, who was wandering, investigating, pioneering through the West, finding place he wanted to live. He came through what was to become Ann Arbor and found a few cottages or log cabins here. About 1820, the latter part of the 20s, about '27 - 8 maybe as earlier than that. But the settlement had already started. But he didn't like it very well, and he made up his mind he might buy land here and went away again, he went south. Later on, he came back and did buy land and settled here. To my knowledge, is from what I've read, he was the first German to come here, but he was followed in the early 30s by the Mann family, Emanuel Mann, and the Allmendingers. They met up with various people coming West. They were all seeking new homes, and finally settled here. They of course later brought their families with them or sent for their families. I think in one case, part of the family did come. The early Germans followed right afterwards. Of course, you know when a few settled, they write home, and here is virgin territory, untouched, beautiful farmland. In Germany, times were very hard. It was well, about the time of the social revolution of 1848 in France, particularly, and the seeds of it were growing over in Germany, and especially Württemberg, which was Western Germany. Württemberg-Baden, it is now. In Baden and Württemberg, the times were very hard, especially for the peasantry. It was a very much what we would call the totalitarian form of government. The poor working man didn't have much of a chance, and his sons on the whole, especially the second and third or fourth sons and the daughters who didn't see much chance of getting ahead, were only too glad to find out about this land over here, and there was a good deal of advertising going on over there from American promoters, not exactly from Ann Arbor, but from America, and of course, news coming back that there was nice land out here in Michigan. Invited them over this way, so they came.
  • [00:03:00] TED TROST: Primarily because of the social and political upheavals in Germany.
  • [00:03:04] FRED WAHR: In Germany and the opportunities that virgin country would offer.
  • [00:03:08] TED TROST: Now, when most of the Germans came bringing their families, they settled in the rural parts of Washtenaw county.
  • [00:03:14] FRED WAHR: Yes, they wanted farm land, and they bought up land. Whatever they could buy, and they immediately cleared the territory and cleared the land and started in farming, built a log cabin or a house of some sort, if their family came with them, and laid claim to their land and started in with farming. The few who had some chance of other forms of work, of course, stayed near the town. As time went on, well, I suppose, what have become these splendid farms out in Scio, Lodi, and Freedom, and so on and so forth, largely the German families. They came the next generation and its following generations, younger sons, particularly or daughters, came into town and began to work in town. That's readily understandable.
  • [00:04:07] TED TROST: I said at one time, I guess the Germans owned half of Main Street.
  • [00:04:11] FRED WAHR: Well, let me tell you, they came into town. One of the first big influences was the German Church, the Lutheran Church. They called the Allmendingers, and the Manns and so on, or got in touch with the institution, the evangelical form of the Lutheran Church in Basel. They sent a man over by the name of Schmid, and he became known as Pastor Schmid. He not only then started a church here out where the present day Bethlehem Cemetery is on Jackson Ave.
  • [00:04:47] TED TROST: Yes, there's a historical marker out there.
  • [00:04:51] FRED WAHR: That was the first church. Of course, you can see it was outside of town. It wasn't in the Ann Arbor proper. In my boyhood, it was quite a distance out to the Bethlehem Cemetery. Well, that, of course, those early Germans wanted to center their activities around a church, and the Lutheran Church was something of a home, shall I say, where they could all gather and meet and discuss things and so on. It was a center place. Well, time goes on in a hurry, and they gradually drifted into town. In time, I think it must have been in the '40s. Now let me say, suppose the German population began coming in numbers in the '30s and into the '40s and 50s. Well, the German population in the country was large enough to require a little better church than the cabin they had out in the Bethlehem Cemetery. About 1847 or 8 or 9, through there, they erected a church on the Northeast corner of First Street and Washington Street. That was, I think, originally known in the country, in the cemetery as the Zion Church. Then it became known as the Bethlehem Church. They called it when they came into the city. By that time, there were a good many Germans in the city. The Germans settled largely in what I have always known, and will all my life call the second ward. I don't like the way they warded Ann Arbor today.
  • [00:06:34] TED TROST: That's the West end.
  • [00:06:35] FRED WAHR: The Second Ward was West of Main Street and South of Huron Street. Yes, West Huron. It was largely populated by the Germans, out in the extreme Southwest corner of that territory was the large park, which became known as the German Park. I think in a way it still exists, so I don't know anymore. But they built their homes there, and they had the school there. Remember, the church was West of Main Street, very central. I don't know. I'm an old man. I know now, but I go back to my boyhood so often in my thoughts, and I always think of the Second Ward as one of the loveliest places in Ann Arbor. That's the old Second Ward. Out there West of Main Street, it was clean. Those Germans had lovely little homes and beautiful homes, beautiful yards, beautiful gardens, fruit trees. They were honest, they were modest, they took care of their work. They worked hard. The church was still the center.
  • [00:07:46] TED TROST: Well, the Germans also had various clubs like the Schwaben Verein [OVERLAPPING].
  • [00:07:51] FRED WAHR: Yes. Of course, the German settlement in Ann Arbor to a great extent, almost entirely was from Württemberg, and they were Swabians. There were some others came into town from Baden and from other parts of Germany, even from Prussia. But they were largely Württemberg, and they spoke Swabian. When I was a boy, and that's way back in the 90s, you could go up and down Main Street and see the signs on the stores. Many of them were in German. The Swabian dialect was very common on Main Street everywhere. I love to hear it. They built up Main Street. I can't tell you offhand, all of the businesses that they had, but the businesses originally were in the hands of the old American citizens of Ann Arbor, the Maynards, and so on and so forth. But gradually as that generation passed, the Germans came into stronger control of the business, not entirely, but not of the government, not of the city council and the mayor, but of the business element. In all fields, they were good businessmen.
  • [00:09:13] FRED WAHR: I have a long list of the businesses. Well, now, let me just go in certain fields. Let me take music. I'll be very brief. The Germans are musical. They love to sing. They sang, they gathered around their churches and sang. They sang in their lodges, the Schwaben Verein, the Arbeiter Verein, the Turn Halle. The word that always balls me up, but it was a word, the Harugari. And the Harugari was built a big Germania Hall on the northeast corner of Second and William Street, which was a gathering place where the Germans for a good many years. They held dances there, socials there, Otto's band used to play. Then we come back to music. During the Civil War, the band that accompanied the troops was the Gwinner band. They made up largely of Germans, and they were amongst the first German bands in Ann Arbor. They were followed by the Otto band. The Ottos, old Henry Otto, I think his name was, played in the Gwinner band, and then Louis Otto, who headed the Otto band finally was one of the foremost bands in this part of the state. Well, not only in the bands, let's go over to music. I would like to mention Mr. Frederick Fischer, of the German school in the Bethlehem Church, who also ran the choir, or directed the choir, and played the organ. His family was very musical. Ike Fischer, for example, started the orchestras and bands that were associated with the university in later days. Before the Michigan band as such was created, Ike Fischer was starting playing at the games with his group. He played dances all over town. Emma Fischer-Cross, the daughter, became a member of the School of Music faculty, was a very fine pianist. I used to take music lessons of her, and they had those Fischer girls and boys had very fine voices. The Schaeberle family was another German family that was very musical. They finally built up quite a big house music business in Ann Arbor. The Allmendingers were very musical and started the Organ Factory [OVERLAPPING] Allmendinger, I could go on that way, but let's go into other business. Take the Eberbachs and pharmacy and drug business. Take the banks. We had men in the banks, the Ann Arbor Bank, which used to stand on the northwest corner of Huron and Main. I'm sorry it's gone. The, Michael Fritz, was one of the foremost men in that bank and president for a long time, and his family was associated with it. The Waidelich family, Ernest Waidelich got into that business. Willie Walz, the Walz family. Willie Walz became mayor, took part in the Spanish American War, and was also one of the founders of the present Federal Bank. Take Rudolph Reichert, who came in as a boy from the country. Most of these people came in from the country, the next generation, and was in the German American bank, which stood at the southeast corner of of Liberty and Main where Hutzel's is at present time. Then during the depression with World War II, he joined in with the State and and the Ann Arbor Bank. Many of those Germans, Alfred Steeb, for example, were in the banks, Ann Arbor Bank, and the State Bank. John Walz was one of the leaders in the state. I say State Bank. I'm sorry, I can't tell you what it is now. I guess they call it National Bank.
  • [00:13:10] TED TROST: National Bank and Trust, I think.
  • [00:13:11] FRED WAHR: I don't know. Well, the first National Bank stood next to where Goodyears is on Main Street, on the west side of Main Street. That was the National Bank in my day. That disappeared with the time of the union of the banks. Charlie Gruner was a banker and Rob Gauss. The Gauss family was prominent in Ann Arbor. Frederick Gauss, Freddie Gauss, I get mixed up. He called himself Christian later on, became a Dean at Princeton. We knew all those people very well. I was brought up on Ashley Street. I was born out where the IOOF is now in the old Brehm House.
  • [00:13:51] TED TROST: Oh, I know where that is, sure.
  • [00:13:52] FRED WAHR: Yeah, I was born out there. And then my mother died when I was nine months old, and I was taken to Saline, brought up for a few years by my grandparents. Then I was brought back here to go to school. We lived on Ashley Street, and of course, we knew all the people around. They knew everybody down on Main Street.
  • [00:14:09] TED TROST: Well, your father was in the [OVERLAPPING].
  • [00:14:10] FRED WAHR: My father was in the shoe business.
  • [00:14:13] TED TROST: Shoe business.
  • [00:14:13] FRED WAHR: He started in with Bach and Abel years and years ago, and then bought out the Krause family was very prominent, owned a beautiful old home out on West Liberty, which, of course, like all beautiful old homes disappeared. He then bought out the Krause shoe business. The Krauses run a tannery, and he bought out that business with his cousin George Miller, and my father continued in business there for a long time. George Wahr was an uncle. He started in with Moore and then Osius in the book business. Down where he remained always on Main Street, down just off of Huron on West Main next to where the old bank used to be, the Ann Arbor Bank. I can't describe it otherwise. He labored until his death, he had the store there, though there was a second store on State Street, which did the student business.
  • [00:15:09] TED TROST: Did you, as a youngster, go out to the German festivals in the German park?
  • [00:15:12] FRED WAHR: Yes, we used to go Sundays once in a while. Not always, walk out there. Of course in those days, thank God, we learned to walk and we walked. We didn't think anything of walking anywhere, you know, miles for that matter. We went on Sunday afternoons. It was very nice, friendly. They had good lunches, and they had, of course, beer and something to drink, and I think they usually had music. I don't remember so much about it. Of course, the Germans as an ethnic group stuck pretty close together. They celebrated together because they had brought with them a good many of their customs and their ideals of living, their way of life.
  • [00:15:48] TED TROST: They really know how to celebrate Christmas.
  • [00:15:50] FRED WAHR: They know how to celebrate Christmas. I want to talk about that, but first, let me mention German Day in the fall or the summer. The big parade with these German lodges would organize with bands and march up Main Street, usually end up out at the park. I want to mention one thing that has left a lasting impression upon me in regard to Christmas celebrations. In the German Church, and our folks belonged to the Bethlehem Church. On Christmas Eve, they usually always had a very tall Christmas tree. All the Sunday school and the boys and girls were invited along with the parents. They had songs and little speeches made and so on. It was an unforgettable thing. It fixed Christmas in your mind to me as nothing else ever did that they should have celebrated it that way. Of course they brought the custom from Germany. I hope it isn't dead. I don't know whether it's going on.
  • [00:16:42] TED TROST: Did they have candles on the tree?
  • [00:16:45] FRED WAHR: Originally, they were regular candles, but, of course, when electricity came in.
  • [00:16:49] TED TROST: They still have the candles at Christmas Eve. Everybody lights one and the whole sanctuary.
  • [00:16:55] FRED WAHR: I think that's wonderful. I really think that is one of the most wonderful things about Christmas time.
  • [00:17:00] TED TROST: Well, there were difficulties though for the Germans in this community. Let's talk a little about World War I. What was the situation then? Was there a strike?
  • [00:17:11] FRED WAHR: Well, you had a great, you had a German population, a good many of them still were alive who had been born in Germany. The children had been brought up in the same feeling. The university, though it had a German department, those men were not born in Germany, the members of the staff as a rule. They had learned German, had studied in Germany, but they were Americans. Aside from that, the university on the whole was very strongly anti-German. That, of course, also prevailed amongst the American born. The descendants of the earlier settlers are the purely English people in the city. The Germans were still west of Main Street on the whole, not entirely, but to a great extent, and the businesses were still existing. That there was a clash and the newspapers, the magazines, the oratory, and everything of that sort, it was before the day of radio and that stuff, were very strongly anti-German. That the clash occurred, of course. I always took the standpoint. I had studied in Germany. I took the standpoint that we were Americans, and we simply had to be Americans, whether we wanted to or not, no matter how our feelings went. You could not fight for Germany and get anywhere in this country. The thing to do was to be a good American, and they were. The Germans were good Americans. They weren't any better Americans. Nobody ever did as much around here to help build up a community than those Germans, but their feelings, their emotions, which they couldn't explain, went back to Germany. They couldn't understand it. I can understand a good deal of that. That not only in Ann Arbor being a college town, it was especially hard. The German faculty was quite large. In fact, before that time, when I first studied in the university, and I graduated in 1911, and got my doctorate in 1915, the German department was one of the biggest departments on the campus, had one of the biggest enrollments. That disappeared. It went down from about, and remember this is way back there when the university was scarcely 5,000, attendance of 5,000.
  • [00:19:52] FRED WAHR: Why? We had eighteen or nineteen members of the staff. When the war really broke, it came down to one or two active members. There were, I think five. The others had to teach French or rhetoric or something else to stay on the staff. But unless you were an associate professor that had tenure, you were dropped. The good many of the very fine men were dropped. I always remember one of the finest scholars we ever had here, old Professor Boucke, but he was German and not American. He'd never become an American citizen. He was not exactly dropped. He retired so to speak, then finally went back to Germany where he became a member of the University of Heidelberg.
  • [00:20:39] TED TROST: Well, now there was nothing like this during World War II.
  • [00:20:42] FRED WAHR: No, not at all. All because you had a new generation.
  • [00:20:46] TED TROST: The German?
  • [00:20:46] FRED WAHR: Even look at the in World War II, just stop to think of the boys of German descent who became soldiers.
  • [00:20:52] TED TROST: Yes.
  • [00:20:53] FRED WAHR: All you have to do is they didn't raise them.
  • [00:20:55] TED TROST: I know down at Bethlehem Church, they were sending all things to boys.
  • [00:20:59] FRED WAHR: That was an entirely different proposition. There was no feeling of that sort. I was a member of the staff all through World War II here in the German staff. We had the soldiers here. The soldiers had to take German. That is the soldiers that were sent in here by the government, they had to take German, and we had special courses for those soldiers.
  • [00:21:23] TED TROST: Well, now the German community through the generations up to the present time is not as tight knit today as once it was.
  • [00:21:31] FRED WAHR: No. I think that the Germans on the whole have been amongst the best American citizens you'll ever find. I'm always so amused. You must feel that way too when you watch TV, and you see who took part in this program. Did you ever watch the German names?
  • [00:21:54] TED TROST: A lot of them.
  • [00:21:55] FRED WAHR: Do you ever watch the names of the Germans in the government? That just shows it right there. Those people don't know anything about Germany [OVERLAPPING] Americans.
  • [00:22:03] TED TROST: I don't think that the full contribution of the Germans to American history is adequately recognized.
  • [00:22:11] FRED WAHR: No, it isn't.
  • [00:22:13] TED TROST: I think there is a field out there of scholarship. There's some work to be done.
  • [00:22:17] FRED WAHR: I agree with you there, it isn't. No. I don't see how you're ever going to do that. It isn't only the small group in the long run that had settled in Ann Arbor, the Swabian group here that has become good Germans, but stop to think of the whole United States.
  • [00:22:33] TED TROST: That's what I was saying.
  • [00:22:33] FRED WAHR: There was Swabians all over the country. Not only Swabians, but Germans natives from every part of Germany settling all over the country, and you wouldn't ever know it today. They're just as good as anyone else, and they haven't much feeling for Germany. It's gone.
  • [00:22:48] TED TROST: As Ann Arbor celebrates it's 150th birthday, let me ask you this question. What do you think are the three major contributions that the Germans have made to our community over the years? You've touched on some of them to be sure. But I'm just wondering how you might list them.
  • [00:23:06] FRED WAHR: Well, I tell you I would put a lot of it in one word. Work.
  • [00:23:14] TED TROST: Work.
  • [00:23:15] FRED WAHR: They know the meaning of work. They're proud to work. They're glad to work, and they're happy at work.
  • [00:23:21] TED TROST: They've worked hard in this community.
  • [00:23:23] FRED WAHR: They've worked hard in this community in every field. Let me stop to think of building the Koch Brothers, the number of buildings they built in that. They're good Germans, if they're ever were Germans. Stop to think I've mentioned music. Stop to think of the other businesses. Now, not so much in law, in medicine, yes. But a good many of the leaders in law in Ann Arbor have come out of the Irish out of the northern part of Northfield, and so on in that region. But I always think of George Burke, Martin Cavanaugh and those fine people. Of course, Carl Lehman was a German. But now there are more Germans in that profession. But you go back to business on the whole building. The labor department. How would you express it, doing the hard work?
  • [00:24:19] TED TROST: The hard work, the manual labor.
  • [00:24:20] FRED WAHR: Doing the hard manual labor in Ann Arbor. The teaching in the schools, great many of of the girls, the teachers were German descent. Think of Miss Gundert in the old Second ward.
  • [00:24:32] TED TROST: I knew her.
  • [00:24:32] FRED WAHR: Yes, Miss Weitbrecht, and you can go right down the row and take construction in thought in well, dammit, patriotism. That's one word that covers all of it.
  • [00:24:51] TED TROST: And a good one.
  • [00:24:51] FRED WAHR: Building up a country. They've made a great contribution.
  • [00:24:54] TED TROST: They've been able to make this contribution quietly without boasting.
  • [00:24:58] FRED WAHR: They don't brag about it. They don't boast about it. In fact, they [OVERLAPPING] with it.
  • [00:25:05] TED TROST: That's a great contribution. Why don't you tell us those three anecdotes again?
  • [00:25:12] FRED WAHR: Well, I hate to mention names.
  • [00:25:17] TED TROST: Don't mention any names.
  • [00:25:19] FRED WAHR: Well, when they were working at Mack and Company's big store on the corner of Main and Liberty Street, men were working right up near the roof, painting, or doing masonry work. The contractor, the boss was down on the ground the sidewalk, and he looked up at them and says, ''How many of you up there?'' The answer came "Three of us, sir." "Half of you come down''. He said no. There was an old gentleman from the second ward who had been elected of German descent. Well, he'd been born in Germany, elected to the city council. It was the time of the introduction of the electric lights, the incandescent light. There was a considerable discussion as to the cost of it all. The gentleman by the name of Keech, member of the council, was fighting in favor of introducing the lights. This old gentleman, old German gentleman got up and he shouted, ''If Keech wants them indecent lights, let him pay for them''.
  • [00:26:29] TED TROST: He said, that's marvelous. That's fine.
  • [00:26:32] FRED WAHR: I don't know what do another one. I don't know.
  • [00:26:35] TED TROST: You've enjoyed living in Ann Arbor, haven't you?
  • [00:26:39] FRED WAHR: Yeah, I don't enjoy it anymore particularly, it's too big. The university's way out grown itself. I don't go down near the place anymore. I got to it. I still have an office, but I don't go down. But the great trouble is I can't walk it, and I have such a job finding a place to park. The same with downtown, so I stick home most of the time. Or if I want to shop, I go out to Arborland which I can go back way and not get on the street.
  • [00:27:06] TED TROST: Have the relationships between the town and the university on the whole pretty good?
  • [00:27:10] FRED WAHR: That's gone. That distinction between the university and the town is practically gone. In my day, when I was a boy, Division Street was limited. On the whole, very few Germans lived east of Main. Some did and some lived way around, especially out in the third ward which was north of West Huron and west of Main, you see. That was the third ward, and there are Germans living out there. Many members of Bethlehem Church lived out in that neighborhood. But now, well you take in my day, there was never any liquor even before prohibition. There was never any saloon or liquor served publicly east of Division Street. That was forbidden by law.
  • [00:27:56] TED TROST: It was.
  • [00:27:57] FRED WAHR: Oh yes, you couldn't. That was forbidden by law. It's only recently that that's been changed, I guess. The saloons all had to be downtown, were downtown, I know. But the university, well it was a small community. Let's say when I was started in, 5,000 students or not even. You can see how small that would be, and the campus was large enough. We had no North Campus. The athletic situation was not nearly as monstrous as it is today. I don't know. It was nice. It was a small college and a nice place. But now I go down, I'm lost.
  • [00:28:39] TED TROST: Speaking of athletics, wasn't one of Michigan's first All Americans Otto Pommerening from the German community? He was a member of the Bethlehem church.
  • [00:28:52] FRED WAHR: No. Ann Arbor is getting too big for me. I know that. I like the old town, but that's natural. The old German businessmen, I should have told you this, how friendly we were. We were all kind of a family. You walk down Main Street, you knew everyone. They all say, hello, and you said hello, and all the businessmen knew each other so well. Wherever you went, they were willing to help each other and get along. Why I remember my old grandmother oh 70 years old. My gracious, and some old friend of hers way out about five blocks away was sick, so she had to make a little [INAUDIBLE] of soup and walk out there. Now, you wouldn't think of it, she walked out and walked back. Take that woman. That sort of feeling is gone. There was a lovely feeling in those days, in my boyhood.
  • [00:29:44] TED TROST: The Germans also were very active and worked hard at the old Washtenaw County Fair. Number of booths out there. Oh they worked. Remember that when I was a boy.
  • [00:29:54] FRED WAHR: Well, you know the fairgrounds, what's there now? Burns Park. That was the fairgrounds. There were no houses anywhere near that. The streetcar ended there. The streetcar started there and ran downtown several directions and ended at the Michigan Central Depot. But we always went out to the fairgrounds for the Circus, Buffalo Bill, Ringling Brothers and Barnum and Bailey was then, when we walked, everybody walked off there, never thought of.
  • [00:30:22] TED TROST: I understand one of those elephants stampeded once.
  • [00:30:26] FRED WAHR: I'll tell you a story about that. That was on, you know where the Elks is?
  • [00:30:30] TED TROST: Yes.
  • [00:30:30] FRED WAHR: Right across from the Elks. There was trees there on Main Street in those days, like there are here. On the elephants, they had these, they call them houdahs or something. These houses built up there for the girls to sit in. They were on there, and, of course, it was dangerous. They came up Main Street from the north, and we were going to turn up William, no go out Packard, I think, and they got as far as the trees there. Dr. Georg lived on that corner. There were houses on the east side of Main Street then. A bunch of students threw firecrackers under the elephants. There was just hell to pay. I wasn't there, but two of my aunts were there and they ran as fast as they could run. You don't know where Martin Haller's barn is. It still stands today. They ran up in the hay of Martin Haller's barn. The bar door was open, and they ran up there. Can you imagine that? That was a standing joke of the family, but it was just H-E-L-L. You could imagine, these elephants ran under the trees and these businesses with the girls. These fine ladies sitting up in there were knocked off. They were thrown on the ground, afraid the elephant step on them. It was terrible. I don't know why I was down further on Main Street and missed it.
  • [00:31:49] TED TROST: Boy oh boy.
  • [00:31:50] FRED WAHR: Yes. Well, the students. They were full of [INAUDIBLE], I know very well a student when I was a boy. We had plank walks. Plank walks preceded, preceded tar walks. First came planks, and then came tar, and then came cement, in some places stone. I used to go to the First Ward school, which stood up next to the Congregational Church because we were near enough to Main Street that Second Ward was filled, so we had to go east to the First Ward. When we'd go up there at Halloween time, there wouldn't be a plank left and the plank walks, they'd all be up. The privies were always out in back of the houses, they'd all be turned over, lying flat. Well, those were gay days. But it was harmless fun. They had to get rid of the fun somewhere or other. Nowadays, it's a little different, I think, and that isn't fun.
  • [00:32:41] TED TROST: Can be a little more malicious.
  • [00:32:43] FRED WAHR: It is more malicious. But then all those are good days, those days gone by. I'm foolish. I know.
  • [00:32:56] CATHERINE ANDERSON: I'd like you to just mention a little bit about the Spanish Civil War.
  • [00:33:00] TED TROST: Spanish-American War.
  • [00:33:03] FRED WAHR: Well, then 1898. Well, the Company A. The old armory stood on the corner, the northeast corner of Ashley and Huron Street. Down where now there is a bus station, isn't there a bus station, the old interurban station stood? That was the armory. Company A was a national guard. Would you call it that? I don't know what they called it infantry. They marched through the band down to the Ann Arbor railroad station and then waited for the train, took them to Toledo where, and they were going south. They went down south in the United States to camp, a good many of them got fever there, and then some of them were taken over to Cuba and nobody was killed, to my knowledge in the fighting, but they didn't have control of the fevers in those days that they have now, it was pretty bad. I knew those fellows very well. Ross Granger was captain, Willie Walz was Lieutenant. I can't remember names anymore. I can see some of those boys. Yes, of course, there were a lot of Germans in it. Germans did join Company A. They used to have midwinter circuses down in the old armory. Like they have now, people from circuses, acrobats would come to perform there. Those were good days. Now, it's all changed.
  • [00:34:29] CATHERINE ANDERSON: What year was that?
  • [00:34:30] TED TROST: What year was that? That would be 1898.
  • [00:34:32] FRED WAHR: That was when I was a boy, I should say in the 1890s.1898 was the war. Well, my father, we used to go out. My father always took us kids along. That was about 95, six, seven through there. The Wurster family. You remember them?
  • [00:34:57] TED TROST: Yes.
  • [00:34:58] FRED WAHR: They lived down on Washington Street next to the Bethlehem Church for years. Then from there on to the corner were saloons, and worse than that. Those things were all in the open those days. I remember there was one woman who ran a pretty bad house. I'd say bad, I don't know, the saloon on the first floor, and what do they call them now? They got them on Fourth Ave.
  • [00:35:22] TED TROST: Massage parlor
  • [00:35:22] FRED WAHR: Massage parlor. That's a polite name. Upstairs, Queen Lil, they called her. The boy, we kids would stand watch Queen Lil drive by with a great big team of horses and a beautiful [INAUDIBLE], and sit in there with her. I don't know who was her husband or not. We didn't know. We'd yell for a block away here comes Queen Lil, so we'd all run out in front of the house and watch her go by. Funny how those things stick in your memory, but it's all part of old Ann Arbor.
  • [00:35:49] TED TROST: No. That's great.
  • [00:35:51] FRED WAHR: Down on the corner of, you know the Manns? I've mentioned the Mann family. I can't remember first name, It is Emanuel, I think it was. Owned property across from the Bethlehem Church. Mann and Schmids. When I was a boy, on the corner of the southwest corner of Ashley and Washington, stood this old red brick house, very painted red, very red, which an old Henry Mann lived in there. He worked at Mack and Company. Next to him, lived a woman whose husband had been a blacksmith, Wagner, was her name. She ran a boarding house. Down on the corner was another Mann place, later the Maulbetschs lived in there. As you went down First Street, the Schmids had a big home in there, and those were all old Ann Arbor families. Remember, when you go down in that neighborhood, you were in the center of town in those days, the Ann Arbor railroad didn't run through, you see? That was a very fine place to live. Right down through there. Going out Liberty Street, West Liberty. You crossed the tracks now, which are very unpleasant. The tracks didn't weren't there. See, it was very nice, those lovely homes stood right up on the hill there [OVERLAPPING] . The Fritzs lived right down there, and then, of course, you'd go on further, and First Street came to German school with nice residences around there. When people lived out, was it First or Second?
  • [00:37:17] TED TROST: First Street.
  • [00:37:18] FRED WAHR: First Street. Way out. Well, that was very nice out there. It is even now.
  • [00:37:22] TED TROST: Yes.
  • [00:37:25] FRED WAHR: Oh dear. You know the end of town, this may astonish you, was Seventh Street, and Seventh streets right down in town. We went to Seventh Street that she stopped. That was the end of town. Went beyond there. There were a few houses going out Liberty Street, a few houses, not very many, farmhouses on the whole. Same with Huron. Jackson Ave built up faster because of the forks out there, one to Dexter and one to Jackson. But that was all fields and old Fred Staebler owned a farm right there on the corner. Big fields beyond before you got out to the Bethlehem Cemetery. That was out in Scio. That's all town now, isn't it? I don't know. I don't go out there very much anymore. I'm afraid to drive that way. I don't drive very much. Well, this was a country here.
  • [00:38:13] TED TROST: Where we are now?
  • [00:38:15] FRED WAHR: This was all country. Where they've got a sorority, that was the old home down there Lloyd's home, was the farmhouse. There was a farmhouse right up here on the hill when we moved up here. We moved up here in 29, and were one of the first to build up here, it was all country. But it built up in no time. The Tuomys lived right out here, and this whole region out here that's all built up was the Tuomy farm. Well, that was nice. But the Ann Arbor railroad came through in the 70s, I think, 70s or 80s. I don't remember when. Then, of course, it ran flat on the ground for years and years. It wasn't elevated as it is over Washington and Huron until more recently. That was just running down on the ground. Out west of town, off of Seventh Street, there was a big mill, what we called the race. Now, I've been asked questions to some of old timers and yes, they all remember the race. Quite a body of water flowing down into the valley came down and ran into Allen's Creek, down around where the railroad tracks are on Washington, Huron in between there. This big race even had a dam in it. I have forgotten the name of the creek. We always called it the race. That ran into Allen's Creek. Of course, that's all covered every bit of it's covered now, you know. Allen Creek, we used to go down play in Allen Creek, before it was covered over, it was all open.
  • [00:39:52] TED TROST: Well, you certainly told us a lot about Ann Arbor.
  • [00:39:54] FRED WAHR: Well, I like to talk about all I can remember is old town.
  • [00:39:57] TED TROST: This has been absolutely delightful.