Gotfredson Bros Hardware

This 1200 page catalog (PDF) was produced by Benjamin & Lawrence Gotfredson (circa 1903).
It has been scanned so it is text searchable.
The introduction below is printed at the beginning of the catalog:

To THE TRADE.
In presenting to you our first General Hardware Catalogue, we do so with the feeling that our efforts to place a complete and up-to-date reference book in the hands of the trade, will be appreciated.

We have endeavored to make the descriptions throughout the book as simple, complete and explicit as possible. The various lines of goods illustrated are grouped and arranged in a convenient and systematic manner, which will enable a person having a little familiarity with the Catalogue, to find the particular article desired without the aid of the index. So far as was practicable, we have used manufacturers' numbers and lists. Where this has been impossible, we have adopted a system of listing and numbering which will facilitate ordering and obviate errors.

Owing to the constant change in prices we do not issue a discount sheet, as it could not fail to be more or less misleading. We will, however, promptly answer all inquiries regarding quotations, which will always be as low as are consistent with t he several qualities.

Our unsurpassed shipping facilities to and from all points by rail or water are unexcelled by any other house in the trade.·

Every effort will be made to ship all orders complete, the day on which they are received.

Mail orders are particularly solicited, and to this department we will give our special attention and study. All orders entrusted to our care will be _executed with dispatch and at lowest market prices. Our uniformly large and well assorted stock renders satisfaction sure.

We take this opportunity to express our sincere thanks and appreciation for the generous favors of our friends in the past, and with our increased facilities and conveniences for serving the trade in the future, we hope to merit a continuance in our growth which your patronage has given us.

Faithfully yours,
Gotlredson Bros. Hardware Co.

The history of the hardware business in Green Bay, WI was described below in a 2012 Coachbuilt article by Mark Theobald

Niles Gotfredson spent his summers farming, and his winters harvesting timber, assisted in both activities by Lawrence and Benjamin, who attended the New Denmark rural school when in session. Lawrence spent two winters in Green Bay, attending the Green Bay Business College, after which he returned to the family's farm, engaging in the sales of farm implements on a small scale with his younger brother Benjamin.

The pair engaged in business under the style of Gotfredson Brothers, opening a hardware and implement store in Cooperstown, Wisconsin during 1878 which was followed by a satellite in Seymour, two year later. Buggies were added to the mix of agricultural implements and hardware and in the spring of 1888 they opened up a Green Bay branch in a 42' x 60' two-story wooden storefront located at 1155 Main St.

Their listing in the Patron's Directory of Foote & Brown's Plat book of Brown County, Wisconsin, pub. 1889, follows:

Each year brought increased trade to the firm and the market for their goods grew constantly. In 1896 the brothers erected a new Green Bay wareroom on Washington Street which was replaced in 1900 by a massive one-story 48' x 198' wooden facility. In the meantime they also established a wholesale division for which they erected a spacious 60' x 175' warehouse adjacent to the Fox River alongside the Green Bay & Western (formerly Green Bay, Winona & St. Paul) Railway.

Gotfredson Brothers' wholesale operations were eventually sold off to the Wisconsin Hardware Company, as reported in the September 15, 1904 issue of Iron Age:

Shortly thereafter the name was changed to the Morley-Murphy Hardware Company as indicated in the November 3, 1904 issue of Iron Age:

The Gotfredson brothers retained all of their Wisconsin retail operations which for many years involved the buying and selling horses, Benjamin having charge of the retail department of the store and the horse business. In the course of the latter enterprise he became enamored with the daughter of a Detroit, Michigan stable and livery operator named Jacob Kolb, marrying her in 1904 and becoming a partner in his new father-in-law's livery and stables (Kolb-Gotfredson Horse Co.) a few months later.

During that same year (1905) the Gotfredsons constructed a 5,390 sq. ft. brick flagship hardware store in downtown Green Bay that included all of the latest conveniences; elevators, central heating, electric lights and telephone.

Benjamin's marriage to Mary Clara Kolb, who was 20 years his junior, was not his first. His first wife was Augusta Emilia (aka Amelia) Graner (b. Jan 27, 1871 in Green Bay, Wisconsin), daughter of Robert, (b. May 1835 in Germany- d. 1880) and Johanna Ernestine (Jachmann) (b. Apr 1843 (or 1848) in Germany—d.1885) - Robert Graner being a well-known Green Bay livestock dealer and former butcher. Benjamin and Amelia's union was blessed with the birth of a son, Robert Benjamin Gotfredson (b. Sep. 6, 1896-d. Mar. 1, 1966), who was born on Sep. 6, 1896 in Green Bay, Brown County Wisconsin.

Gotfredson separated from and divorced his first wife sometime prior to his June 20, 1904 marriage to Mary Clara Kolb (b. Feb. 17, 1883 in Michigan - d. Jul. 25, 1964 in Los Angeles, CA) the daughter of his future business partner Jacob and Mary (Lawrence) Kolb. The marriage yielded no children, the 1917 Detroit Directory lists them living at 306 West Grand boulevard; their 1922 lists them at Garden Court Apts., 2906 Jefferson Ave. E. Phone #Edgewood 773.

Benjamin's brother Lawrence (b. 1861) married Florence "Flora" Rahr, daughter of Henry Rahr, proprietor of the Rahr Green Bay Brewing Co., on October 24, 1893. To the blessed union was born two sons, Henry and Roy Gotfredson. Flora divorced Lawrence Gotfredon in 1903 after her husband was caught in a hotel room with his 'typewriter' (the live type, not the machine). Lawrence Gotfredson remarried on June 14th 1910, to Miss Beulah Witherell (b. Apr. 2, 1889 d. Jun. 11, 1960), a daughter of two pioneer Green Bay settlers, Mr. and Mrs. W.J. Witherell. To the blessed union were born two children, Phyllis I. (b. 1913) and Lawrence B. (b. 1917) Gotfredson. Lawrence and his family remained in Green Bay for the rest of their lives although Benjamin relocated to Detroit after his marriage to Clara Kolb.

At the beginning of 1909 the Gotfredsons announced that they were getting branching out into retail automobile sales as reported in the January 1, 1909 issue of the Cycle & Automobile Trade Journal:

Their automobile sales experiment was short-lived as the October 20, 1909 issue of Horseless Age reported that the Gotfredsons' had sold their retail automobile operations to Zimmer & Malchow:

Shortly thereafter they sold off their retail hardware business to two employees. Green Bay native John B. DuBois (b.1869-d.1936) joined the Gotfredson hardware operation in 1901, as a partner in the Green Bay Implement Co. another Gotfredson owned firm. When the Brothers retired from the retail hardware business they sold it to DuBois and another employee, Amie (Amos) Haevers (b.1875-d.1936), as recorded in the May 1910 edition of Engineering Review reporting:

In 1924 DuBois reorganized the firm as the DuBois-Massey Company although the Gotfredson Real Estate company continued to own the property until their deaths with Lawrence serving as vice president of the Bank of Green Bay.

The virtually simultaneous sales of the Gotfredsons' Green Bay businesses coincided with the creation of the American Automobile Trimming Co. in Detroit, which was formed by the Gotfredson Brothers and a group of investors all associated with the Kolb-Gotfredson Horse Co., which was a reorganization of a cattle-trading firm founded by Jacob Kolb (II)'s father sometime after 1855.