Anton Bruha’s Grocery Scale

Robert Mullen

Catalog Number: 1996.018.01

When Anton Bruha used this scale at his grocery store in 1930, he was selling bacon for 43 cents a pound, five pounds of flour for 23 cents, and 10 pounds of potatoes for 36 cents. The scale was probably the only one in the store and it was a necessity for Bruha’s business.

Today’s supermarkets still use scales to weigh foods in the produce, meat, and deli departments as well as at every check-out counter. Like today, many foods in 1930 were pre-packaged and pre-measured in cans, bottles, or boxes. But more items were sold in bulk, needing to be weighed on a scale. Besides meats and produce, early 20th century storekeepers like Bruha also weighed items like cookies, peanuts, candies, flour, and other food staples.

Anton J. Bruha began his small grocery store on the 900 block of Adams Street about 1885. The business would become a neighborhood fixture for the next 96 years, with his sons Joseph and Charles taking over the business in the 1950s.

During Bruha’s early years in business, his competition came from similar neighborhood grocers scattered across the city. The proprietors knew most of their customers; they lived nearby and walked two or three blocks to do their shopping. Clerks gathered the customers’ purchases for them, using the scale when necessary. Home delivery was common, as was “running a tab” to be paid later.

After the first national chain food stores came to La Crosse in the 1920s, Bruha and several other independent grocers formed a buying cooperative named “Selrite Foods” to broaden their purchasing power and meet the competition. Bruha was the original president of the organization and for many years oversaw its growth to some 45 stores in the La Crosse and Eau Claire areas.

The chain stores of the 1930s and 1940s and the newer, larger “supermarkets” of the 1950s forced independent grocers like Bruha to make changes to their businesses. While they remained small neighborhood stores, proprietors responded to the competition by becoming mostly self-service, stocking more pre-packaged items, and purchasing freezers to market frozen foods. Anton Bruha still offered home delivery service in the early 1950s, but after he died in 1955, his sons Joseph and Charles started to phase it out. By then, most people preferred to drive their cars to the bigger stores that had a larger selection, to gather a week’s supply of food in their grocery cart, and pay for the purchase in cash.

When the Bruha grocery store shut its doors for the last time in 1981, Anton’s son Charles was the sole proprietor. He was featured in a La Crosse Tribune article about the closing of the store. In the photo accompanying the story, the 83-year-old Charles was shown weighing some groceries on this early twentieth-century scale. Manufactured by the Detroit Automatic Scale Company, it is made of cast iron, brass, and glass and features a fan-shaped indicator, a balance arm and counterweight, and a wire basket for holding the customer’s purchase. This much-used scale was donated to the La Crosse County Historical Society by the Thomas C. Bruha family in 1996.

This article was originally published in the La Crosse Tribune on July 16, 2021.

This object can be viewed in our online collections database by clicking here.

Lyle Monti's ID Badge

Amy Vach

Catalog Number: 2021.005.01

This small round yellow identification badge was worn by Lyle Monti while employed at the Bump Pump Company of La Crosse. Instead of displaying Monti’s name and position title like most work badges do today, this badge instead bears a small square photo of him standing in front of a height chart. The metal ID badge has a leather backing and a clip to attach it to the employee’s clothing.

Monti was born in 1911 to Herman and Nellie Monti in Fairchild, WI. Monti followed his brother, Ervin, to La Crosse, where he briefly worked for the Bump Pump Company, where he would have worn this identification badge in the mid-to-late 1940s. Monti followed in the footsteps of his brother Ervin and worked as a tool and die maker.

The Bump Pump Company was George Bump’s third name for his manufacturing company. George Bump came to La Crosse around 1910 and started Bump’s Paper Fastener Company to manufacture paper fasteners. As Bump’s list of inventions continued to grow, he reorganized his business to include the new items like a carburetor adjusting mechanism, an air compressor, and a pencil holder under Bump’s Manufacturing Company. The Bump Pump Company was the final reorganization of the company when production shifted to manufacturing pumps.

During World War II, Bump Pump’s staff grew to keep up with the supply and demand of war-time manufacturing. In 1941, the company employed approximately 30 people, but by 1944 Bump Pump employed 200 people. During this time, manufacturing focus shifted to parts for land and amphibian tanks, aircraft, and guns.

In the 1948 La Crosse City Directory, Monti is listed as working at Allis Chalmers, where he would continue working until his retirement. Bump Pump Company’s La Crosse plant closed in the 1950s when it was purchased by the Ulrich Manufacturing Company.

This identification badge was recently donated to the La Crosse County Historical Society by Monti’s son, Gerald.

This article was originally published in the La Crosse Tribune on May 28, 2021.

This object can be viewed in our online collections database by clicking here.

Walter Brown’s Sheet Music

Carol Mullen

Catalog Number: 1945.018.47

This piece of 19th century sheet music was composed by Walter Brown, an early resident of La Crosse. The ornate cover of “I Love But Thee” mirrors the sentimental lyrics of Walter’s 1881 composition.

The piece is dedicated to Emma Abbott of the Grand English Opera Company. Abbott was an operatic soprano of the era, famed throughout Europe and the U.S. She and her husband Eugene Wetherall toured America from 1878 until Emma’s untimely death in 1891.

It is unknown if Emma Abbott performed Walter Brown’s song, or even heard of it. She often included popular music along with opera in her repertoire, which the public appreciated. Brown may have heard her sing in another city, or even in La Crosse where the Pomeroy Opera House had opened in 1878.

Walter Brown was one of La Crosse’s early settlers, arriving as a young man on the steamboat Nominee in 1851. He was born in Cuba and had trained in the hardware business in Connecticut. His future wife Abby Whitney came to La Crosse with her family from Massachusetts shortly afterward. Walter and Abby were part of La Crosse’s 1854 resident list, under “Single Men” and “Single Women.” They married in September 1855.

Walter began a hardware business on the riverfront, in partnership with W. E. Fales and later W. W. Jones. His wooden storefront burned in fires that ravaged early La Crosse’s business district in 1855 and 1864. He became an insurance agent in 1866, a career he would follow until his retirement. He had also invested in land as an early resident, and sold real estate.

Walter and Abby became writers in retirement. The back cover of the sheet music promotes two novels. “Mitylene”, written by Walter and Abby jointly in 1879, and “Can She Atone?” written by Abby independently in 1880.

“Mitylene”, subtitled “A Tale of New England and the Tropics”, is about a man, his daughters, and their physician shipwrecked on an uninhabited Pacific island. With elaborate prose, it told a Robinson Crusoe like story of their life on the island and eventual rescue. The book was highly popular in its time.

Abby’s book, “Can She Atone?” is about a woman who had a child out of wedlock, fell upon hard times, but eventually married a kind man. The story was fairly realistic, and sold widely throughout America and Britain in its day. It is currently available in reprinted editions because of its significance in women’s literature.

Walter appeared proud of his wife’s accomplishments. In La Crosse’s 1893 City Directory, he was listed as “real estate and author”. Abby had a separate listing at the same address as “authoress.”

Walter died in 1901, Abby in 1911. They are buried together in Oak Grove Cemetery. The couple had no children, or at least none that outlived them. Abby’s obituary lists a nephew as sole survivor.

The cover of “I Love But Thee” includes an inscription from Walter to Miss Inez Cooley. In 1945 now Inez Brayton, she donated the sheet music to La Crosse County Historical Society.

This article was originally published in the La Crosse Tribune on May 1, 2021.

This object can be viewed in our online collections database by clicking here.

Helen Hoeft, a pioneer in photo finishing

Robert Mullen

Catalog Number: 2021.009.01

Remember looking at all of those old black and white photos that were in Grandma’s photo album? You know, the pictures with a white border around them and maybe a fancy deckled edge?

Most families have some of these old photos stored away. They date from the 1920s through the 1970s, and were taken with an inexpensive camera that held a roll of film. When grandma finished the roll of film, she sent it out to be processed at a photo finishing plant.

La Crosse was fortunate enough to have a lot of photo processors in those days. Photographers from all over the Midwest mailed their rolls of film to one of the La Crosse firms. Within a week, they received an envelope like the one shown here and had their negatives and prints in hand.

This envelope, from the 1950s, was from Ray’s Photo Service, one of the most successful photo finishing companies in the city, and one of the first in the country.

Ray’s was the brainchild of Helen Mae Hoeft. She and Millard Reynolds began a portrait studio and photo finishing operation in La Crosse in 1920. When a competitor drastically cut prices four years later, Hoeft’s and Reynolds’ business seemed doomed for failure.

It was then that Helen conceived of the idea of offering a mail order service. She convinced her business partner to help pay for advertising in various magazines and newspapers around the country. Send in a roll of film, along with twenty-five cents, and Ray’s Photo Service will process and print your pictures and return them to you in the mail.

Things looked pretty bleak after their initial efforts. Helen actually moved to Chicago to work as a waitress. According to her story reported in a 1954 La Crosse Tribune article, she came home after her first exhausting day at the Chicago restaurant to find a telegram from Reynolds: “Twenty sacks of government mail in front of the store. Come back. I’m panicky.”

She took the next train back to La Crosse. They quickly hired some additional employees, set up their equipment, and began a brisk business that lasted for decades. She said it was not uncommon to receive over 1500 rolls of film a day; that’s nearly $400 in quarters.

Hoeft claimed that their business was the first in the country to offer mail order film processing. Others copied the format, with dozens of similar companies across the country entering the field over the next several years. La Crosse became known as a center for film processing, and soon had as many as fifteen such businesses. Besides Ray’s Photo Service (known locally as Paramount Studio) other local firms were named Universal, Century, Club, Radio Film, Moen Photo, and American Studio, among others. They all advertised regionally or nationally.

Helen purchased full ownership of Ray’s in 1942 and ran the firm until she retired in 1955. The company continued at its 225 Main Street address until 1983.

Known as a pioneer in the photo finishing industry, Helen Hoeft would likely be astonished to see the instant digital photography of 2021. Of course, many millennials are equally astonished by the time and effort required to create photos back in the twentieth century.

This article was originally published in the La Crosse Tribune on March 26, 2021.

This object can be viewed in our online collections database by clicking here.

Ice Fishing Scene on Lake Onalaska

Robert Mullen

Catalog Number: 2021.016.01

Drive north or south of La Crosse along the river these days, and you will see many signs of one of our area’s favorite winter recreations, ice fishing.

The thick ice created by February’s stretch of below-zero weather has brought many intrepid fishermen onto the frozen river. It’s a good time to chill out, breathe in the fresh winter air of the Upper Mississippi, and get away from the hustle and bustle of the rest of the world.

The basic gear needed for ice fishing is simple: warm clothes, a fishing pole with line and bait, and an auger to cut a hole in the ice. Those high-tech electronic fishing devices are not necessary to have an enjoyable day, whether or not any fish are caught.

This watercolor painting depicting ice fishing on Lake Onalaska was painted in 1987 by local artist Jean Amundson. It shows an unidentified person in a heavy parka and boots sitting on a plastic bucket and holding a short ice fishing rod. An ice strainer, a bait holder, and a bucket for holding the day’s catch lie next to the fisherman.

In the background is an old, well-used wooden ice fishing shack standing on the solid river. A chimney from a wood stove pokes out and up from the wall and a small supply of kindling sits outside the open door, though no smoke appears above the stack. It must have been a warm day because the fisherman, perhaps the artist herself, is sitting outside the shelter. The painting captures a reflective moment of ice fishing on a quiet, overcast day.

Jean Amundson was a popular actress in the La Crosse Community Theater for many years, but she was also an accomplished watercolor artist who painted local scenes and showed her work in area venues.

She and her husband, Herbert Amundson lived in La Crosse, but had a second residence in Dakota, Minnesota near the Mississippi River and Lake Onalaska. Herb’s name appears on the primitive sign hanging on the ice fishing house.

Jean Amundson passed away in 2007, but her paintings still hang in many area homes. This watercolor was recently donated to the La Crosse County Historical Society and is now a part of their collection of works by local artists. 

This article was originally published in the La Crosse Tribune on February 26, 2021.

This object can be viewed in our online collections database by clicking here.

Sprinkler Unit Made in La Crosse

Amy Vach

Catalog Number: 2021.002.01

With all of this snow and dropping temperatures, it’s pleasant to imagine a warm summer day working outside.

This handy Aim-Spray “sprinkler unit” designed and manufactured in La Crosse was just the thing to help water your lawn, or so two La Crosse residents thought. In 1949, Philip Dyer of 1716 Winnebago St. and Robert Dummer of 936 Ferry St. joined forces to eliminate the several hours a week that they were wasting standing outside holding the garden hose to water their lawns and plants.

Dyer and Dummer separately drew up plans for an invention that would hold the garden hose in a locked position. When the pair met to share their designs, they were shocked to see how similar their drawings were.

That same year, they applied for a patent; however, the patent office had a backlog of over 135,000 patent applications. Eventually, on March 31, 1951, they were granted their patent.

An April 1950 La Crosse Tribune article describes the Aim-Spray as resembling “a giant firecracker, with an adjustable clamp replacing the fuse. The base is 1½ inches in diameter and 20 inches high, with a spike on the bottom to anchor the holder in the ground and an adjustable clamp on top to hold any size hose. The hose holder weighs only nine ounces.”

A month later, an advertisement in the La Crosse Tribune for the new invention with a small graphic showed how the Aim-Spray functioned. The Aim-Spray could be purchased for $1 in select hardware stores or by mail order for $1.20.

Aim-Spray Co. operated out of the Rivoli Building in downtown La Crosse. At this time, Dyer was working as a manager at the Strand Theater, and Dummer was working at Trane Company. Later in life, Dyer worked as the sales manager at WKTY, whereas Dummer continued working for Trane Co.

Another advertisement appeared in a 1951 La Crosse Tribune, and that seems to be the last time that Aim-Spray Co. advertised in the paper. Aim-Spray Co. did not make it into the La Crosse City Directory listings for the Rivoli Building, possibly meaning that this company did not last long after receiving its patent.

This hose-holder was recently donated to the La Crosse County Historical Society by Carol and Mark Francksen.

This article was originally published in the La Crosse Tribune on January 31, 2020

This object can be viewed in our online collections database by clicking here.