Teichgraeber, Bernhard

The following data is extracted from A Standard History of Kansas and Kansans.

Bernhard Teichgraeber is now sole proprietor of the City Mill and Elevator Company at Emporia. Any institution whose wheels have been turning and whose machinery had been grinding out a useful product for daily consumption during a period of thirty years or more had more than ordinary interest and associations. This is particularly true of the City Mill and Elevator Company of Emporia, which was established prior to 1886 by Doctor Armour, and is one of the landmarks of the city.

Its present owner is a practical miller, a profession which had run in the family for several generations, and he had been a resident of Kansas more or less continuously for about thirty years.

He is of German origin and birth, born in Saxony, Germany, June 12, 1861. His father, William August Teichgraeber, who was also a miller, was born in Saxony in 1820 and died there in 1878. He was a member of the Lutheran Church. The maiden name of the mother was Antonia Fisher, who was born in Saxony in 1832 and died there in 1873. Their children all came to America, and a brief record of them is as follows: Theodore, a miller, died at Lindsborg, Kansas, at the age of fifty-six; Wilhelmina, wife of William Unger, a retired resident at Salina, Kansas; Bertha, wife of Herman Winkler, a farmer at California, Missouri; Richard, in the milling and cattle business at Eureka, Kansas; Bernhard; William, a miller at Gypsum City, Kansas; Emil, who was formerly one of the owners of the City Mill and Elevator Company at Emporia and who died there in 1908; and Mary, wife of Charles Balmyer, who is boiler inspector for the Kansas City Southern Railway, and resided at Kansas City, Kansas.

Bernhard Teichgraeber lived in Saxony until he was twenty-four years of age. He acquired a practical education, also some vocational training, and served the regular term in the German army from 1881 to 1883.

Coming to America in 1885 his first location was at Leavenworth, Kansas, where he spent about nine months in the carriage business and then for another nine months was in the same industry at Jefferson City, Missouri. After that he was connected with the milling business at Eureka, Kansas, until 1887. The following five years were spent in the tool business in New York City. In 1892 Mr. Teichgraeber returned to Eureka, Kansas, resuming the milling business, but in a short time went to Gypsum City, Kansas, and was a popular miller in that city for nineteen years. In 1911 he came to Emporia and bought the City Mill and Elevator Company from John Kliver and Mrs. Emil Teichgraeber, the widow of his brother. The mill is located on the Santa Fe Railroad between Commercial and Mechanic streets and had a capacity of 175 barrels of flour per day and twenty tons of corn feed. The flour manufactured by these mills had a high standard of excellence and much of it is shipped to such distant markets as Galveston and New Orleans.

Mr. Teichgraeber is a deacon in the Lutheran Church, is a republican, member of the Emporia Country Club, and is affiliated with Emporia Lodge No. 633, Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks, and Emporia Lodge No. 2, Ancient Order of United Workmen.

He enjoys the comforts of a good residence at 916 Union Street. In Brooklyn, New York, in 1887, Mr. Teichgraeber married Miss Hulda Teichmann, a daughter of the late Gottlieb Teichmann, who was a farmer. To their marriage have been born four children, who comprise a bright and very interesting family. Richard, the oldest son, was born July 10, 1890, graduated Ph. B. from the University of Chicago in 1912, and is now his father's assistant in business; William, the second child, was born April 11, 1894, spent two years in the University of Chicago, and now assists in the mill office; Otto, born January 21, 1896, is in the sophomore year at the University of Chicago; Florine, the only daughter, born November 25, 1899, is a member of the senior class in the Emporia High School.

Source: A Standard History of Kansas and Kansans

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