William Edward Vogelsang  Page 627-628 - William Edward Vogelsang. One of the important and well-ordered business concerns of Grand Rapids is the Weidman-Vogelsang Lumber Company, of which the vice-president and general manager is the progressive citizen and business man whose name initiates this review and who has been a resident of Grand Rapids the greater part of the time since his childhood. Mr. Vogelsang was born at Saginaw, Michigan, March 12, 1879, and is a son of William and Amelia (Steinmann) Vogelsang, the former of whom died March 18, 1923, and the latter of whom still maintains her home in Grand Rapids. William E. Vogelsang was but one year old at the time of the family removal to Grand Rapids, and his is the second in order of birth in the family of six sons: Arthur A. is secretary of the Grand Rapids Y. M. C. A.; Omar E. is an executive in the Minneapolis offices of the Coca-Cola Company; Herbert A. is with the Berkey & Gay Furniture Company, Grand Rapids; Leander A. holds a position with Walker & Company in the city of Detroit; and Irving E. is associated with the Grand Rapids Show Case Company. The early education of William E. Vogelsang was obtained in the public schools of Grand Rapids, and while taking a course in a business college he defrayed his expenses by his service as janitor of the building. Thereafter he held various positions as bookkeeper and accountant and for five years he held the position of assistant general auditor with the G. H. Hammond Company, which was then a prominent meat packing concern at Hammond, Indiana. He next passed two years as financial man and assistant manager of the States restaurant, one of the leading concerns of its kind in the central business district of the city of Chicago, and he then returned to Grand Rapids and became an office executive and also a salesman with the Dennis Brothers Lumber Company, manufacturers of and wholesale dealers in hardwood lumber. He thereafter became a salesman for the Turtle Lake Lumber Company, of which he became manager and vice-president, an office he retained for eleven years. He was then advanced to the position of president and general manager of the company, serving in this capacity for three years, and upon selling his interest in the business he effected the organization of the Weidman-Vogelsang Lumber Company, as general manager and vice-president, of which he has been the prime force in the development of the large and prosperous business, the company being sales agents in the handling of the products of the Weidman Lumber Company, of Trout Lake, Michigan, and the Bergland Lumber Company, of Bergland, this state. John S. Weidman, Jr., president of the company, is one of the best-known and most successful representatives of the lumber industry in Michigan, where his father was a pioneer in this field of enterprise. He is president also of the Trout Creek State Bank and the Isabella County Bank, of Mount Pleasant, Michigan, is a director of a bank in the city of Marquette, is president of the Weidman Timber Company of Grand Rapids, Michigan, and is secretary and treasurer of the Bergland Lumber Company. He was the first president of the Marquette Development Bureau. Mr. Vogelsang is affiliated with the Masonic fraternity, including the Mystic Shrine, and he attends and supports the Fountain Street Baptist Church, of which his wife is an active member. He has membership in the Exchange Club of Grand Rapids, the Hamilton Club of Chicago, and the Milwaukee Athletic Club of Milwaukee, Wisconsin. In 1899 Mr. Vogelsang married Miss Evelyn Pauline Trebilcock, who was born at Woodstock, Ontario, Canada, a daughter of James Trebilcock, who was a native of England and for many years a resident of Grand Rapids, and is now deceased. Mr. and Mrs. Vogelsang have two children: Caroline Fay is the wife of Sumner A. Terry, of Detroit, and they have one child, Patricia Ann. James William is, in 1926, a student in the Central High School of Grand Rapids.

Transcriber: Nancy Myers
Created: 30 December 2002