In the Music Room at the Muscatine Art Center
Thursday, November 5, 2015 from 5:30-6:30 p.m.
FREE ADMISSION
Historian Tom Rasmussen and author Judith Healy will present "The Weyerhaeusers and the Mussers," explaining the important relationship between Peter Musser and Frederick Weyerhaeuser both as partners in the lumber business and good friends. The program, held on Thursday, November 5th at 5:30 p.m. in the Art Center's Music Room, is free and open to the public.
Tom Rasmussen is the great-great grandson of Sarah and Frederick Weyerhaeuser and has completed extensive personal research on the Weyerhaeuser family and Judith Healy is the author of the book, Frederick Weyerhaeuser and the American West (2013). Using amazing photographs of bygone days, of forests and villages and family celebrations, Rasmussen and Healy will present the story of these two self-made timbermen both of whom were as much family men as business men.
The history of Frederick Weyerhaeuser is also the history of the settling of the Midwest. A towering figure of the later decades of the 1800s, Frederick Weyerhaeuser made his fortune by founding and growing a timber business that depended on the mighty Mississippi. Although he made his home in Rock Island, his business affected the Iowa side of the border as much as the Illinois side, and all was fed by the timber his men took out of the Wisconsin forests.
In the book, Frederick Weyerhaeuser and the American West, Judith Healey presents Weyerhaeuser as a successful businessman and family man. With only six years of formal schooling himself, Weyerhaeuser sent his children to eastern colleges, and in his later years, became a philanthropist who generously supported projects locally and in his native German village.
Peter Musser was one of Muscatine's leading citizens. Born in Pennsylvania of Swiss and English parentage, his connection with the Iowa lumber trade began in the early 1870s. Musser was head of a saw mill which produced 40 million feet of lumber annually. He was also a large holder of Minnesota and Wisconsin timber lands and an active logging trader. Throughout the northwest, he was known for his farsighted business judgment.
In his northern ventures, Peter Musser was an associate of Frederick Weyerhaeuser, whose pioneer enterprise in timber tracts along the upper Mississippi and its tributaries made him nationally known as "Lumber King of the Northwest." Musser and Weyerhaeuser jointly located their two sons - Drew Musser and Charles Weyerhaeuser - in Little Falls, Minnesota to run a lumber operation. The two sons built mansion side-by-side - today, both homes are listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The Weyerhaeuser mansion is open as the Linden Hill Historic Museum.
The program on November 5th is free and open to the public. Reservations are not required. Please contact Melanie Alexander, Director, with any questions or concerns at 563-263-8282 or by email at malexander@muscatineiowa.gov.
The Muscatine Art Center is located at 1314 Mulberry Avenue in Muscatine, Iowa. Hours are Tuesday through Friday from 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m., Thursday evenings until 7:00 p.m., and Saturday and Sunday from 1:00 to 5:00 p.m. Admission is free. Donations are appreciated. Visit www.muscatineartcenter.org for more information about programs and events and to download a class brochure.
