Читать книгу Memoirs of Milwaukee County, Volume 5 - Josiah Seymour Currey - Страница 28

Frank S. Rost, for a third of a century identified with the William Frankfurth Hardware Company of Milwaukee, of which he is the vice president, entered the employ of this concern as a traveling salesman and through various promotions has reached his present official position, his expanding powers making him a forceful factor in the commercial circles of the city. Mr. Rost was born in Richmond, Indiana, November 18, 1862, a son of Fred F. and Anna (Houdoff) Rost, both of whom were natives of Germany. The father's birth occurred at Bismarck, Prussia, while the mother was born near Bremen. They came with their respective parents to the United States in the winter of 1848-9, crossing the Atlantic on a sailing vessel which had a stormy and hazardous voyage. At length, however, they reached an American port in safety and made their way westward to Defiance, Ohio, later became residents of Dayton, Ohio, and eventually established their home in Richmond, Indiana, in 1859. There Mrs. Anna Rost is still living at the advanced age of eighty-two years, enjoying excellent health and remaining very active, her physical and mental faculties being unimpaired. The grandfather in the paternal line was John C. Rost, a skilled musician who played all kinds of instruments. He was a member of the Richmond band during the Civil war and his son, Fred F., was also connected with that musical organization. It was the result of political activity in opposition to militaristic dominance and lack of freedom in Germany that brought John C. Rost and his family to the new world and thus Fred F. Rost, reared under the parental roof, became a cigar manufacturer of Richmond, Indiana, where for many years the family name has figured prominently in business circles.

Frank S. Rost was educated in the public schools of his native city until graduated from the high school with the class of 1880. Of this school Jane Grey Holcomb, who was at that time its principal, is still living, at the notable old age of ninety-one years. After leaving school Mr. Rost worked in the shops of a corn planter factory in Richmond for a year or more and in November, 1881, he went to Dubuque, Iowa, for the purpose of securing employment in that city. After a search for work for more than two months he was driven almost to despair, when one morning he picked up a paper and found an advertisement saying if Mr. Rost was still in the city he would learn something to his advantage by calling at a designated place. It seemed that soon after his arrival in Dubuque he had formed an acquaintance who had inserted the advertisement and when Mr. Rost presented himself to the Great Western Orchestra — as designated in the paper — his friend told him that he might secure a position as a member thereof. Having played the violin from the age of seven years he was proficient with that instrument and continued a member of the orchestra for some time. In January, 1882, he turned his attention to commercial pursuits by entering the hardware store of Schreiber, Conchar & Company, there remaining for a period of three years. In July, 1884, he left this concern with the intention of going to college, but circumstances later prevented him from carrying out his plan and he made arrangements to enter the employ of the Pullman Company. However, upon returning to Dubuque, Iowa, he was prevailed upon to travel for a hardware concern — the firm of Andrew, Tredway & Sons — whom he represented on the road for three years in northern Iowa and southern Minnesota.

It was on the 1st of January, 1888, that Mr. Rost came to Milwaukee and became commercial traveler for the William Frankfurth Hardware Company, whom he represented in the same territory for three years. He was then called into the house to take charge of the house furnishings department and was likewise made buyer of agricultural implements and dairy goods. He was connected with these departments for about thirty years and in 1915 was elected to the vice presidency of the company, having become a stockholder and one of the directors in January, 1895. As a boy it was always his ambition to become a lawyer and one day in 1907 when he was lying under a big willow tree at Beaver Lake dreaming of his boyhood and thinking of his aspirations in early days he made up his mind to take up the study of law and following his return to the city entered the Milwaukee Law School in the month of September, 1907. For three years he attended the school and in July, 1910, passed the bar examination at Madison, thus becoming a full-fledged attorney. He has never practiced law a day in his life, but his knowledge of the principles of jurisprudence has proven a great asset to him in his business and he has never regretted carrying out his boyhood ambition. He is a member of the Milwaukee Bar Association.

On the 6th of January, 1887, Mr. Rost was married in Dubuque, Iowa, to Miss Martha Wunderlich of that city, and they now have two children: Erminie, who is now Mrs. Lewis Sherman of Milwaukee; and Nadj, who is now Mrs. George N. Arpin of Minneapolis. In club circles and in other organized efforts Mr. Rost is well-known. He belongs to the Wisconsin Club, the Milwaukee Athletic Club and the Rotary Club. He is chairman of the boys work committee of the Milwaukee Rotary Club and as a member of the Association of Commerce has served on the board of directors for several years. He belongs to the Masonic fraternity, in which he has attained the thirty-second degree of the Scottish Rite and he is also a member of Tripoli Temple of the Mystic Shrine. During the war period he participated in fourteen different drives and was vice chairman and later chairman of Group 10. In this work he was particularly active and his labors were most effective. He has been a member of the Milwaukee council of the Boy Scouts for several years and was recently elected vice president. He takes the keenest interest in everything that has to do with the welfare of the youth and believes in safeguarding the boys by giving them a vent for physical energy and activity in well devised and carefully directed sports and pleasures. He is a close student of the boy problem and his work in this connection is of practical value.