Wichita eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1886-1890, 1889-03-17
A MILLION MORE DOLLARS.
Superior Pressed Brick for the Entire State.

Wichita has secured and developed
| through her enterprise and encourage
ment number of industries whose mag
niIude is little dreamed of by the citizens
| of the older cities. They acknowledge
that some way or another it has actually
| happened that great city, whose thriv-
| ing throbs stirs the commercial life of the
| entire state is located on the Little and
Great Arkansas rivers. that such city's
trade, as disclosed by the weekly clearing
| house reports, is from two to four times
that of any other city in Kansas, yet,
after all, and all the while they are
half persuaded that there is in it
the element of myth or bubble, that
the thing is not, cannot be real.
Not unfrequently we find men
in our own city who have no
adequate conception of the real business of
Wichita. of her freight tonnage, of the ag-
gregate of her annual sales in any of the
prominent mercantile lines. or Of the ex-
tent or number of really great industries
which are Furnishing and growing all
around them.
These reflections come when, by accident
yesterday, we run on to some of the fig
operations of the Forrest City Pressed
Brick Co., which figures will prove in
structiye if not entertaining. The above
company have at big salary secured the
services as gen eral manager, Emil Fern
holtZ. of St. Louis, who is not only one Of
the best known pressed brick men in the
west, but an experienced machinist whose
fourteen years Of successful work in
pressed brick manufacture at ST. Louis,
makes the company perfectly secure in
their greatcontracts. Under the direction
of Fernholtz and his able assistants the
yards and Kennedy machines have all been
thoroughly overhauled, new machines
added, repairing lathes put in and the
work for the summer already fairly begun.
Yesterday thirty7nine thousand nine hun
dred and thirty bricks, perfect in every
particular, were turned out and set in
kiln. Forty thousand fine pressed brick
and ten thousand common mud brick is
the capacity of the works. The mud brick
are for ordinary brick work and are made
for the top and side courses Of the burn
ings. The company have started out to
make ten millions Of brick this year and
two hundred thousand of extra fine trout
and architectural bricks. They have
already contracted upwards of four mill
lion, the biggest per cent of them for
this city. The company employs sixty
men and ten teams constantly. The
kilns consume thirty car loads of coal and
fifteen car loads of wood per month, or al
most two car loads of fuel for every work
ing day. They have the contract for all
the brick which go into the sewers and
in the county building. and orders are re-
ceived every day for this and adjoining
cities. The officers Of this great enter
prise. the operations of which this season
viii represent round million of dollars,
is William Matthewson, president. of the
Savings bank, whose enterprise, liberality
and energy are recognized and admitted
by friend and foe. The secretary and
treasurer is c. G. Curtis. The office of the
company is at $50 North Main, with f. F.
Lewis as salesman. In short this one con-
Germ, with only sixty men employed, will
produce this season a product whose cash
value will not be less than a million dol