While Neenah and Menasha became well-known for making many kinds of paper, other industries, like the Jersild Knitting Company, made an abundance of different products. Early foundries, like the Bergstrom Stove Company, began to specialize, producing a full line of stoves, for both cooking and heating. And as communities like Menasha improved their streets, the Aylward Sons' Foundry branched off from stoves, and into municipal castings, like storm sewers to drain newly-paved roads. Ed Aylward would split off from the family company, and start what would become the Neenah Foundry, which grew to be one of the largest in the state. And as cities around the country installed water and sewer systems, manhole covers, from the Neenah Foundry, became an iconic part of the streetscape, in all 50 states, and many countries.
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The George Banta Publishing Company was started by George Banta, Senior, and greatly expanded by his son, George, Junior. But it was his mother, Ellen Pleasants Banta, who took the first steps to grow the business, which became one of the largest printing companies in the country. It all began in George and Ellen's home, where George printed forms for his insurance business with a small press on the dining room table. Eventually, Ellen convinced him to start a storefront business in Menasha, which grew with local trade. He had some health challenges and so he would go off to the Southwest, sometimes for months at a time. So, it fell to his wife, Ellen, to take over running the company. And this was unheard of at the time for a woman to run any kind of enterprise. One of her brothers had moved east, and got in on the ground floor of Quaker Oats. And he saw an opportunity, in his position there, to throw some business in the direction of his sister. So when they were set to come up, Mrs. Banta came in and told everybody, "You run every print press in the plant." Just take paper-- blank paper, used paper, whatever-- and run it through whatever number of presses they had at the time so that they looked exceedingly busy. And here was this din of activity and stuff going on! And, as the story goes, the Quaker Oats people said, "Man, if they're doing this up here, they really must know what they're doing." And so, it was this sham that got them their first big break. But it was Mrs. Banta who did it. George Banta Publishing would soon become a national leader in printing books for schools, universities, and the military. But it was a contract to print soap wrappers that helped to launch another industry, the Menasha Printing and Carton Company. Purchasing its own equipment, the company expanded into printing millions of bread wrappers. And after the National Biscuit Company first packaged their Uneeda crackers in a printed paperboard box, Menasha Printing and Carton joined a growing revolution in food packaging. They focused next on making printed cartons for ice cream makers, and also cartons for butter makers, nationwide. The business bought so much paper from the Marathon Corporation in Wausau that the owners there decided to buy the company. And while their name didn't survive-- In merging, Marathon moved here, which tells you how big the production was here. Marathon Corporation became a major manufacturer of packaging and consumer products, like waxed paper. The packaging revolution became bad news for the Menasha Woodenware Company, as demand for wooden containers like cracker barrels and butter tubs plummeted. It's falling out of favor, you know. The world was changing, and they stumbled upon this product called "corrugated." And they were one of the first companies to invest in a corrugator. Not understanding a lot about it, they literally had to make a shift to this new product. So, there was a lot of production and work within those two cities that was available to almost anybody there. I kept going down to Gilbert's to put in my application, and, finally, I got a job there. I started on March 10th, 1937. I worked in the finishing room, and they would bring the reams of paper from the cutting machine. First, it was sorted to see if there were any bad spots on it. And then the ladies would fan it up and count it. And we would seal 'em up like a package. And sometimes, I would go home at Noon. We had a bowling team, and we got to go to the tournament one year in La Crosse. Gilbert used to have parties. I made a lot of nice friends. It was a lot of fun. And most of the industry were all locally-owned people. The Kimberlys and the Clarks from Kimberly-Clark lived in Neenah. And George Banta lived in Menasha. But those people met their workers and knew them on a first-name basis. They went to church. Saw them at church and the school functions and civic functions. I know my dad told me that sometimes they'd only have work for two days a week, but nobody got laid off. The connection that everybody had in making it work was very prominent in those days. You had to have people stirring the pulp. You had to have people printing the paper. You had to have everybody. Even if you were a secretary, you had a sense of ownership because it was in your town. It was in your hometown, and you were helping make it go. It was all one big operation.
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