George Herbert Elwell, Sr.

Married Miss Belle Horn in Appleton, Swift County, Minn. --Mower County transcript, October 11, 1882, online. See in MEDIA.

Purveyor of the Elwell Kitchen Cabinet, a kitchen center even bigger than the usual Hoosier cabinet.

• https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn83045366/1903-11-26/ed-1/...
• https://books.google.com/books?id=zgVUAAAAMAAJ&lpg=PA629&ots=o2Pshy...

The J.T. Elwell Manufacturing Company changed its name to the Minneapolis Furniture company as reported in the St. Paul Daily Globe, July 24, 1886, Page 3, p. 3 (newspapers.com). J.T. Elwell was G.H. Elwell's older brother, and had started the furniture company which G.H. Elwell then ran.

GEORGE H. ELWELL (George Herbert Elwell) - Vol III, pg 258-262 Under the vigorous and progressive management of George H. Elwell the business of the Minneapolis Furniture Company, of which he is the president, has stead虹ly grown and developed. In other fields, too, Mr. Elwell has labored effectively and earnestly and particularly was he well known in connection with his services as a member of the Minneapolis school board. He has been a witness of the growth and development of this city almost from its inception, for he was born November 25, 1856, in what was then the village of St. Anthony. He is a son of Tallmadge and Margaret (Miller) Elwell, who were natives of the state of New York, and both came to Minnesota in 1852. Mrs. Elwell and her sister engaged in the millinery business at Stillwater from 1852 until 1854, when in a double wedding Margaret Miller became the wife of Tallmadge Elwell and the sister the wife of John P. Furber of Cottage Grove, Minnesota, the wedding ceremony being performed by the Rev. David Secomb in the First Congregational church. Tallmadge Elwell was a daguerreotyper for some years and made a number of pictures which appear in the historic section of these volumes. After devoting several years to the art he started a town site at Granite City, in Morrison county, in 1855 and there resided until 1862. The indications for success were most promising until that year, when the uprising of the Sioux and Chippewa Indians made it unsafe to remain on the frontier and Mr. Elwell abandoned his project. He then removed to Little Falls and after two years took up his abode in St. Cloud, Minnesota, where a similar period was passed, during which time he was collector of internal revenue in the employ of the government. In 1865 he became a resident of Cottage Grove, Washington county, Minnesota, where he continued until 1872 and then removed to Minneapolis, where he and his wife spent their remaining days, Mrs. Elwell passing away on the 19th of March, 1894, while Mr. Elwell survived until February 7, 1903. With his return to this city he engaged in the manufacture of spring beds, being the pioneer in this field of industry in the Northwest. Both he and his wife were members of the First Congregational church, in which they were married. They reared a family of eight children: James T., who represented the thirty-ninth district in the state senate of Minnesota; George H.; John F., of Wichita, Kansas; Rev. Robert T., who is a Congregational minister in Seattle, Washington; Susie Isabel, the wife of C. T. Rickard, proprietor of the Minneapolis School of Business; Mary Whitmore, the wife of T. N. Spaulding, living at Pasadena, California; Mattie Laura, the deceased wife of Dr. William Noyes, dean of chemistry in the University of Illinois; and Jessie Helen Campbell, the wife of Dr. William Frost, professor of bacteriology in the University of Wisconsin at Madison.

The youthful years of George H. Elwell were passed in the various towns in which the family home was maintained until he arrived in Minneapolis at the age of eighteen with the return of his parents to this city. He supplemented his public school training by a three years' course of study in Carleton College and afterward attended the University of Minnesota for a year. In early manhood he took up the profession of teaching, serving as principal of the public school at Appleton, Minnesota, from 1879 until 1882. In March of the latter year he took charge of the business of the Minneapolis Furniture Company, of which he was one of the incorporators, and became the first secretary and manager. The following year he was elected to the presidency and has since remained the executive head of the company. The business has grown steadily under his capable direction and now constitutes one of the important manufacturing enterprises of Minneapolis. The output consists of bedroom furniture and Elwell kitchen cabinets, the latter a very useful article now extensively sold. The business represents an investment of three hundred fifty thousand dollars, while the annual trade reaches approximately five hundred thousand dollars. Employment is furnished to one hundred and fifty people and the concern has steadily developed under the guiding hand of Mr. Elwell, whose systematic habits and progressive methods have brought to him a substantial measure of success.

In the fall of the same year in which he took over the business of the Minneapolis Furniture Company, Mr. Elwell was united in marriage to Miss Belle Horn, who had been one of his pupils in school. They have become the parents of five children:

1. Harold Manford Elwell, who is a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania and is now secretary of the Minneapolis Furniture Company
2. Georgia Belle, who is a graduate of the Columbia Teachers' College, taking a special course in domestic science and art, which she has taught in the East high school, and who is now supervisor of that course in the State high school, and was state supervisor of Vocational Home Economics while working in Idaho
3. Florence, now the wife of A. R. Compton of Webster, South Dakota
4. Susie Marie, who was graduated from the East high school and the State Teachers College of Duluth and is now kindergarten teacher in Minneapolis
5. George Herbert, Jr., who also completed his studies in the East high school and for one year attended the University of Minnesota. He has adopted music as his profession and is now in France.

Politically Mr. Elwell has been an earnest republican since attaining his majority, and while he has never sought or desired office as a reward for party fealty, his fellow-townsmen, recognizing his ability and fidelity to the public welfare, called upon him about fourteen years ago to serve as a member of the board of education. Immediately after his election to that position he was chosen president of the board and the period of his incumbency in the office was one of the most important in the history of the school system of this city. The schools grew rapidly under his direction, necessitating the erection of several new school buildings, and marked improvement was shown in the methods of instruction and in the introduction of new phases and features of teaching. He gave much of his thought, time and energy to the work of the schools and Minneapolis profited directly by his labors in connection with her educational system. Both Mr. and Mrs. Elwell attend the First Congregational church, in which they hold membership and in the work of which they are actively and helpfully interested. When leisure permits Mr. Elwell turns for recreation to farming instead of golf, and he also possesses a social nature which finds great joy in the companionship of friends of similar tastes and interests. He is an active member of the St. Anthony Commercial Club and the Six O'Clock Club, and he is frequently found in those gatherings where men inclined to deep research and investigation are met in the discussion of themes vital to the welfare and progress of the community, for he is not only a representative and prosperous business man but also a most public-spirited citizen.

http://files.usgwarchives.net/mn/hennepin/bios/1923/elwellgh.txt

"Big Stone County Correspondence," offered by P.M. Camp, July 26, 1880: "...We have a Sunday school which is doing nicely. George H. Elwell, son of Talmage Ellwell, formerly of Little Falls, is our superintendent." --Little Falls Transcript. July 30, 1880, p. 4

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Brother of G.H. Elwell was James T. Elwell, early settler of Anoka, Minn. and inventor of a spring mattress.

James T. Elwell and Como neighborhood of Minneapolis.

https://secomo.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/2006ComoHistoryCalend...

http://www.blainehistory.org/James_Elwell/Elwell_Poster.pdf

"The Elwell furniture factory, recently burned, near the Pillsbury elevator on Division street, East side, has been fully rebuilt on a much larger scale than before." --Daily globe, May 13, 1882, p. 2 (St. Paul, Minn.)