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Cooperage is topic of Monti Historical Society meeting
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Gary and Jim Hess will present the story of The Frank J. Hess and Sons Cooperage, the last cooperage in America to manufacture white oak beer kegs, for the Jan. 22 meeting of the Monticello Historical Society.
MONTICELLO - The Monticello Historical Society's general meeting will begin at 7 p.m. on Thursday, Jan. 22, in the North Room of the Zwingli Church in Monticello. This month's program will feature Gary and Jim Hess who will be speaking about the Frank J. Hess and Sons Cooperage. Closed in 1966, the Frank J. Hess and Sons Cooperage was Wisconsin's largest independent cooperage and the last cooperage in America to manufacture white oak beer kegs.

Frank J. Hess Sr. was born in southern Bohemia on April 10, 1870. At age 14 he wanted to learn the cooperage trade. A cooper is a barrel maker. So he served a 3-year cooperage apprenticeship at the Pilsner Brewery in Pilsen, Bohemia. At age 19 he immigrated to America by ship and by train to Chicago. He worked as a cooper manufacturing white oak beer kegs for a short time in Chicago and Prairie du Chien. In Prairie du Chien he married, Anna Stluka, and started his family.

Then in 1904, Henry Fauerbach of the Fauerbach Brewery in Madison, persuaded Hess to move to Madison to start an independent cooperage business. That business, The Frank J. Hess and Sons Cooperage factory, was on Schenk's corners for 62 years. They manufactured and repaired beer kegs for the Fauerbach, Hausmann, Breckheimer, Brunkow and Mueller, Potosi, Stork, Slinger, Rhinelander, Portage, Baraboo, Sauk City, Columbus, Watertown, Janesville, Duluth, Jefferson, and Monroe breweries and breweries in Iowa, New York and Baltimore. Members and the public are encouraged to attend this presentation.

The general meeting begins at 7 p.m. with the program to follow at 7:15 p.m. Along with a the presentation will be barrel parts, tools and barrels from the original cooperage.