Omaha Folklore Project: Interview with Daniel R. Gruenig

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-Barbara Gruenig (BG): The following is an interview between

Mr. Daniel Gruenig and Barb Gruenig on December 5th, 1976.

You've lived in Omaha all your life, haven't you?

-Daniel R. Gruenig (DG): Yes, I lived in Omaha all my life.

I was born in 1895.

My parents came to Omaha

in the late 186s.

-BG: Did they come from Europe, come over from Europe?

-DG: My father came from Europe, Darmstadt, Germany

and my mother was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

Then they moved from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

to the dells of Wisconsin and

my father landed in Philadelphia

from Germany and went into partnership with a party there

in the cigar making business but evidently

the partnership did not work out satisfactorily,

so my father left Philadelphia, taking with him

a trunk filled with tobacco and forms to make cigars

and paid his way by boat from the Philadelphia

down to the Mississippi River and up the Mississippi

and then Missouri River and landed in Omaha

at what would be now about Eighth and Douglas Street.

He immediately inquired of some people

where he might be able to rent a house.

Someone advised him that there was a two room house

available at would be about where the Burns Station

is today to the west of 16th Street.

He rented the house and immediately started making cigars.

And he was selling cigars about town

and walked out to Fort Omaha.

Fort Omaha then had a lot of soldiers

because of the Indian problems.

In his trip from downtown up to Fort Omaha,

many occasions when the Indians followed him

and stopped him and he gave them cigars,

which evidently they didn't want because he said

they just took em and tore em up.

I think that they wanted money to buy firewater with.

There were two farmhouses from downtown out to the fort

and father would have to stop at one of those houses

waiting for the Indians to disperse.

Sometimes he had to stay one or two days.

-BG: Was that the only fort in Omaha, or was there?

-DG: No, we had a Fort Crook, it was south of Omaha

where father also made trips to

to sell cigars and during the course of time

he eventually built a store at Ninth and Capitol Avenue.

There were two storerooms and two flats on the second floor

and then he started in the grocery business

and seemingly was very successful.

The covered wagons going west invariably came across

the river by ferry and empty

and were filled up with goods, having purchased

many of them from my father's store.

Father told me that most of the money

was in gold pieces.

-BG: They paid in cash?

Well how did your mother get to Omaha?

-DG: Mother as I said before was in the dells of Wisconsin.

Her mother and father received a letter

from their mother and father from England

that their two parents were going to be coming

to the United States on their way to Salt Lake,

having been sold the idea of the Seventh Day Adventists

and they wanted, they wrote in the letter asking

that my grandmother and father

and my mother and several other children,

would they meet them in Omaha, Nebraska?

And so my grandmother and grandfather loaded the family

into a covered wagon and they drove from the dells

of Wisconsin to Omaha, arriving as I said before

in the late 1860s.

Upon arrival in Omaha and sometime later,

having gone shopping in the grocery store a few times,

that's where my mother and father had their first meeting.

-BG: At the grocery store?

-DG: At the grocery store and then the time arrived

that in March the 11th, 1871 they were married.

-BG: How many children would they have?

-DG: Well they had six boys and six girls.

-BG: Even split.

-DG: Quite a family, that's right.

-BG: Where did you live?

-DG: Where did we live?

I was born the 24th and Meredith.

Father Gruenig had bought 10 acres of ground

which would now be known as the northwest corner

of 24th and Ames Avenue.

-BG: What was the neighborhood like then?

-DG: At 24th and Ames Avenue?

-BG: Yeah.

-DG: Well the area was made up of modern homes

mostly occupied by employed people.

-BG: Well were there any ethnic influences

in your neighborhood or in different areas of Omaha?

-DG: Well there were several districts in Omaha.

There were Italians who were mostly located on Sixth Street

and 10th Street in the area of Pacific on South.

There was quite a Polish settlement

about 36th and would be Q Street.

Germans were mostly on 13th Street, South 13th Street.

Swedish, there were a lot of them in the area

of 30th and Lake Street,

they had very nice homes always kept in very good shape.

-BG: What were the central areas of Omaha at the time?

-DG: The central business districts of Omaha?

-BG: Yeah.

-DG: Oh I would say from Cummings Street south to Leavenworth

and from retail district across from 14th to 24th Street.

-BG: Were there mainly just stores, or?

-DG: Well, they were made up of type of business

that would be in most every community,

all natures of business, merchandising, clothing, shoes,

all type of department store type,

doctors, lawyers, service companies and so forth.

Our City Hall was in the city area.

Our county courthouse was also located there.

-BG: Were there any major shifts in population?

Did Omaha move at that time or was this later?

-DG: I think the major shift of population

came many years later,

possibly in the late 50s and early 60s.

-BG: What was your employment?

-DG: I was in the real estate business

and continued in that activity

until my retirement in 1967.

-BG: Well when did you get married?

-DG: Well I'd been in the army and I got out of the army

in March of 1919

and was married the following November in 1919.

-BG: Where were you stationed in the army?

-DG: I spent most of my time at Fort Omaha in Nebraska.

That's 30th and Fort Street.

Some time we had occasion to go to Fort Crook

which was south of Omaha and is now known

as SAC Headquarters.

-BG: It became the Air Force Base the year before.

When did you get your first car?

-DG: First car we got

in October of 1913.

It was known as

a B35 Buick,

a four cylinder touring car.

-BG: They didn't have sedans then?

-DG: What's that?

-BG: They didn't have sedans at that time?

-DG: No sedans at that time, they were all touring cars.

-BG: What was the traveling like?

-DG: Well traveling the roads of course

were mostly all dirt roads, some gravel.

In the towns there was some paving, mostly with rock.

We made a trip in 1919 to Denver

and even at that time the roads were still

mostly dirt roads and sand and when it rained

it was a good place to stay off of.

It took us about three days to get to Denver.

We had an enjoyable vacation.

-BG: Did they have any actually marked roads with maps?

-DG: They had at that time as I recall we had

what was known as a Lincoln Highway

and later on I believe it became

Highway Number Six.

-BG: Highway Number Six, was there any type of

public transportation in Omaha at the time?

-DG: Oh yes before that time in the beginning

of course most all transportation was by horse and wagon

or buggy, then the first public transportation was

the horse cars, which were

a vehicle built and placed on rails and hauled by horses.

-BG: Were they very big?

-DG: They were possibly 12 feet long

and maybe eight feet wide.

-BG: What kind did they have after the horse car?

-DG: Then after the horse cars came the cable cars.

The cable car was mostly restricted to downtown use.

That had headquarters of the cable car company

was at 20th and Harney Street.

When certain work was done in Greeting

and putting in some lines they discovered

where the cables ran underneath the street

and in this one particular spot they even

found the cable that was on the spool.

-BG: Was there like a motor or something that moved the cable?

-DG: Yeah it was a steam propelled motor

that causes continual run of the cable

that's hooked onto the cars

and pulled them from one place to another.

-BG: I see.

-DG: Later on the next step in the transportation

was the electrified

powered street cars.

They're the ones that had the wires above the street

and a pulley or roller

that ran onto the wires.

It was the sport of a lot of kids to get on

and then pull the cord down so the car would stop

and the motormen would have to get out

and go and put the wheel back on the wire again.

-BG: Do you remember how much it cost to ride the streetcar?

-DG: At that time it was a nickel.

When there were streetcars

and I remember riding from Florence, Nebraska.

Florence clear through to South Omaha for a nickel.

It was a great deal.

Transportation as far as street cars were concerned

were pretty good.

Then of course we have now the buses

which came after the street cars.

-BG: Well they had public transportation, did they have

a fire or police department set up at the time?

-DG: Well it was my understanding in the early days

it was all hand,

mobile hand pulled carts.

The hose was on a pull cart

and they had a pumper

and when a fire occurred there was bells that rang

or they rushed to call on the volunteers.

My father happened to be a member

of the volunteer fire department.

When a fire occurred they rushed to certain intersections

of the community or town where holes

had been excavated in the intersections and covered

where they continually kept it filled with water

and the hoses was pushed into the water

and the pump was started and that's the way

they worked to extinguish the fire.

-BG: Did the volunteer fire department have any drills

or anything, did they have meetings or what?

-DG: Well in later years I can remember that they continued

a group that were interested

in continuing the volunteer fire department

and they had meetings in the City Hall

about once a month.

-BG: Did they have a police department, too?

-DG: Well in the early days they had foot policemen,

what we called on the beat.

The walked around testing out at doors

and so forth and so forth.

-BG: Okay, what were the early politics like in Omaha?

-DG: Well Nebraska's mostly been Republican,

of course we had Democrats but our City Councils,

mayors, I think, were elected more or less

by nonpolitical systems.

Whoever filed, they were either liked or not liked

and were elected or not elected.

Omaha was really surrounded by other little communities

such as South Omaha, Dundee, Benson, and Florence.

These communities have since been annexed to Omaha.

This occurred in the early teens.

-BG: At first they just had a mayor in Omaha, didn't they?

Did they have just a mayor?

-DG: Just a mayor, I think that mayor was a top man of course

but they had some others who I think

were appointed by the mayor

for the police and the fire department

and streets and so forth.

-BG: So then from that a City Council developed?

-DG: So that's the City Council developed,

was based more or less upon our federal government status.

-BG: Do you remember anything

about the tornado on Easter Sunday?

-DG: Yes, I remember the tornado quite vividly.

It was on Easter Sunday March the 23, 1913

at around 6:00 in the evening.

I was standing on our south lawn and saw,

looking to the southwest,

the copper colored sky and clouds.

And coming in from the southwest end I heard

the fire department coming from the fire station

at 22nd and Ames Avenue

and I ran to see what was going on.

I saw the firetrucks turn south on 24th Street.

Looking south I saw flames blowing across 24th Street.

I ran to see what was going on and ran to about 24th

and Miami Streets where I was stopped by police

and firemen and ordered to leave the area

because of broken power lines and so forth.

The tornado entered the Omaha area from the southwest

and continued to northeast

and left about at the river,

the northeast part of Omaha.

-BG: Did it take a long time for people to clean up?

-DG: Well of course there was a lot that has to be done

and some were unable to do much of that at the time

but I imagine it took in many instances several weeks

to restore the solid semblance of order again.

Some of the houses never were replaced.

We'd be driving through certain sections

of the tornado area.

We would see walks leading up

to a vacant basement

but were never rebuilt and I imagine

if we looked around today we'd find some evidence

of the tornado of 1913.

-BG: Still there now.

Do you remember anything about the lynching

of Mayor Smith in 1919?

-DG: Well I'll have to tell you a little about that.

I didn't see the actual

happening of the attempted lynching of Mayor Smith.

I was visiting my wife's home

and we had been invited

to attend a friend's home at about Eighth

and Worthington Avenue

and we did go there.

These peoples' name was Mathews.

They owned the Mathews Bookstore at 17th and Harney Streets

and we were there

and left there around 4:00.

We drove west on Harney Street coming from the east

about from 10th Street

and when we arrived at the courthouse area,

17th and Harney, there was maybe 30,

40 young people and they were throwing rocks at the windows

of the south side of the courthouse.

Well we kept right on going and got out of their way

and went to my father in law's home

at 35th and Dodge Street.

-BG: Do you know why they were throwing rocks,

what started that?

-DG: The reason for that was

a white girl had been raped in Ridview Park

and the people were so excited about it.

That seemed to have been the cause of it

and they accused some of the Negro of this attack.

We had a telephone call, getting back to 35th and Dodge.

We had a telephone call from the

oh what do you call it?

Where the wires and windows and all,

the detective agency who looked after boutique windows,

that Mr. Balan had better come down to his store

and take out what jewelry he could from the windows

because of the fear of breakthrough,

which that brought us back downtown.

When we got back downtown to 16th and Farnam

the crowds were so dense.

How many thousands of people were there I would hesitate

to say but there were several thousand.

We finished getting the windows cleared out

in Mr. Balan's store and walked up to

the Omaha National Bank Building which was

the northeast corner of 17th and the front of it.

We were standing on the steps looking over the heads

of all these people who were out in the street

and firemen on 17th and on the courthouse lawn grounds

when all of a sudden some shooting occurred

and one shot came and a lead bullet hit the building

that we were standing not over 10 feet above our heads

so it was time for us to leave.

And we took off, went back down to 16th and Farnam

and while we were going down

the fire department come up

to go to 17th and onto the courthouse.

Someone had poured gasoline to the courthouse

and set fire to it.

When the fire department got about halfway

between 16th and 17th the people just took

a hold of the truck and pushed it back down the hill.

Now the street car lines on 16th Street were open

and the car line on Farnam Street was open coming west.

As we got to 16th and Farnam, street cars stopped there

and a young colored fella got off the street car

and the crowd saw him and took after him.

A street car had just crossed 16th and Farnam

going north and this colored boy saw that

and he ran so fast that he caught the streetcar

at 16th and Douglas Street, which was a block away

which was lucky for him because he would have been lynched

just because of the hatred of this mob

of people who were rioting.

-BG: Mayor Smith was trying to stop the mob,

wasn't he, when they?

-DG: Yes, Mayor Smith was trying to talk to the people.

I didn't happen to see it because we had left

but it was my understanding that during that time

that he was talking to people, some of these rioters

grabbed him and took him and actually hung him

up to crossbars on a lamppost and I can't recall

the name of the man who presumably cut him down

but he was saved by this man's help.

Now to continue about this boy, he was in the jail.

These rioters got a hold of him and they tied him up

to a pole and mutilated him.

That pole was about 18th, 19th and Harney Street.

Dodge Street from 16th Street west was being graded down

to lower the hill, it's quite a sharp hill there.

And they had taken up the street car tracks

and all these ties they had piled up there

and these rioters got down there and they made

a big pile of em and brought this colored fella

was dead I think at that time and put him on the top

of the thing and lit all these ties and had a big fire

at 17th and Dodge Street

where the Medical Arts Building is today.

-BG: Oh wow, how was Omaha

and how were you affected by the Depression

and the New Deal programs that came from it?

-DG: My situation during the Depression was

a difficult problem, as it was with the majority of people.

Many people were being foreclosed on.

Many people lost money in banks.

The WPA did help some people, at least to eat.

As to its effect on Omaha, I would say the Depression

slowed the growth of Omaha for several years.

-BG: Did the people in Omaha seem to like the New Deal,

did the programs that were set up for work

or did they seem to think it did much good?

-DG: Well of course a number of people were happy

to have what little work the WPA

and the New Deal set up for them.

-BG: Did Omaha expand quickly or was it more slow?

Were there any major industries that affected this growth?

-DG: No, Omaha enjoyed steady growth.

Omaha had and obtained many industries, to name a few:

Western Electric, Northwestern Bell,

large insurance companies, large food processing companies,

packinghouses, and the smelters.

-BG: There were the railroads, too.

Weren't there quite a few railroads in Omaha?

-DG: Yes Omaha was the center of about 15 railroad companies

which with the repair shops

and so forth these companies created a lot of employment

for the citizens of Omaha.

-BG: Okay, I think we'll end it here.

I want to thank you for this interview and time we spent.

-DG: Well I thank you and I enjoyed having you

of all people interviewing me, thanks.