The Gilbert Paper Company was founded in 1886 with a capital stock of $100,000. Originally associated with George A. Whiting, William Gilbert formed a separate paper company with his sons William, Albert, Theodore and George. Built on the Lawson Canal in the year of its completion, the Gilbert Paper Mill was the third paper manufacturing operation in the city. A second paper machine was added in 1891, a third in 1919. The third expansion marked the end of the company’s dependence on water power, filling in the canal which had been the original site selection rationale. This major expansion also included offices designed by Childs & Smith of Chicago. A gatehouse was added to the complex by 1926, while the offices were expanded sometime after that date.
By the 1950s, the Gilbert Paper Company was one of the largest in Wisconsin, focused on producing high-quality cotton fiber paper for bond and ledger uses.
In 1960, the firm was purchased by the Mead Corporation.
An anonymous comment online says, “In the 1960s, my father used to tell me stories about Gilbert making paper for US currency. When this paper was produced, the Secret Service had agents on duty all the time to prevent somebody from taking any of it. Even the waste from the process was carefully guarded. An agent would accompany the wastepaper to the powerhouse and watch as my father would put the stuff into the furnace that heated the boiler. Once the paper was incinerated, which I presume did not take very long, the ashes were removed from the hotbox and the agent poked through the ashes to ensure that the wastepaper had been totally incinerated.” Another comment says the agents looked through employees’ lunchboxes before they went home.
Contract TEP-5374 for Distinctive Paper (Gilbert Paper Co.) Under Schedule No.12
Term: 12-month period beginning June 30, 1964
Most of the correspondence between the BEP and the Gilbert Paper Company involved Mike Donovan, Procurement Officer at the BEP, Washington DC and George Griffin, Vice President of Gilbert Paper Company, Menasha Wisconsin.
In a letter between the two, dated May 7 1965, George writes; Regarding our telephone conversation of today, the Gilbert Paper Company would like to be relieved of running the fourth portion of the subject contract TEP-5374.
The contract was amended from 150,000 pounds to 85,501 pounds, and from $111,750 to $63,698 on May 10 1965, and officially terminated on June 11 1965.
Gordon Kettering, who had been with Mead since 1949, was brought in as president of Gilbert Paper around 1970.
A tragic explosion occurred at Gilbert Paper Company in June 1971. Near 5:00am on June 26, a 10-foot diameter water softener exploded in the boiler room, killing seven men and injuring at least two others. According to the News-Record, a repair team from Milwaukee Local 107 of the Boilermakers Union employed by Combustion Engineering Inc., based out of Windsor, Connecticut, was working on a nearby boiler when the explosion occurred. A burst of steam filled the room, severely burning the victims. Windows in the boiler room were blown out and the force blew metal tubing and acetylene tanks through the air. The three employees who were usually assigned to the boiler room were not present and escaped injury. Menasha firemen poured water on the boilers in an attempt to reduce temperatures and pressure and causing a second explosion. There was no fire, but temperatures were high.
Gilbert president Gordon Kettering told the press, “The bottom blew out of the 10×25 foot softener. We don’t know why… We can’t operate the boiler house until we get a new water softener.” He expected everything to be up and running in one week or less. (I don’t know if it was Kettering, or the way the press asked questions, but there seemed to be a focus on the cost of operations and very little attention paid to the men who died.)
Early reports identified the men as working for the Connecticut company, suggesting they were from out of state. In fact, they all came from Wisconsin. The men who perished were:
David W. Nelson (DePere)
Norman Thompson, 60, and David J. Novy, 46 (both Manitowoc)
Emil Motel (Mason), age 47. Motel was single but had five brothers and four sisters throughout the state.
Leonard J. Marlow (Milwaukee), 57. Marlow lived at 4644 North 39th Street in Milwaukee. He was survived by wife Alice, son Raymond and daughter Jean.
Howard A. “Sam” Bodette (Sheboygan), age 57. Bodette was a single man and rented an apartment over Smiling’s Restaurant in Sheboygan. He was rarely home, though, as the job took him throughout the state.
William G. Cole (Sturgeon Bay), age 57.
Almost all of the men were taken to Theda Clark Hospital and were treated for hours or days before they perished. Bodette and Motel lingered for several days at Theda Clark before dying. Their pain must have been unimaginable. Motel was also diabetic, and the doctors had an extra challenge keeping his blood sugar stable.
The two injured but surviving were:
John C. Coleman (Nekoosa), age 44.
John F. Wellner (Francis Creek), age 61.
Wellner spoke soon after the incident, “When I heard that explosion, I thought the whole world was coming down. The first thing I thought was to get out, and the next thing after I was out was that there were guys still in there. We knew they were in there because we could hear them yelling for help.” Wellner had been working inside a steam drum 15 feet up, which he credited with protecting him. When asked about the men, he said, “I’ve been working with some of these guys for 25 years and I didn’t even know them.” He said they were unrecognizable as they were brought out – they had on goggles and hard hats, but that did very little to help them. Wellner expected to be back on the job in under one week.
On the morning of June 28, Kettering gave an update: “We have been busy investigating the cause of the explosion with our insurance people, and we have brought in outside consultants. Until we have all the information, we won’t have a report on what caused it… Our main concern is with the people injured; we feel it was a terrible thing.”
August 7, 1971: A preliminary report came back blaming the explosion on corrosion of the water softener. The insurance company was still trying to determine the cause of the corrosion.
Cornelius Rippl was the city fire chief at the time.
In 1995, retiring Fire Chief Thomas Miller recalled the explosion as the biggest incident of his career. He remembered the confusion when fire fighters arrived at Gilbert Paper Company that morning. There was no smoke. No fire. And the mill was not extensively damaged.
August 2001, Mead Corp and Westvaco Corp merged in a $3 billion deal designed to forge two midsize paper companies into a more formidable global competitor. The deal called for Mead shareholders to own 50.2% of the new company and receive one share in MeadWestvaco for each Mead share, plus $1.20 per share in cash. Westvaco shareholders would own 49.8% of the new company and would receive 0.97 shares for each share held.
Gilbert Paper was purchased in October 2001 by the Fox River Paper Company (an Appleton-based company since 1883). After being purchased, the paper mill closed at the end of November 2001. 170-300 people were employed there (different contemporary articles gave different numbers). Mead (Gilbert’s parent) also acquired a 20% interest in Fox River Paper.
The mill was demolished a few years later. Some Gilbert employees were able to find jobs at NewPage (Midtec) in Kimberly, but that paper mill went down in 2008. (The Appleton Coated paper mill in Combined Locks went down in 2017 but was revived the following year.)
The smokestack at the former Gilbert Paper mill in Menasha stood tall since 1887 but was demolished in January 2014 after 127 years to make way for a new development and riverfront trail.
All that remains of the mill and its history are a small gatehouse and the company office building, which presently serves as office space.