CHAPTER XVI INDUSTRIES, BANKS AND NEWSPAPERS C. G. CONN, INCORPORATED CHARLES G. CONN-TWO OTHER Long ago Elkhart outgrew that stage of her industrial life when the establishment of a single manufactory caused a deep commotion in her midst. In fact, for the past few years, especially since the founding of her Industrial Association in 1906, it was only the industrious reporter who could closely note the enterprises of that nature which were continually being incorporated as elements of her progress. At the present time there are probably sixty incorporated concerns which are carrying along industries as varied in character as they are in scope. Automobiles in whole or in parts; carriages and wagons for either millionaires or sturdy farmers, for ladies or babies; band instruments of every description; medicines for man and beast; paper for books and newspapers, bristol board for artists and paper boxes for manufacturers and merchants; brass and iron work, brick and cement, and rubber, flour and cereals; ice and matches, tablets, and scales and harnesses-why, the reporter might fill a good-sized printed page with the leading manufactures produced by the industrial plants of Elkhart and then not exhaust the list. Without further anticipation, therefore, he will specially mention a few of the oldest and best known of such establishments. 360 C. G. CONN, INCORPORATED The above is the official title of the industry which has given the Conn band and orchestra instruments an international fame. That such a statement is not beyond the literal truth is evident from the fact that they were awarded four superior medals at the Panama-Pacific International Exposition, San Francisco, in the summer of 1915. The Conn exhibit won the highest honors over seven competitors, the world's best in the manufacture of instruments for bands and orchestras. CHARLES G. CONN The founder and owner of the industry is one of Elkhart's leading citizens. His father, a prominent educator of Northern Indiana, brought him as a boy to Elkhart, where he went to school for about ten years and then, still a youth, enlisted in the Union Army. Even then his musical talents earned him a position in the regimental band. Young Conn, after seeing considerable service at the front, re-enlisted in a company of Michigan sharpshooters, and within a few months had been promoted to its captaincy. He spent the last year of the war as a prisoner in Confederate prisons, and for a short time afterward engaged in business at Elkhart. But his musical talents and his mechanical gifts soon evolved a simple improvement in the cornet mouthpiece which laid the foundation of C. G. Conn, Inc. The commencement of Colonel Conn's career as a manufacturer and a public man of broad caliber is thus given by one who writes from personal knowledge: Being what might be called a practical musician, with great natural gifts in that art and greatest fondness for all its manifestations, he soon became identified with the line of manufacture which has made his name more familiar to the world at large than any other phase of his versatile career. He invented his famous "elastic face mouthpiece" for cornets, which became so popular that he could not manufacture them fast enough. Beginning his manufacturing with himself as practically the only workman and with a lathe made from a sewing machine table, he was soon compelled by rush of orders to expand every part of the industry and become the directing head of a force of employes. The story of his persistent efforts and struggles to make financial ends meet while he was getting started as a manufacturer has often been told, and is familiar to all his friends and acquaintances in Northern Indiana. Having effected a wonderful improvement on the old-style cornet by means of his mouthpiece and by dint of shrewdest sort of business management getting a foothold in the uncertain field of manufacturing enterprise, he then applied himself to the study of the cornet with a view of bringing out the highest latent powers of that instrument. He secured patent after patent, each one representing some advance toward perfection in the cornet, and in time he produced what is known to the world of music as the "Conn Cornet." All the other modern brass band instruments are also now manufactured in Mr. Conn's establishment, and their excellence may be gauged by the fact that they are used by Sousa's Band and have received the highest honors at all the recent world's expositions. The manufacturing establishment for the production of the Conn instruments is mentioned in the history of manufacturing elsewhere in this work, and at this point it is only necessary to state that this industry has become, during the last quarter of a century, one of the foremost sources of the industrial prosperity which has marked the City of Elkhart. This alone would entitle him to distinction and would be regarded a sufficient accomplishment to be called a life work by any man; yet Colonel Conn has extended his efforts to the great public questions which concern the welfare of the country, to the social and economic problems of America, and to practical humanitarianism. In the early days when his business was just emerging from a small factory into one where success seemed sure, the democratic party at Elkhart nominated him for mayor. Contrary to the general course of municipal politics up to that time, he was elected, and gave the city such a practical, progressive and beneficial administration that it is still a high standard for others to be measured by. He was re-elected to the office, and was soon slated for further advancement in political honors. A normally republican district gave him a seat on the democratic side of the lower house in Indianapolis, where he was connected with important constructive legislation and gave much attention to the solution of the labor problems. In 1892 the thirteenth district, through its representatives assembled in convention at Michigan City, placed his name on the democratic ticket as nominee for Congress. In James Dodge, also a prominent Elkhart citizen and one of the most influential republicans of the district, Mr. Conn had a worthy opponent, but the result of the hotly contested campaign was that Mr. Conn went to Washington to represent the people of this district. As congressman Colonel Conn was a man of mark from the time he took his seat, and both as a legislator and reformer left a lasting influence. It was in the field of journalism that he found the power needed in this assault upon some of the strongholds of municipal mismanagement which he found fixed upon the capital city. He purchased the Washington Times, the morning newspaper now owned by Frank A. Munsey, and instituted a campaign against vice and crime which for several years had run riot in the city. Directing his attack first upon the police association and the police force, he aroused public attention to the existing conditions and after bitter conflict, overcame the inertia of the powers for law and order, caused the dens of vice to be vacated, the gamblers driven from the city and crime reduced to a minimum. The severe strictures made upon the police force by the Times resulted in an indictment for libel against Colonel Conn, but the forces of persecution failed in their purpose and the colonel was acquitted at the trial. Having accomplished for the capital city what he started out to effect, he then sold his newspaper and returned to Elkhart. Before going to Washington he was well known in the journalistic circles of Northern Indiana, for in September, 1890, he had founded the Daily and Weekly Truth. Mr. Conn is still identified with this enterprise as proprietor, and the history of the Truth will be found elsewhere in these pages. Since his retirement from Congress he has sought no further political honors. In 1900 he supported with personal effort and money the candidacy of McKinley for President and did much to get out the largest republican vote in the history of Elkhart County. From the little plant which turned out the elastic face mouthpiece for cornets to the massive plant which covers about three acres of ground on Elkhart Avenue and the St. Joseph River involved much hard labor, as well as a long stretch of years. All the original buildings were practically wiped out of existence by fire in 1910. The structures which replaced them were of the mission type, substantial and attractive, and include the office building, the metal working factory and the bell, valve and polishing departments. The products of the plant now include flutes, clarinets, saxophones, cornets, mellophones, alto horns, trombones, tenor horns, eupho |