A Good Place to Trade

Hoplin & Nelson - The Early Years

Editor Note: Here's another of Glenn Hoplin's reminiscences, this of the early years of Hoplin & Nelson Hardware, Machinery & Furniture Company.  Again, you will need to suffer through some technical details. 

Origins – 1916 to 1929

Stark Anderson Hardware - before 1916

Editor note: In 1916, a group consisting of Ole, Esther’s father Carl and several of her brothers purchased the Lowry Hardware and Machinery Company in Lowry from Stark and Anderson.  Esther’s brother Gust had been in Lowry for a number of years and operated the Lowry Lumber Company. The move brought Ole, Esther, Esther’s parents, Carl and Sofia, and her brother David from Brandon to Lowry, occupying a large square house east of the railroad tracks.  Esther said, “The color scheme was red and yellow with green woodwork.”  She painted the woodwork white and once the furniture arrived – a brass bed, a Birdseye maple chest and dressing table and matching rocker, the house was grand.

Hoplin & Nelson after 1916.  Dave Nelson, Ole Hoplin, Warren Nelson.
[Note the ladder, ax rack sitting on ammunition boxes-with irons in the middle, tungsten spark plugs, scissors, clocks, egg beaters,stoves, kerosene cans & hand tools hanging on back wall & about 6 calendars.]

The early years of the hardware business was supplying the farm community with “honest to goodness” hardware – bolts, nails, horse harness, etc.  After the 1929 crash, credit problems were rife.  Many farms were foreclosed upon by insurance companies and financial institutions.  

During the ‘20s & ‘30s, most freight arrived by railroad. The Soo Line had a weigh freight that stopped in Lowry twice a week. The dray man would deliver the freight to the business places from the depot.  The dray man also hauled material for residents, mostly coal.  When the goods were delivered to the store warehouse, each item was marked with a selling price – generally with a markup of 25%. The cost was recorded with a cost mark – a code representing the numbers 1-10. Many people tried to break the code but most gave up.  To add confusion, when a number was repeated a B or P was used - the forerunner of the bar code. In the ‘40s, a single digit representing year of purchase was added to the cost mark   e.g.  xxx – 5. At times,  it became hard to know what decade the year code represented.  

Most merchandise was ordered from salesmen who stopped weekly. Jack Hite from Glenwood would come and stay all day. Jack was an early heating expert who would figure jobs, etc. He traveled for Janney Sample Hill Co. of Minneapolis. As kids we always knew when Jack was due in town and made it a point to appear.  Jack always had a nickel for us which bought an ice cream cone. Henry Applequist represented Farwell, Ozmun & Kirk Hardware retailer of St. Paul and was a regular as well. Walt Miller represented Marshall Wells Co. out of Duluth, however shipping from Duluth was problematic as freight had to first go to Minneapolis.  The freight costs had to be included into the cost of merchandise.  

In the ‘50s Uncle Dave invested in a dealer owned distribution center known as United Hardware Co., based in Minneapolis. Freight was brought to Lowry by cattle truck over the years by Frank Bisek, Leif Dahl, Leo Dahl, Phil Wagner and the Lundblad Brothers.  Some freight was also delivered by Raymond Truck Line, which came through Lowry twice a week.  In the late ‘50s, with the advent of the computer, merchandise was ordered by “IBM” numbers without any other description. Later an electronic device with a keyboard was used to capture orders and transmit the order by modem.

Uncle Dave was a bit of a jokester and enjoyed laying it on thick to Pete Reistad, who ran a hardware in Kensington. Pete came to Lowry complaining how terrible business was.  “We haven’t had a single customer today, not one.” Uncle Dave said, “We had one earlier today”. Pete said he would be so happy to have just one customer. Uncle Dave added, ‘Of course he brought something back”. Another time, knowing Hank Applequist was due to arrive and his first stop was always the biff in the basement, Dave smeared the toilet seat with peanut butter.

In the ‘30s, Hoplin & Nelson added the Minnesota line of farm machine, initially all horse-drawn machinery: mowers, grain binders, dump rakes. As the years progressed more machinery was added to the line – a slide rake and a manure spreader. Finally, power takeoff machinery – mowers and manure spreader.  

The hardware also sold the Minnesota brand of twine. There were three grades of twine; standard, manila and pure manila, selling for 6, 6 ½ and 7 cents per pound. The twine was packed six balls to a sack, 8 lbs per ball with 2 lbs for the sack – so nominally 50 lbs. The standard twine had 500’/lb; manila 550’/lb and pure manila 600’/lb. All the machinery and twine was produced by the Minnesota State Prison in Stillwater and delivered to Lowry in cattle trucks. The machinery came in parts and had to be assembled. Assembling a binder was a full day’s work for two men. Often times the binder would be delivered knocked down to the farmstead and assembled there. The machinery business also created an ongoing parts business which was very good until the advent of tractor machinery when parts became obsolete very quickly. There were tons of parts that went to the scrap heap.  

Editor note: In the '50s & '60s the machinery business had dwindled mainly to hog feeders and an occasional hay rake. Marian & I had feeder assembly duty. She was the brains of the operation. I was there because I was small and could get inside the hog feeder to hold the bolts. No power tool aids then.

Rural electrification came to area in the late ‘30s. Dad had a master’s electrician’s license and began wiring farms all around the area.  Plumbing evolved with the installation of drinking cups in barns, supplied by gravity from an elevated storage tank. Water was delivered to the storage tanks by a force pump and overhead piping. When electricity became available, the force pumps were replaced by electric driven pump and pressure tanks and indoor plumbing arrived.

The heating sales consisted initially of the stoves that occupied every living room. The early ones were mammoth, with dozens of mica panels to make the burning coals visible. Then came the circulating heater of many different makes and models.  They usually had an enameled jacket over the heat exchanger so the cold air from the floor would rise under the jacket, be heated, and rise to the ceiling – a great improvement.  Hoplin & Nelson supplied a stove truck to anyone for free for this spring and fall task. One of the leading manufacturer was “Heatrola” and was the generic name for all stoves,  just as “Frigidare” was the name for all refrigerators.   

The Heatrola eventually gave way to oil fired parlor stoves. Women didn’t like the ash problem. There were Jungers, DuoTherm and many others. All used a pot type burner that caused a problem on low firing because the burner was not hot enough to completely vaporize the fuel – causing soot deposits.

Furnaces in basements began with single registers brought to a central point. They had a double jacket with the central jacket around the heat exchanger and rising to the round section of the square floor register. The outer jacket from the floor register was the cold air return that would drop to the bottom of the furnace and rise in the center to the heat exchanger. These systems worked very well.  All were originally hand-fired with wood and coal.  Warm air heating evolved into large pipes installed to each room and a central cold air return located centrally with wood grills in the floor. Many were subsequently converted to stoker and oil firing.

Automatic heat soon became a necessity; first draft controls from the living area stoker and oil fired systems. Propane became a fuel for heating in the ‘50s using 100 lb cylinders. This became wide-spread and was used also for cooking and water heating. There were dozens of Hoplin & Nelson customers using these tanks, mostly delivered “after supper” by Martin Heggestad. Eventually the demand for propane brought 500 and 1000 gal tanks and the 100 lb tank business faded.

The hardware business was always adjusting with new products.  In the period after WW II, consumer goods were very scarce. Farmers had electricity and were eager for appliances – refrigerators, electric stoves, small appliances were in great demand with few available. Whatever we could get we sold quickly and usually had a waiting list.

The electrical contracting business grew to include larger buildings – schools, hospitals & nursing homes.  A strong business grew in Elbow Lake, doing electrical, plumbing and heating on homes there, working with building contractor Eric Pearson.  Eric built the house at 249 Drury Ave.  

 Hardware – 30’s & 40's                                                                                        .

Before 1952, the hardware was in two buildings. The north half housed the hardware and the south half, which was unheated, the furniture.  It had a large display window with two large plate glass windows. A few pieces of furniture were displayed, floor coverings, congoleum rugs and kitchen appliances. The building had a full upstairs, used for storing seasonal merchandize, such as garden supplies, horse fly nets, fly spray – and a few caskets. Access to the upstairs was a very steep stairway which also had a large opening to the roof. A block and tackle was rigged to the rafters and heavy items were hoisted to the upper level and through the roof opening. The room contained casket display items along the south wall – eight cabinets that folded down like a Murphy bed. The cabinet had a latch and a handle that could be reached from the floor. The bottom hinge side was about two feet from the floor so that when the cabinet was lowered a small saw horse on the upper end could support it.  The caskets were strapped on the cabinet door and a block on the lower end to keep the casket from sliding down when standing upright. Often the caskets were displayed on the cabinet door. The floor also had a mattress display on a moveable mattress rack.

Hoplin & Nelson – 1953 onward

1953. Dave Nelson, Marian Heggestad, Glenn Hoplin, Maynard Nelson, Walter Svec, Art Tewes, Martin Heggestad

In 1953, Eric Pearson and his crew removed the front of the building.  He tore out the wall between the north and south, making the store size almost double.  A brick front was installed with three large thermo pane windows on each side of the front entrance.  Eric had suspended the building on posts and had enclosed the wide open front with lumber for a working enclosure.  On April 13, 1953 a tornado passed through Sedan.  Lowry experienced some wind, but there was little damage – we easily could have lost the whole thing. The project was completed with a brick and glass front and a canopy over the sidewalk, replacing the former awnings.  New display fixtures – or “islands” – were constructed and wall display cases were made.   Concrete floors were poured in the new south part as well as a new concrete wall inside the old south wall and on of the north side.

The Lowry store had a pair of loyal, dedicated employees – Martin Heggestad and his wife Marian. Martin and Dave Nelson managed the store from 1939 to 1975 when Martin & Marian retired and moved to Fergus Falls, where their daughter Lorraine lives.  Super employees for 36 years.