Forbes Article @ Dubuque
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IN THE
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DUBUQUE, IA:
IN
LOCATION
Dubuque is located on the border of
the states of Iowa, Illinois and Wis-
consin. The city is 183 miles west of
Chicago and 310 miles north of St.
Louis, and 25% of the nation's popu-
lation is within 500 miles. Dubuque
is a picturesque city, sitting on the
bluffs of the Mississippi River, with
wooded hillsides, scenic valleys, lime-
stone outcroppings and historic
architecture.
POPULATION (1980 Census)
City of Dubuque - 62,321
County of Dubuque - 93,745
CLIMATE
Average winter temp. 20.3
degrees/ Average annual snowfall 35
inches
Average summer temp. 70.2
degrees/ Average annual rainfall 33
inches
EDUCATION
Iowa is known for its excellent edu-
cation system. According to the Col-
lege Entrance Examination Board,
Iowa students rank number one on
performance on college entrance
exams. Dubuque is no exception to
the rule when it comes to excellence
in education. The City of Dubuque
has 13 public elementary schools,
two public junior high schools and
two public high schools. The average
teacher/student ratio for the public
system is one teacher for every 16.1
students. There are also ten paro-
chial elementary schools and one
parochial high school. Every building
in the public system has a special
education program and nine special
education classes are offered. The
system also offers special classes for
the talented and gifted as well as
support services for speech impair-
ments. Infants age two and under are
also provided in-home therapy in
dealing with specific handicaps.
CLARKE COLLEGE - Founded in
1843, Clarke is a Catholic, liberal arts
college with an enrollment of 896
students. The undergraduate division
awards the Bachelor of Science
degree and the Bachelor of Arts
degree. Business and Computer Sci-
ence are offered along with 25 other
departmental majors and individual
contracts majors. The college's grad-
uate division grants a Master of Arts
degree in Education with speciliza-
tion. Clarke also has a continuing
education division which sponsors
programs designed to meet the edu-
cational needs of the community
through a wide variety of workshops,
short courses and evening classes.
LORAS COLLEGE - Founded in
1839, Loras is a Catholic, liberal arts
college with an enrolhnent of 1,784
students. The undergraduate division
offers majors in 32 areas as well as
coursework in pre-professional areas
including a major in Business
Administration. Degrees granted are
the Associate of Arts, Associate of
Science, Bachelor of Arts, Bachelor
of Music, and the Bachelor of Sci-
ence. The graduate programs offered
are the Master of Arts degree in
Education/ Administration, Educa-
tion/Guidance and Counseling,
English, History and Psychology.
UNIVERSITY OF DUBUQUE -
Founded in 1852, the university is
composed of an undergraduate Col-
lege of Liberal Arts, and a graduate
Theological Seminary. The College of
Liberal Arts enrolls approximately
1,117 students and grants the follow-
ing degrees: Associate of Arts, Bach-
elor of Science, and the Bachelor of
Science in Nursing. The college also
grants special Associate and Bache-
lors Tri-College degrees, as part of a
program for adult learners. Major
study is offered in more than 30
fields and pre-professional areas.
NORTHEAST IOWA TECHNICAL
INSTITUTE - Established in 1966
by the state to provide new voca-
----'
THE HEARTLAND
tional-technical education opportuni-
ties. Thirty career programs are
offered with full and part-time
enrolhnent possible. Continuing and
Adult Education courses are avail-
able through NITI with more than
400 courses offered each year. The
institute works closely with business
and industry by conducting pre-
employment and employee skill
improvements training.
TRANSPORTATION
RAIL - The City of Dubuque is
served by three Class I railroads; the
Burlington Northern, the Illinois
Central Gulf and Milwaukee Road.
HIGHWAYS - The city is accessible
by U.S. Highways 20, 52, 61 151 and
State Highway 3. Motor freight ser-
vice is provided by sixteen carriers.
Bus service is provided daily by two
lines offering passenger and package
express service as well as charter ser-
vice.
AIR - The airport is municipally
owned and is served by two com-
muter carriers. Charter services are
also available. The airport runways
are 150' wide and one is 6500' long
and is ILS equipped, and the other is
4900' in length. Three overnight air
courier services provide package deli-
very service.
UTILITIES
TELECOMMUNICATIONS
Northwestern Bell is installing the
newest, most technologically
advanced equipment available. The
new system will offer custom calling
services such as call forwarding,
three-way calling and call waiting,
etc. It will also provide faster service
and the use of Centrex and Centron
systems for business customers. The
system will be fully duplicated pro-
viding more reliability.
WATER - By virtue of Dubuque's
location on the Mississippi River,
barge traffic is an intregal part of
a transportation network for commo-
dities being shipped to and from the
area. There are several barge dock
facilities available to serve the river
traffic needs.
NATURAL GAS - Peoples Natural
Gas Company provides a distribution
system in Dubuque supplied by a
pipeline that completely circumvents
the city and carries an operating
pressure of 78 pounds. The natural
gas has a calorific value of 1,000
BTU and a specific gravity of .61.
Supply is currently available to both
large and small industrial users.
WATER AND SEWER - Services
are provided by the municipally
owned system. Presently there are
five shallow wells and four deep wells
used as a standby supply. Water is
supplied to the city by gravity
pressure from storage reservoirs at
the average pressure of 88 pounds.
Total capacity for the system is 20
million gallons a day. Total hardness
is 90 mg/l at 9.2 P.H. and the water
is both flouridated and chlorinated.
The secondary water treatment
plant has a capacity of 15 mm GPD
and serves 99% of the community.
Additional capacity exists in the sys-
tem to meet the needs of major
industrial users.
ELECTRICITY - Interstate Power
Company furnishes Dubuque with
electrical power at a gross capacity
of 954,900 Kilowatts. Ninety-two
percent (92%) of the electricity pro-
duced comes from coal. Interstate
Power Company with its general
offices in Dubuque, serves a 10,000
square mile area and 252 communi-
ties in sections of Iowa, Minnesota
and Illinois.
HEALTH CARE
Dubuque has two hospitals, Finley
and Mercy Health Center, with a
total capacity of 567 beds. Both faci-
lities are helicopter-oriented trauma
centers and both facilities provide
24-hour physician staffed emergency
facilities. Because of the excellent
medical facilities, Dubuque has
become a regional medical center.
There are several specialty clinics
and the city is now being served by a
Health Maintenance Organization.
CULTURAL AND LEISURE TIME
ACTIVITIES
By virtue of the city's location on
the Mississippi River, Dubuque offers
many and varied recreational activi-
ties: boating, fishing, canoeing, water
skiing and swimming. Five marinas
are located in the immediate vicinity
of the city and have a capacity for
730 boats. The terrain allows for
excellent downhill and cross-country
skiing. Sundown Ski Resort has 17
runs, three chairlifts and three rope-
tows. There are five separate loca-
tions with cross country ski trails.
For golf enthusiasts, the city offers
three public 18-hole courses, two pri-
vate 18-hole courses, and one public
9-hole course. Dubuque is also
located 20 miles from Eagle Ridge
Golf Club, which was recently rated
as one of the 20 best new courses in
the country. Tennis, racquetball, ice
skating, as well as a full complement
of activities for all ages are offered
by the city's recreation department.
Dubuque has six art galleries, five
theatre. companies, a professional
symphony, and a youth symphony.
For further information on
Dubuque development opportunities,
please call or write:
Dubuque Area
Chamber of Commerce
880 Locust Street
Dubuque, IA 52001
(319) 557-9200
Cover reprinted with pennission
of Rand McNally.
"True Grit in the Heartland"
reprinted with pennission of Forbes.
Is Middle America sunk in economic de-
spondency, decay and defeat? If you think
that, come visit Dubuque, Iowa with us. It's
no boomtown, but life is still pretty good in
this old industrial city on the Mississippi.
"I've learned how
to save
my money"
singles crowd, she says; more impor-
tant, there is the money. She made
$22,300 last year as a secretary at the
big lohn Deere division outside town,
and she and her daughter live well on
that. "In Cincinnati they're offering
$12,000 to $14,000 for administrative
assistants," she says.
Of course, this divorced secretary's
high pay is part of the curse and the
blessing of Dubuque. The auto work-
ers union ran wages up so high at the
Deere plant that it's
hard to attract new
business to town. By
contrast, lim Brady,
Dubuque's mayor,
makes only $16,000 as
a teacher across the riv-
er at Galena, Ill., but
also clerks at Radio
Shack. His wife makes
salads at Ring's Restau-
rant and does checkout
at the Target discount
store. Put it all togeth-
er and there is a re-
spectable $30,OO\~, but
it takes five jobs to
earn it.
If the tattooed lady
and the Bradys earn
good money, they
spend it, Out at the Kennedy
Mall, I.B. White, who runs Rosheks
department store ($10 million in
sales I, is booking a 20% sales increase
for this year. Big wages mean good
houses, campers, new cars (jim
Walsh, who runs Bird Chevrolet, says
he's mcreasmg his factory orders
20% I. But what about the people who
aren't still working and spending?
Pat Dillon, president of the UAW
local at Deere, tells a story. Only
2,100 from the local are still working;
4,000 are laid off. "With all that un-
employment we thought we'd get
By Jerry Flint
DUBUQUE, low A is the sort 01 place
editors and TV producers thmk
about when they want to do stories
purporting to describe how hard the
recession is hitting Middle America.
Which is one major reason the media
do such a poor job of covering the
economy. In general they see what
they want to see: defeat, decay, de-
spair. But to write about Dubuque and
places like it only in .
terms of stereotypes is Dub..."", Town Clock
to overlook the funda- Tral'ls Brownell
mental economic vital- Jrd Grade
ity that still pervades
Middle America.
According to the last
census, Dubuque had a
population of 62,321,
and it is probably
somewhat less now:
people are leaving to
seek better opportuni-
ty elsewhere. But up
here in this northeast
comer of Iowa, with
the Mississippi River
in their backyard, a
good many more peo-
ple are staying, work-
ing and getting on with
their lives. Recession there is. Despair
and decay there is not.
This attractive divorcée with a
three-year-old daughter is as good a
way as any to start understanding Du-
buque. The lady wears a charming
mushroom-and-turtle tattoo on her
thigh, and a bit lower, toward the
knee, there's a flower and a butterfly.
She is quite proud of them and doesn't
seem depressed. "I'm going to stay
here," she says across her drink at
Brothers' Lounge at the Midway Mo-
tor Lodge. But isn't Dubuque too dull
for such a lively lady? There is a small
130
lJfeoa
the llississippi:
The people. . .
For historical reasons, practical-
ly everybody is white and two-
thirds of the population Is Ro-
man Catholic. There is a lower
divorce rate and a higher birth
rate than for the country as a
whole, but plenty of old people,
which pushes up the death rate.
This type of homogeneity prob-
ably helps to account for the
impressively low crime rate,
which Dubuquers always list as
a principal advantage of living
in this Iowa town.
J
I
. 1ha1nu¡.e
Du,s.
PopnlaUon
Birth rate
I.., i.ooo 01 pop.,.d.nl
Death rate
1..,1,000.1 po,w..innl
.ediul age
Dlyoree rate
I.., i,ooonfpop.,.'inni
ï 10 10 ¡Õ ÏlÖ
Racial JDiz IdneaUon .eligfon
_to ...... IUCJt ........ c.thoU.
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I 83.1% D lö
D 0.3% """"
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6.4% 5.2% 32% 2% 70%
D D ïD An..dm",d D .D
0.5% 0,0008% ].¡,wi.b
- lomili..
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row.....
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132
FORBES, MARCH 28,1983
~
. J
II
some turkeys for the holidays for
them. We took a plant gate collection
and raised $5,000, then chipped in
$7,000 from union funds. We had a
thousand 18- to 20-pound turkeys. We
sent out letters to the 4,000 saying
that those with $600 or les\ a month
to live on could pick up a free turkey
from the union at the
Salvation Army head-
quarters. Well, we had
2S0 people there, so we
got 750 turkeys left.
We sent out another
letter, and the postage
for each mailing was
$800. This time we
said $900 a month and
gave them out at the
union hall just in case
people didn't want to
go to the Salvation
Army. We were open all day and gave
out another SOD. We still had 2S0 tur-
keys left and they were starting to
thaw. I wasn't going to send out any
more letters. 1 went over to the radio
station and announced that any UAW
member laid off could get one. That
got rid of the last 250. 1 couldn't be-
lieve it. The only conclusion is that
we're too proud to ask for anything
free."
Proud. And adaptable. Every hour
maybe 800 pigs get their throats
slashed at the FDL plant on 16th
Street. It used to be Dubuque Packing
and was failing.
"Frankly, the plant costs, the lack
of productivity, poor attitudes and
lousy management were dragging the
corporation down. I was the chairman
Turke!J
Darcy Elgin
4th grade
of the board," says Robert Wahlert.
"We tried. The union made conces-
sions. It got worse. It's not that the
plant was outdated. We spent $27 mil-
lion in the late Seventies. This is vir-
tually state of the art."
What was wrong? Well, the story of
Iowa Beef's low wages and boxed-
beefed technology is
part of it. But Wahlert
doesn't pass the buck
that way. "There was
bad management from
me all the way back to
my great uncle," says
the company founder.
He gives examples. "In
the Forties and Fifties
we had slow time. We
opened a cafeteria and
let the girls from the
plant run it. So decades
later we ended up with $18-an-hour
dishwashers, $18-an-hour janitors. It
was a hard work situation, so they
gave time off. We ended up with four
on the line and two in the rest room."
Why not close it
down? Wahlert's father
is R.c. Wahlert, prob-
ably the richest man m
town. Close it down'
"Yeah, but we had to
live here, too," says
son Robert. "] was frus-
trated to see the plant
closed up and liquidat-
ed. What was going to
happen' There's the
Wahlert library in this
town, the Wahlert high
school, and the park.
There were 1,100 workers and not
much alternative."
The family split. Robert Wahlert
and his side walked out. "We put $70
million together for a leveraged
buyout," he said, although actually
there was just a few million dollars in
cash. He got some federal money,
took the old plant and formed FDL
Foods-FDL for fleur-de-Ivs, an old
brand name of Dubuque Packing. The
union didn't like it, but it signed on to
save the jobs. It's tough. Workers that
were making $10 to $11 an hour (in-
centives and fringes pushed labor
costs to $181 started back at $6. "We
used to have five, six weeks vacation.
We got no vacation, no medical, no
pension. Sure, we know we'll have to
have these things, but not cradle to
the grave like before," says Robert
Wahlert.
"We opened last Oct. 16, and sales
School Bus 2S8
Am]' Conlan
2nd grade
. . . and the money . Dnbnqne Du.s.
Average earnings are high for a small city because of the union .edian family Unemployment
Ineome rate'
wage scale at the Deere construction machinery plant and the $22,484
packinghouse. Deere blue-collar workers average $27,000 a year, $22,388 20.5%
and even a secretary earns $22,000. But today unemployment runs I D I
above the national average: more than half the Deere workers are 11.4%
laid off: and the packinghouse workers have taken large pay cuts D
to save their jobs. The high wage levels led to prosperity: Dubu-
quers lived well, but that is part of the problem, too.
worldng In Worldng In .ediu nIne of Loeal to: ratea' Zdneatlon
mannfaetnriDg' nolUllunfaetnrlng' oWDer-occnpled bo1l.le (""adh." p" ,hUd)
26.3% 28.3% 73.7% 71.7% I $51,300 $330.92 $2,527 $2,510
I D I 0 D $126.31 D I 0
. 'Im...,.,""';a.." 1o.""auIIK'an. Th,D"aq~""w" =0..11, high '".."a'.h, a~ ...a.h da,", of. 'aha 0""
""a'Y. 'Nanqri"""'" w."..d """ w,,',n {""p' d"""'"I. 'p" "pi.. p""o, ..,.
SOU"" U.S "w<ou of <I" c","" "",ouof Lob.,S""";,,,¡ob Sm'"o¡ low", a'pourn,,< of Publ" lnwuo<wn.lowo
FORBES, MARCH 28, 1983
13.3
in the first quarter were $135 million,
and we're in the black. We're looking
for $1 billion a year. Three months
doesn't make a company, but it's a
start. Anyway, we're all Dubuquers.
We're all in this together, labor and
management, together."
The real Dubuque, hke the real
America, just won't fit the stereo-
types. People in Dubuque don't but-
tonhole you on the street to talk
about the crises that fill the metro-
politan press, like what the EP A did or
did not do with paper shredders. The
richer folk still like Ronald Reagan.
"It took 50 years to get
in this mess. It will
take us a while to get
out," says Paul From-
melt, executive vice
president of Frommelt
Industries. "I know it's
easy to sit here in a
warm office and say,
'stay the course,' but
we've got to do it."
The union people
don't hke the Presi-
dent. "On a scale of
one to ten, if ten is
high, I give him a one,"
says Pat Dillon of the
UAW. The students in
the high school seem
to think that all the
pohticians-in Wash-
ington and at City
Hall-aren't very good.
If you ask, people are for a strong
defense-but maybe some cuts in de-
fense spending. The old folks are wor-
ried about Social Security, and they
flood their congressmen with mail
against the withholding tax on inter-
est and dividends. There's worry
about trade. "Why don't people in
Washington understand that we need
reciprocity in trade," says lim Houtz,
who runs a growing computer service
company called CyCare Systems. He
has a subsidiary in Canada, but says,
"If we try to go to Japan, we cannot
get in."
All these things count in Dubuque,
but what really counts is not Wash-
ington or the world but Route 61 and
a downtown mall. They have just
opened a new bridge across the Mis-
sissippi between Wisconsin and Du-
buque, but there's not much of a con-
necting road through the town. If they
can squeeze money from the state and
feds for Route 61 through town, more
people may come to shop. Then may-
be the bigger dream, a downtown mall
connected to the civic center and the
restored theater, will be built. But just
the other day I.c. Penney said it will
close its downtown store and move to
the mall at the western end of town.
That hurt, because it cripples the
dream of a downtown mall's bringing
in more business. And it is business-
the economy-that people worry and
talk about today.
It's bad in Dubuque. There are 689
houses for sale countywide, the real
estate association says, but some
folks figure the number in the city
may be closer to 1,000. Everybody
knows someone who has left, gone to
Texas, to Florida, to Moline, to find
work. People hurt.
fohn Rapp, for example, was laid off
Mar. 6, 1981. (Ask a
Dubuquer when he
was laid off and you
will get a specific date.1
He is married and has
four children. The first
year he got by well
enough with unem-
ployment compensa-
tion and layoff pay
from Deere. His wife
was selling Avon, too.
"But the way the mon-
ey is, there aren't many
buyers for a bottle of
perfume," he says.
Now, with special
ADC grants, $464 a
month, plus food
stamps, he just gets by.
His mobile home pay-
ments are only $195 a
month and he is only
paying the interest anyway. "I've
been to about every place around, and
some places twice. After two years it's
getting harder and harder every day to
get up. But you have to get up and say
to yourself, 'Today's the day I find
something.' "
A high school senior says, "There's
lots of pressure. When dad was laid
off, he'd even sit there and yell at the
dog. The poor dog
didn't know what was
happening and he'd
hide."
The biggest problem,
of course, is the Deere
plant that makes con-
struction-type ma-
chines with 3,600 blue-
and white-collar work-
ers now, against 8,200
three years ago. Other
plants have lost work,
too, and the slump in
agriculture hurts Du-
buque, although per-
haps not as badly as
other areas, because
Dubuque is hog coun-
try and today hogs are
better than grain.
oI'ulfenDub...,ue'. Graue
Cheryl Blaser
4rh grade
134
Pen '" Ink Chalk De8ign
Jodl' Vanderah
6th grade
For the past two years Dubuque's
Deere plant has closed almost com-
pletely for January. This pushes the
jobless rate into the 20% area for the
month, which brings in reporters
from around the country. "We get the
slash-and-burn stories, the out-of-
work suffering stories, the let-'em-
eat-cake story," says Steve Kent, ex-
ecutive editor of Dubuque's Telegraph
Herald. It's not that they aren't factu-
ally correct, adds Kent. It's that they
don't have what he calls "the sense of
the place."
Part of that "sense" is a kind of
faith in the future. "There's nothing
in the immediate future that looks
bright. But the local Deere division is
well managed, sound financially,
with high ideals. We'll be around and
as big as Caterpillar [in construction
machineryJ someday."
Who said that? The
plant manager? No. Pat
Dillon of the UAW. He
also says that the aver-
age worker made
$13.20 an hour in real
wages-or $27,000 a
year full time. "In the
old days those costs all
got passed on. We
billed the farmer. I
know we have to give
up something." True,
he doesn't want to give
up all the benefits it
took years to win, but
that isn't the type of
talk you used to hear in
Detroit.
Howard WickIer, 38,
The Shot Tower
Dorene Fish
Jrd grade
FORBES, MARCH 2S, 19S3
Fenelon Plaee Eleuator
Brent Kraske
4th grade
Log Cabin at Eagle Point Park
Jamie Benson
6th grade
married, two children, laid off Feb. 14,
1982, has that faith. "At Deere I ran a
drill and earned $30,000 a year. But
lohn Deere treated me A-lOO%. They
hung on to guys as long as they could.
The only bad feeling was I was there
ten years and finally got a job 1 liked
and then lost it." Howard had enough
money at first, but he got fat, 190
pounds. "I joined the health club. In
three months I was 158." He was so
happy that he went to work for the
club, trying to sell memberships in a
new workout center in a downtown
office. "I never worked
directly with people in
my life. I like it. This
will give me a chance
to talk to businessmen
about selling jobs,
maybe in the health
field. It's growing."
When he is called back
to Deere, and he's cer-
tain that will come,
"I'll work part time in
the day at the club." In
fact, he says, ''If I could
get back to work in
three months I'd be in
better shape than when
I was laid off. I've
learned how to save my
money."
Dubuque has a repu-
tation for being around ten years be-
hind the times. Practically no one will
argue with that. The houses are part
of another age. There aren't many TV
antennas (the city was wired long
agol. White-collar workers who came
in boom days say it was hard to make
friends. "If you don't have eight or ten
brothers and sisters and brothers-in-
law and cousins and uncles, it's hard."
Dubuque is a heavily Catholic city.
"The good-looking girls are 17 and
under or 17 and married," jokes a lo-
cal. Becky Sisco, who used to head the
local League of Women Voters, says
it's just too quiet for some: her five
best friends left town in five consecu-
tive years. "It's true, some of the
women won't dance with a man un-
FORBES, MARCH 28, 19S3
less they think he is someone they
can live with forever," says Elizabeth
Lovette, a secretary. The men are the
same, she says: Invite one home for
dinner and he won't come unless he
can bring a friend for protection.
"This place is too old-fashioned.
lust look at the buildings," says Paul
Lattner, a 17-year-old senior at Du-
buque Senior High School. He is right;
Dubuque does show its past, but
that's not all bad.
It's said that Iowa is flat, Republi-
can and Protestant, but Dubuque is
hilly, Democratic and Catholic. The
Catholics came because Bishop Ma-
thias Loras, who arrived in 1839,
wrote back to Europe telling potential
Catholic immigrants that Dubuque
was safe for Catholics-they had been
frightened of the U.S. because of re-
ports of the bigots called Know Noth-
ings. "The Sisters of Charity for the
Blessed Virgin Maty came here after
being burned out in Philadelphia,"
says Reverend Edward Petty, who di-
rects Catholic charities.
Around the turn of the century Du-
buque was the major wagon-building
center in the nation.
There's a story that
Henry Ford came to
Augustin Augustine
Cooper, the biggest wa-
gonmaker, and sug-
gested that he build
horseless carriages.
Cooper, a true Dubu-
quer, did not see any
future in it.
The Catholics and
the non-Catholics did
not always get along,
I either. In the Twenties,
football between the
Presbyterian Universi-
ty of Dubuque and
Loras (one of the two
Catholic colleges I was
ended because the
games turned into riots. They re-
sumed a halt-century later. "The sto-
ry of the first mixed marriage in town
was when an Irish Catholic married a
German Catholic and that turned into
a riot," says Walter Peterson, presi.
dent of the University of Dubuque.
There is still some dispute about anti-
black or anti-Iewish feeling in Du-
buque-there are about 30 Jewish
families. Some say yes; some saý no.
But there are only 219 blacks in Du-
buque [1980 census I. Why so few?
Some say Dubuque was like one of
those "don't-let-the-sun-set-on-you-
here" towns a halt-century ago-but
you can't prove it.
"Dubuque always seems to be on
the trailing edge of trends," says edi-
Langworth" Octagon Bouse
Dawn Dzaboff
6th grade
tor Kent. In the city's early days, lead
mining was the big industry. When
that died, there was lumber, wagon-
making-which the automobile
killed-door and window sashes alu-
minum, and then meat packing and
construction equipment. Says Uni-
versity President Peterson, "We
thought it was the end of the town
when the [window] sash plant closed.
We thought the end was at hand when
it looked like the pack [the packing
plantJ might close. We recover." What
comes through the history is that Du-
buque has depended on the bright-
ness, the innovativeness, of its ordi-
nary people-people with ideas.
Paul Frommelt tells the story of his
firm. "Grandfather Ludwig worked
for Cooper, the wagonmaker. One
dollar a day. Back in 1909 Ludwig
bought Cooper's small awning com-
pany for $100. We ran it that way
until 1950," Paul says, "a couple of
guys and a truck. I drove that truck on
dates. I didn't even have a car. Then in
19S0 my father watched a man weld-
ing. He invented a canvas welding
shield." That opened up a business of
factory safety equipment. "Then in
19S1 Dubuque Packing came to us.
The meat inspector wouldn't let them
load their meat in the railroad cars; it
was getting dirty. We built a canopy."
Now Frommelt builds specialized
canopies to cover the loading dock
between the truck and plant to keep
the weather out, and does $25 million
a year, with 200 employees. "We're
135
[Inion leader Pat Dillon
(I'ift) and wellhom
Bob Wahlert
Poles apart po/itica/(l'.
but each will tel/xou
wben the other's name
comes up, "We were 11/
higb school together "
building a new $5 million plant,
150,000 square feet," he says proudly.
R.c. Wahlert (father of Robert Wah,
lert, who runs the new FDLI tells the
story of Dubuque Packing. "The first
time I came here was 1931. I was 17.
My uncle bought this place and want-
ed me to go with him. Every river
town had a packing plant; you get rid
of that blood in the river. But I was
not going to live in a jerk town like
Dubuque. lt was like
Paducah. Vaudeville
comics made jokes
about it."
The phone rings and
R.c. breaks off his sto'
ry to shout into it.
After a few minutes of
noisy bargaining he
smiles. "I just sold 450
pounds of pituitary
glands (each about half
the size of a peal at
$110 a pound." He's
happy.
But he did come. "I
was the 34th employ-
"Now look. There's no Swift,
there's no Wilson, no Cudahy, no Os-
car Mayer. They're conglomerates."
Eating habits changed, too. "Those
doctors. They say don't eat meat.
What the hell can you eat? Chicken?"
he says with disgust. "You go to the
store. Our hot dogs are $1.S9. Oscar
Mayer is $1.89, and they got 99-cent
chicken wieners. What goes on them'
Catsup, mustard, pickles. What do
you taste' Catsup,
mustard and pickles.
What do they buy'
Those 99-cent things?"
But his son saved the
packing house for Du-
buque, and there are
grandchildren coming
up--and in the plant-
and old R.c. still
makes deals.
Over at Flexsteelln-
dustries, Frank Bertsch
tells his story. Dad had
a furniture company in
Minnesota, but in the
Thirties he was part of
ee. I worked six days a week, 12 hours
a day, every job from killing hogs to
sweeping. For the first 25 years I never
missed a Sunday. Sure, 1 always
worked Saturday, but I never missed a
Sunday, either. The last 20 years I
skipped Sunday."
It comes as no surprise that the
elder Wahlert despises unions. "The
UAW is the curse of Iowa," he says.
At Dubuque Packing, before the cri-
sis, labor costs for the members of the
food workers union were close to $18
an hour. "We all followed like a
bunch of sheep, yes, me too. We never
had a strike. We gave them everything
they wanted.
136
the establishment fighting the
unions. "There were overturned cars
and dad carried a billy club. When it
was over he came here, and ever since
we haven't been interested in fighting
unions."
Bertsch isn't too happy. Flexsteel
has 600 employees in Dubuque, seven
plants around the country and nearly
$100 million in sales. Part of the busi'
ness, furniture for recreational vehi-
cles, is running strong now.
"We're as productive here as any-
place in the country, but the last three
contracts killed us," says Bertsch.
Last year he took a nine-week strike
in Dubuque and didn't appreciate it.
"We worked all through the year to
make understood the need to be com-
patible. We thought they understood,
but they wouldn't back down. Most of
the furniture plants are in the South.
We did get some partial gains on
COLA and lower hiring rates and a
one-year pay freeze." That sounds
good, but Bertsch says he pays $6.50
an hour with incentives and fringes,
pushing labor cost to $12, which he
figures is $3 above other furniture
plants.
For the nation as a whole, new
white-collar, high-technology jobs
may take the place of many of those
lost in the older blue-collar occupa-
tions. As a result, the recession has
cut overall employment only very
slightly, from a peak of 101 million in
mid-1981 to 99 million in January.
But Dubuque isn't the nation; it is a
corner where job losses have so far
easily exceeded job gains. Dubuque is
an unlikely spot for a high-technology
boom. "The salt on the streets around
here will sure wreck your Porsche,"
says Dan Dittemore, professional
planner with the Chamber of Com-
merce, joking about the California
high-tech lifestyle. But is there a fu-
ture for smokestack Dubuque in the
computer-chip America that's being
born? "We're asking the same ques-
tion," Dittemore says. "We just don't
know what place Dubuque will have
in the restructuring of America."
lim Houtz, though, has a pretty
good idea about that future. He is
president of CyCare. lt's the sunrise
industry around Dubuque, a comput-
er operation that sets up accounting
systems for doctors and sends out
their bills. It is a national operation,
the largest of its type, with $24 mil-
lion in revenues last year. Houtz talks
about $100 million by 1986. "The
doers of the 1990s are going to be
companies like ourselves," he says.
Houtz' story is not unlike those of
older entrepreneurs hereabouts. He
worked for Burroughs, then IBM, be-
fore starting his company in 1967.
Why stay? "There are lots of high-
tech firms from White Plains to Phoe-
nix," Houtz says, and follows with
the litany of advantages that Du-
buquers know by heart: "You can
walk down any street and not worry
about getting to the end of the block.
The school system is better than in
most metropolitan areas. I've never
spent more than five minutes walk-
ing to the office. And we've never had
any smog."
CyCare has 160 employees in Du-
buque and 285 more around the coun-
try. Houtz owns 45% of the stock and
says there's no intention of selling
I
FORBES, MARCH 2S, 19S3
Dub...,ue City Hall
Ginger Grote
5th grade
out. "We are going to be doing the
acquiring," he says.
"Who knows, CyCare might bring
in the software people. There could be
splitoffs from it, but there's no assur-
ance," says Bertsch of Flexsteel.
There's a publishing firm, too, Wil-
liam C. Brown, with 350 employees,
producing college and religious text-
books, but that's communicatio/lS, and
that is another magic word supposed
to mean jobs in the future.
But high tech and communications
arenotlor everybody. "I've got a friend
who fixes computers. He does well. But
that's one guy," says Dillon of the
UAW. He doesn't think much of the
talk of retraining. "How are we going to
make accountants out of assemblers
when we've got accountants laid off?
Yes, a computer course is great, but it
won't put 4,000 people to work."
Tom Tauke, the Republican Con-
gressman from Dubuque, recognizes
the dramatic industrial change com-
ing. "But that doesn't mean the whole
country will be high tech. Ten years
from now Dubuque won't be high
tech. lohn Deere will be here, the
packing house will be here. A.Y. Mc-
Donald-water pumps and valves-
will be here. Somebody's always go-
ing to process the food. This is the
largest hog-producing district in the
country, and that is where we ought
to be going-processing food."
Wayne Norman, development offi-
cer of the University of Dubuque and
a doer in the community, sees other
movements. The colleges will be a
job-producing education center, the
hospitals will produce jobs as a medi-
cal center, a downtown mall will help
the area grow as a regional retailing
center. Then there is the tourist busi-
ness-the architecture [those old
houses I, the Mines of Spain National
Park [which doesn't exist yeti, a "lit-
tle Tivoli" park on City Island [that
park doesn't exist yet, either I. But, in
fact, there is a growing tourist trade,
the waterfront museum and the side-
paddler docked there and river dining
in summer, the skiing outside of town
in winter. Norman figures there will
FORBES, MARCH 28, 1983
be 3,000 jobs in tourism someday.
Peterson of the university talks
about his new programs, in computer
science and aviation administration.
"We want to establish an M.B.A. pro-
gram to help keep the local people"
Meanwhile Dubuque is losing too
many children. At Dubuque Senior
HIgh enrollment is down to 1,800
from 2,400 four years ago. Families
are smaller, and everybody knows
someone who has gone.
"Both children went
to Texas to find work.
One's a chemical engi-
neer. He graduated in
May and got a job in
Dallas. He would have
stayed if he could find
work," says lay Kolker,
who sells Harvester
trucks. His daughter
followed a job-hunting
boyfriend and is an as-
Sistant manager in a
clothmg store.
Mel Maas, the union
president at FDL, has a
son who was a star
halfback at the univer-
sity. "There's no job for
him in the field here
[safety engineeringl.
He'll probably look
around Chicago and Milwaukee."
Tina Kamm, a hIgh school senior,
will be a nurse, but says: "I'll probably
move to Florida. I've got an uncle
there. You can't stay in a town if there
are no jobs."
Pat Dillon talks about one of his
brothers: "Jerry worked at Dubuque
Packing. They said they would cut his
pay from $12 to $6 an hour. He said
that for $6 he'd go to Florida-and he
did. He works nights for $6 at a 7-
Eleven and lies in the sun all day. Well,
he's single and 32 and can do that."
RIght behind lerry, though, is a gen-
eration of youngsters that seems less
pampered, tougher than the genera-
tion that preceded it. Senior High
Principal Donald Kolsrud, notes:
"Our kids are more somber and seri-
ous than they've ever been. Atten-
dance is running 96%
to 94%. I feel the
change. It's not just
me, me, me. It's our
family, us, we."
Something else im-
possible to measure is
community closeness.
When you mention
Bob Wahlert of the
packing house to Pat
Dillon of the UAW,
Dillon says, "Bob and 1
were high school class-
mates." When you
mention Dillon to
Wahlert, Wahlert says,
"Pat and I went to high
school together."
Over at the Deere
plant, John Lawson,
the manager, figures he
will recall 600 to 800 workers by fall.
"We've absolutely reached the bot-
tom of the barrel in employment," he
says. That's the good news. The bad:
Even after recalls, the job level would
be half that of three years ago.
In Dubuque, they scramble to get
more factories, they cut pay and work
harder, they study computers, they
hustle for a shopping center and a new
road, they build a museum for tour-
ists. Decay? Despair? That's maybe
10% of the story. .
Ameriean TnLst Building
jil7Kim
4th grade
Spirit of Dub..."",
Brian Wrigbt
Jrd grade
137
woodward
Communications,
Inc. PO 80x688 Dubuque. Jowa52001 (319) 58S-5687
Woodward Communications is intensely aware that its future
is inexorably entwined with the future of the Dubuque area.
In addition to the recognition that the Dubuque area repre-
sents the financial underpinning for the company, the s tock-
holders also have a long history of being an integral part
of this community...of wanting to live, work and play here,
raise families here. It is to us a uniquely fine community
in which to reside.
Those factors key a committment by WCI to undertake all reasonable
efforts to improve the economic climate of the Dubuque area
while enhancing the community's livability. To that end,
we have adopted as one of our objectives: to commit our human
and financial resources to work with others in both the public
and private sectors to further economic development. It is
in our best interest, the community's best interest, and it
is the single most important contribution that can be made
for the people we call friends, neighbors and fellow residents.
And our committment to the community goes beyond the economic
concerns. We want to playa role in preserving our heritage,
our culture, the things that have given Dubuque the spirit
captured by Jerry Flint in the Forbes article. So we sought
the opportunity to participate in restoring the Five Flags
Theater, creating a riverboat museum and other elements that
make Dubuque more than the economic center of our existence.
We think the Forbes article captures well the flavor and spirit
of this community. Times are tough right now. But we can
make them better. We will make them better. And those who
follow us in Dubuque will thus be able to enjoy a quality
of life, a mix of work and play, that is all too rare to find
elsewhere. '
/~.~- :L;~~.~'
William Woodward
~'M\(~~
Norman McMullin
Publisher, Telegraph Herald