By Pauline Masson –
Swiss immigrant Remig Leber brought an astonishing cultural lifestyle to the frontier rail town of Pacific, but he died young, leaving his 38-year-old widow and five children to carry on his legacy.
For 45 years, from Mr. Leber’s death in 1887 to her death in 1934, Mrs. Mary Leber managed Leber’s Hall and Leber’s Park, founded by her husband. She also headed the Diaconian Ladies Aid Society that raised amounts of money to aid the needy that would rival today’s Pacific Eagles’ gifts. And she built the most magnificent house in town
She had a good start.
Remig Leber, born April 15, 1843, and his brother Lorenz arrived in the American port of New Orleans aboard the Henry Pratt, when Remig was nine and Lorenz was seven. As adults they arrived in Pacific as the town’s two railroads were rolling the former unincorporated farm hamlet smack into the industrial age. The brothers look not at the steam and rail but at the thousands of workers who were pouring into Pacific. Cigar makers by training, the brothers turned the hospitality industry – refreshments, recreation, entertainment and leisure – into thriving businesses that were the center of cultural life here for more than hundred years.
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Remig built Leber’s Hall, which he always referred to as a saloon, a three-story hulk of a building that stood at St. Louis and Second streets for about 90 years. It was razed in 1967 to make way for Citizens Bank. The Pacific Post Office now occupies the former bank building on the site. The actual date the building was constructed is uncertain but an 1878 newspaper clippings noted that Remig was bringing “another” show to Leber’s hall, indicating that it had been there for some time.
Remig’s brother Lorenz was also in business in 1879. He owned a restaurant on the north side of St. Louis Street opposite the railroad depot, which, like his brother, he referred to as a saloon. But newspaper ads noted that he also sold groceries, candy, “premium” ice cream, cigars, and ice. His great granddaugher Georgia Clark noted that he also operated a hotel and delivered ice to business. In the 1880s he served as alderman and later treasurer of Pacific. Lorenz was killed in 1905, in a train accident near the main crossing on St Louis Street.
Remig was the catalyst for the entertainment behemoth the two brothers developed. He had an affinity for music and public performance, which may have gotten a start when he served as a drummer in the music regiment of the Union Army during the Civil War. He invited music groups of all genres to perform in his hall.
It was the age of traveling Chautauqua entertainers. America was on the move.. But Remig Leber was a one man Chautauqua organizer. He lured musicians, acting troupes, lecturers, politicians, preachers and vaudeville acts to performa at Leber’s Hall. School children presented there school plays there. Church ladies staged their bazaars there. The Knights of Pythias, the Free Masons, the Ancient Order of the United Workmen, political committees from both parties and Grand Army of the Republic (GAR) veterans held their meetings there..
Remig especially favored dances that he referred to as “balls.” He frequented the local newspaper office to promote his next big event. His 1879 ball to honor the Pacific U.O.T.B. lodge – when Mr. And Mrs. Joe Beck emblazoned Leber’s Hall with flags, evergreens and ribbons – eighty couples danced into the wee hours of the morning, prompting the local editor to eulogize, that it was one of the best balls ever given here leaving dancers to wish that, “the shadow of Mr. Leber may never grow shorter, and that he may live to entertain them with many more such enjoyable occasions.”
In a January 16,1880 newspaper snippet he urged residents to come to Leber’s Hall on Saturday to see Henry Schaller, Fred Pyatt, Rock Freeman, and Ed Robertson and their Pacific String Band perform- which, he promised would be a grand affair.
In February 1885, Remig announced that a band of Genuine Seneca Indians would march down St. Louis Street in full native regalia in a grand street parade to join the Splitlog’s Silver Cornet band at Leber’s Hall to perform and visit with citizens.
In 1881 a Professor T. J.Burrill of the Illinois Industrial Authority showed up at Leber Hall to give a talk on strength of Catalpa trees. In an experimental planting of twenty selected species of forest trees,” Professor Burrill said, “the Catalpa, “outgrew the black walnut, white ash, Osage orange, the American elm and European Larch – everything except the white willow and silver maple.
Shortly thereafter Remig learned of two undeveloped lots at Union and Second streets that boasted a grove of full grown Catalpa trees. He bought the property and opened it to the public as Leber’s Park. In particular he invited his fellow GAR veterans to gather at the park to share their war stories.
When the popular hospitality guru died in 1887 at age 44, citizens mourned that the frequent balls, music shows, traveling speakers and picnics might be lost to the city.
They didn’t need to worry.
Although she had previously been known only as Mrs. Remigius Leber, when her husband died, Mary emerged as a leader in city life.
She was, by any account, a woman ahead of her time. She was not challenged to break through a glass ceiling. She landed in the top job of a flourishing and wide-ranging leisure and hospitality business in one fell swoop.
I told her family members that I wanted to write about her life because it seemed to me that she had been a neglected community heroine.
“She was a hero,” her great-great-granddaughter Gwen Mueller Keleman said. “After her husband died in his forties she took over running the hall with her children, because that’s what women did.”
She was born Mary Schleihing in Wurttemberg, Germany on January 7, 1849 and emigrated to America with her parents in 1857. They settled near Pacific in what is known as the Bend neighborhood. On July 4, 1870 she was married to Remig Leber.
Mary and Remig Leber had eight children in fifteen years. Two of their children, Eugene and Herman, died in infancy. Herman died the same year as his father. A third son, named for the Swiss National Hero William Tell – but fancifully identified by the family as “Willie Tell” – died at age two. At the time of Remig’s death, Mary had five children – Albert Remig, 16; Elizabeth (Lizzie), 15; Otillia (Tilly), 9; George Washington, 5; and Harry Arthur 3.
Mary took the helm of Leber’s Hall – and Leber’s Park – in 1887 in the golden age of railroading, when Pacific bustled with stock pens, gravel, sand and lumber yards. Some 18 railroad buildings occupied the rail yard, located in the present day commuter lot and Pacific Plaza Station. Traveling salesmen and tourists using cheap train travel brought upwards of two-dozen trains a day to the St. Louis and First Street passenger depot that was shared by the Pacific Railroad and its Southwest Branch, the Frisco… Department stores, groceries, pharmacies, jewelers, shoe stores and tailors jostled with blacksmith shops and tinsmiths along St. Louis Street. All those successfully employed workers and travelers would need refreshment and fun.
Mary may have been more reticent than Remig, foregoing his constant boasts in the newspaper of spectacular upcoming event. But she knew who she was.
For years, Remig had placed a small ad in the newspaper each week advertising his “Saloon,” mentioning that he also happened to have a hall. Mary continued the ad each week with a not so subtle change. She removed the word saloon and thereafter advertised “Leber’s Hall,” Mrs. Mary Leber, Proprietress.
Although she did not woo the newspaper as Remig had, the local editor marveled at her every move. George’s attendance at veterinary college, Tillies piano lessons and frequent social gatherings in her fine home were duly reported.
When Rev. Hartman organized the Diaconian German Ladies Aid Society to provide aid for the needy. Charter members included Mrs. Christine Gross, Mrs.Elizateth Reomer, and Mrs. Stoelzner. Mary Leber was elected president. She was re-elected to the post every year until her death..
The other town business leaders, all men, took it in polite stride. When the city required that a “dram license” was required for establishments to serve liquor by the drink the newspaper reported the annual licenses invariably listing the men owners and ending with, “and Mrs. Mary Leber.”
In 1880 Mary purchased 80 acres from William Knoble for $1,450. It is uncertain where the property was located, but Mary Leber and her children and grandchildren were later identified with the property now occupied by the Pacific Care Center.
The local editor noted that in addition to her business success she was gracious and supportive of her family, friends and a surprising number of civic groups. When her daughter Lizzie married Adolphus Meyer. in 1899 a half page column on the front page described the event, noting that the bride was, “one of Pacific’s most worthy and accomplished daughters.” Her sister Tillie played the wedding march and her brother Albert Remig walked her down the aisle. Approximately 50 family members were present and were treated to a sumptuous supper in the third floor dining room.
In the first decades of the new century, Mary changed with the times. For the summer of 1912, she organized the Catalpa Amusement Company and changed the name of Leber’s Park to Catalpa Park, in recognition of the Catalpa grove that had attracted Remig. She planted more Catalpa saplings, and added a 36-foot by 36-foot dance floor to the park with the announcement that there would be a dance there every Saturday night. And ownership of the park was transferred to her daughter Lizzie Meyer.
The following spring Lizzie landed the State Poultry Board to hold a day-long poultry meeting and basket dinner there. A two-column wide 20-column-inch ad in the Transcript promised band music, demonstrations, speakers by poultry experts, and cash prizes. To close out the event, Lizzie invited her cousin Lorenz.Leber and his partner Henry Hirth to show a moving picture to close out the program.
Catalpa Park must have been a wondrous site to see and an inviting place to gather. The property held a generous grove of Catalpa trees that attracted a flock of woodpeckers each spring that stayed for the summer, serenading residents with their drum roll rapping out a continuous series of notes. The arrival of the woodpeckers was often reported in the local newspaper. In 1946, an anonymous essayist wrote a paean to the woodpeckers. (See Sidebar)
Lizzie sold Catalpa Park to the Volunteer Fire Department in 1946. The Fire Department retired the names Leber’s Park and Catalpa Park for their new home and, using their own labor built their future home. Currently the MVR-III school district technology department occupies the property and the American Legion Auxiliary veterans memorial stands at the immediate corner diagonally facing the intersection
After the turn of the century, as Mary approached her sixties, she made several dramatic changes. In 1905 she turned part of the management of her business to her son Albert Remigius, who left his job in St. Lois as an architectural draftsman and returned to Pacific to go to work for his mother. In 1910 she sold her liquor business to Albert and her youngest son Arthur. Arthur’s grandson Jim Mueller says that must have meant the two brother bought Leber’s Hall.
Mary busied herself with one more impressive structure. She built a new home on the west end of St. Louis street. It replaced the house that she had lived in since 1873. This new mansion dominated the west end of St. Louis Street. It was the largest and one of the finest homes in Paciific. She moved into the large house in 1913. I had surmised that this house was the house later identified as Dr.George Leber’s house. Mary’s great grandson Jim Mueller agreed. He said there seems little doubt that this was the famous house that Mary Leber built and lived i until her death in 1934.
Jim Mueller recalls visiting the house every Sunday, when Dr. George Leber, his wife Henrietta and daughter Mary Jane lived there.
”The picture that you have of the house shows the Union Street side where the actual entrance was,” Mueller said. “It was up high, level with Bell Funeral Home. But the front of the faced St. Louis street and could be seen all the way down the street. At the end of St. Louis Street, there were these big iron gates with a scrolled top bar that opened on to a huge lawn. About half the way up the hill a beautiful round gazebo decorated with a lot of gingerbread sat on a little knoll.”
“We spent most Sundays out front by the Gazebo,” Mueller said. “I never went through those huge front doors to the house. When we went inside, we would go around to the Union Street entrance and go into a huge kitchen, dining area that was big enough for the entire family to gather.”
Jeff Titter, local history museum founder, tracked down the photo above in the Historical Society archives, with a hand written note that identified it as the home of Dr. George Leber, Mary Leber’s son. On Dr. George’s death in 1974, his daughter Mary Jane Labit lived there for a time.
Mary Beth Schmidt, part of the 700 West Union Trust that bought the Dr. George Leber farm in 1981 to build Pacific Care Center, confirmed the belief that Dr. George’s house was the house that Mary builg in 1913. She recalls visiting Mary Jane Labit there. She and Mary Jane were both nurses.
“The house was huge and truly beautiful,” Schmidt said. “The front entrance faced St. Louis Street. When you entered those big front doors you were in a huge room that was beautiful. It had very high ceiling and wainscoating. All the wood was so beautiful It had all these stair cases and wndows. It was so huge it was eventually divided into apartmens.”
For decades the local newspaper identified each family by name that moved into their new apartment in the Leber Home. But with the news style at the time, actual addresses were rarely reported.
When Mary Leber lived in the house it was a bee hive of family and cultural society. She welcomed visitors to the house and grounds.
In February 1916, she held a three-day quilting bee where she and fellow quilters stitched up a quilt for each of her grandchildren.
She could be seen delivering extra fine grapes from the farm to the Transcript office. She never tired of the work of the ladies aid society.
For 45 years, the ladies of the Pacific area Diaconian (German Ladies Aid) Society met monthly, at Mary’s home or Leber’s Hall, and worked to help the needy. In 1929, in response to the start of the Great Depression, the Transcript reported that Mary Leber’s aid society raised $7,098 for needy causes – $127,000 in today’s money – a princely sum for a town of 1,400. Groups that received funds included new emigrants, local churches of all denominations,, disaster victims, homes for misplaced persons, the feeble minded and orphans, plus the Red Cross and the Pacific Volunteer Fire Department
When Mrs Mary Leber died March 19, 1934 the newspaper regaled her as, “One of Pacific’s most prominent and best loved citizens.”
“She was public spirited and ever ready to lend her aid and influence to any civic improvement. In her Homelife she was a shining example of the gracious hostess and devoted, indulgent and understanding mother and grandmother. Service to others,” was her motto.
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