In 1880, Captain Ellery Clark of DePere, Wisconsin, moved his hub and spoke factory to Cadott after being drawn there by the high quality and abundant supply of white oak timber. Formerly a steamboat operator moving logs on the Fox River, he established the factory with a capital of $100,000 at a site one quarter of a mile south of this museum. At times the plant employed between 150 and 300 men, and its capacity grew from 8,000 sets each of hubs and spokes to 85,000 sets each per year. It also produced 15,000 sets of bob sled runners annually and manufactured many million feet of hardwood lumber for building and furniture purposes. The factory operated in Cadott for eighteen years before Clark and several company heads moved the operation to Ironton, Missouri, in 1898. Theodore Filtz & Sons bought the mill in 1906, where wooden cheese boxes were then made with elm veneer sides and aspen tops and bottoms. Production ceased in 1944, but lumber production continued on the site for more than 115 years.