Cincinnati Enquirer: May 8, 1949 1:1 (Sec. 3)

Tanks Never Die

All Industries Use Wood Variety

by John Menzies

    THIS IS A WORLD of steel and plastic, an why should it be concerned with one more old and respected industry which, in the development of its product, relies primarily on the wood-working art.                                              

    The answer is given in a commemorative booklet celebrating the anniversary of the Hauser-Stander Tank Co., specialists in wood tanks...they can be seen everywhere, on building tops, along railroad lines and in factory yards.  Just go to the highest spot in downtown Cincinnati, entrance off Vine or Race Streets, and look around.

    This 80-year-old concern considers this to be its heyday, for, as it is said, "it would now be difficult to mention an industry, common in the knowledge of our times, but what somewhere in its operational scheme wood tank equipment is not employed."

    WHEN STEPHEN HAUSER, a great grandfather of the present heads of the company, founded his business in 1869, principal users of wood tanks were brewers, distillers, farmers, paper manufacturers, railroads and tanners.

    Since, with industry's development, literally thousands of uses for wood tanks have been found.  Consequently, Hauser-Stander officials, along with officials of about 20 other such companies throughout the country, may well be, with a stretch of the imagination, the world's heartiest enthusiasts of industry at large.

    The object of this enthusiasm makes an impressive list: water supply, food processing, textile and clothing manufacturing, mining, ore reduction, and metal refining, glass making, chemical production, with the ramifications of each aside from the industries the company orginally served.

    The only fly in the ointment, commented Frank H. Bailey, the company's Vice President, is that wood tanks are comparatively ageless.  Bailey, incidentally, is the only company official who is not a descendant of the founder.

    THE FOUNDING HAUSER set up shop in what is today the heart of the downtown business district, a few squares from the Ohio River.  It was important in those days to locate a factory as close to water as possible for the facilities of water transportation.

    In 1888 the founder's son, Stephan Hauser Jr., joined the business.  At the same time the original name of the enterprise, Hauser and Debus, was changed to Hauser, Brenner and Fath.  In 1914 the third generation of the family entered the business in the person of S. J. Hauser.  A sister of this generation married Lee Stander, whose name entered not only the family but the business.

    The fourth generation, which is now in control of the company, is represented by Carl Stander, President: L.D. Stander, Treasurer and the brothers, Stephan W. and Richard Hauser, Chief Engineer and Secretary, respectively.

    THE COMPANY, which is now situated in Winton Place, the heart of Cincinnati's heavy industry, recognizes the fact that every few years some new product of merit is introduced in competition to wood tanks.

    Hauser-Stander, nevertheless, feels it has this ace in the hole: that instead of an ill effect on demand for wood tanks, production of substitutes calls for the use of wood tanks in the manufacture of plastics, ceramic and special metals which are the prime alternate materials for wood.

    Since Hauser-Stander, therefore, intends to play a role in industrial expansion beyond the age of steel, it feels like the proverbial smiling, toothless octogenarian, "80 years young."