Another who devoted many years on the public school board and helped in building Battle Creek, was Henry Walz. Henry came as superintendent of our public schools. In 1920, he wanted to go into the chick hatchery business and intended to buy a hatchery at St. Paul, Nebraska. The young veterans of World War I decided to give Henry a farewell party. We gave him, as a present, a piece of luggage. That was only a minor part of the party as it was one long to be remembered and left a deep impression on Henry.

The following morning at 5:00 a.m., Henry boarded the east bound passenger train to start his journey to St. Paul. As the train sped on its way, his thoughts returned to the people who had become his friends and who had planned and executed the wonderful farewell party for him and, as he later told it: "I thought, 'Why am I leaving such good people who will be my lifelong friends if I return to them'." He left the eastbound train at Wisner and boarded the west bound passenger train to return to Battle Creek at 1:20 p.m. Needless to say, his friends were just as happy to have him return as he was of his decision. This writer believes that perhaps there was some other motivation. He returned to marry Margaret Brink, his lifelong companion.

A number of locations were investigated by Henry to start his hatchery. He finally decided on the Risor place one and one half miles south of Battle Creek. He started his chick hatchery in the house with a great number of "Old Trusty" incubators which were manufactured in Clay Center, Nebraska, and were in such common usage in many a farm at that time. His brother Lawrence came from Kentucky to help him. They "batched" as neither was married at that time and during the hatching season they took turns at staying up during the night to guard against failure of the incubators to destroy the contents of the incubator or even the entire venture. The work of cleaning and refilling the kerosene burners was tremendous. The operation grew and for a number of years, it was one of the largest operations of its kind in this section of the state. He opened like businesses in other locations such as Neligh, Orchard, Randolph, Wausa and Humphrey.

Lawrence Walz later entered the livestock and grain trucking business and was quite successful, enough so that he later bought a sizeable tract of Elkhorn river bottom land northwest of town and settled down as a farmer.

John Walz followed in the early twenties to start a meat market in the Jennie Flood building which he later sold to James Koudelka, Sr. He then entered the dairy business with a large herd of dairy cows.

Another family not previously mentioned, and who had a prominent part in "building" the community, were the Werner brothers, Herman and Charles. They married daughters of the Warnke family. Herman married Mary and Charles married Emma. They arrived from their native state of Wisconsin in the late eighties to work at the carpenter business. Many of the buildings which made up the earlier part of the Battle Creek

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