Fritz, Hanna and the Last Case of Oshkosh Bock

Feb 1970: Fritz Smick was a couple of weeks past his 85th birthday when he brought home his last case of Oshkosh Bock. This was one of his old rituals. Bock beer was a stronger beer released once a year. It was always this time of year. When winter was crawling towards spring.

When Fritz was a kid, his father ran a saloon on 6th Street. When bock-beer season arrived, the saloons would hang a special sign in their windows. The sign was illustrated with a mischievous-looking goat. That too was part of the tradition. A come-and-get-it to the aficionados that this year’s bock beer was now on tap. At 85, Fritz remained an aficionado. There weren’t many like him left. 

Fritz didn’t drink that 1970 case of Oshkosh Bock by himself. His wife, Hanna, liked beer too. Fritz and Hanna drank from that case until there were just two bottles left. The last two bottles were put away for a later date.

Fritz and Hanna Smick, late 1950s.

Fritz and Hanna were two of a kind. Both were of immigrant families uprooted from Germany and transplanted to Wisconsin. Hanna’s birth name was Johanna Templin. She was born in Germany in 1888. She was three when her family migrated to Wisconsin. Fritz was christened Frederick Martin Smick and born into a German-speaking family in Marshfield in 1885. The Smicks came to Oshkosh when Fritz was six.

There were thousands of people in Oshkosh like Hanna and Fritz. They were ethnic Germans caught between the old world of Europe and the jarring culture of modern America. They came of age when cars and telephones and radio and movies were introduced. They were native to nowhere. They were not like their parents. And their children would not be like them.

A class photo taken at the German-English Academy on Court Street. The curriculum included English language lessons for German-speaking children.

The two bottles of bock beer that Hanna and Fritz set aside were being saved for their anniversary. In the summer of 1908, Fritz and Hanna went to Menominee, Michigan for a quickie wedding. Menominee was where you went when the cost of a formal wedding was more than you could afford. Fritz and Hanna were young and poor then. By 1970, they were neither young nor quite so poor.

Their life together began full of promise. They started out in an old farmhouse on the west side and filled it with kids. Fritz drove a truck for a living. He raced motorcycles for fun. They were far from rich, but they were getting by well enough.

Fritz became well known on the local motorcycle racing circuit riding a 1911 Excelsior like the one seen here.

In 1919, their seven-year-old daughter, Ethelyn, died of spinal meningitis. Fritz and Hanna buried her and moved the family to North Dakota. Their fresh start didn’t pan out. A year later, they were back in Wisconsin. They settled in Fond du Lac. That didn’t work out, either. By the end of 1925, they were back in Oshkosh and flat broke. It got worse.

The crash of 1929 brought on the Great Depression. Oshkosh was devastated. Local relief efforts were no remedy for the mass layoffs. Fritz and Hanna were dirt poor. They grew vegetables in a vacant lot to help feed the kids. Fritz hauled garbage and tried farming to bring in money. He leased three acres of land from his father, and when Fritz fell behind on the payments, his parents sued him. There was nowhere to turn.

 Lining up for “rough fish” at the Municipal Warehouse on Otter Street. In the early 1930s, the city gave away suckers, sheephead, and carp that were netted in nearby waters to help feed people in need of food.

Life got better in the 1940s. Fritz had regular work again, first at Buckstaff and then at Deltox Rug. Hanna worked at Deltox, too. They were finally getting ahead after almost 20 years of living hand to mouth.

In 1948, they moved to Division Street. This was not a fancy neighborhood. The trains that ran down Division Street crossed over the driveways of the homes in the 500 block, where they lived. The engines roared past their front door.

Fritz and Hanna flourished there. Their children were off having children of their own. Fritz retired in 1955. He got into fishing and gardening. Their little yard was filled with roses and morning glories and vegetables. Fritz was one of the neighborhood characters. He was called the Mayor of Division Street.

Looking south down the 500 block of Division Street. Hanna and Fritz lived in a home a few doors south of where the locomotive appears.

Fritz and Hanna were still living on Division Street on August 25, 1970, the day they finally opened those last two bottles of bock beer. It was their 62nd wedding anniversary. They ate breakfast and then brought out the beer. They drank a toast to one another. This was their celebration. They had no other plans.

A reporter from the Oshkosh Northwestern came by later that morning and took a picture of them on their porch. The photo shows Hanna seated and smiling. She’s looking off into the distance. Fritz stands behind her in his low-bib overalls. He looks stern, serious. He holds his last bottle of Oshkosh Bock in his left hand, a hand made thick from years of manual labor.

Hanna and Fritz, August 25, 1970.

The photo appeared in the afternoon paper. It was accompanied by a few remarks about the old couple who saved two bottles of Chief Oshkosh Bock for their anniversary. The remarks were trivial. But the photo was arresting. It captures a moment when a singular generation and their way of life were fading away.

Fritz was 86. Hanna was 82. They were part of a transitional, and dwindling, group of ethnic Germans in Oshkosh. The bock beer they celebrated with was a cultural tradition. And that was ending too. 1970 was the last year the Oshkosh Brewing Company released a bock beer. It was gone with those last two bottles.

The last label for Chief Oshkosh Bock, 1970.

Hanna Smick passed away at Mercy Medical Center on a cold night in September 1975. She was 87. Fritz died the following summer. He was 91. Their home on Division Street was torn down in 1994 to make room for a parking lot.

Division Street today. The red “X” indicates the former location of the home where Hanna and Fritz lived.

Lake View Memorial Park, Oshkosh.

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The two photos of Fritz and Hanna used in this post are from monochrome prints that were colorized.

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