Kerndt, G., & Brothers Office Block

The Kerndt brothers provide a textbook example of the industriousness and united family effort that has often typified the history of small-town commercial development in Iowa. Through a thorough understanding of the financial underpinnings of Lansing, a grain shipment center on the Mississippi River, the Kerndts covered the vital areas of mercantile trade with their general store crop sales with their grain warehouse, and finance with their small private bank.

Gustav was the first member of the Kerndt family to emigrate from Germany in 1849 when he opened a small broom factory in Schenectady, New York. Later he learned cigar making and opened a cigar business in New York City. His brother, Moritz, followed in 1853 and traveled to the Midwest, where the entire family joined him the following year. In 1856 the Kerndts settled in Lansing. Brother Hermann farmed and provided the broom corn for the family's early broom business, while the remaining brothers (Gustav, William, and Mortiz) opened a broom factory and also a cigar selling business. Soon, in 1858, the brothers were able to acquire sufficient goods to open a small dry goods store and then purchase a lot on the levee for a grain elevator.

In 1861 the brothers built the first half of the G. Kerndt & Brothers general stores and were sufficiently successful to construct an addition of equal size five years later. The mercantile and grain businesses were related since farmers patronized both concerns and led to the establishment of the third leg of their financial empire, a bank. Peterson's history of Iowa relates to the following:

"Farmers came to town to sell their grain at the Kerndt elevator. They bought groceries and dry goods at the Kerndt store. Rather than carry home the money realized from the sale of their products, a large number of farmers fell into the habit of leaving their currency in the large iron safe in the rear of the Kerndt store.

Sometimes, when they needed money for financing their farm operations, they borrowed at the Kerndt store. This was the day of private banks and soon the Kerndt store engaged in this business, in the 12-foot space, railed off in the rear of the building."

The bank was and continues to be a success. The family incorporated the Kerndt Brothers Savings Bank under this, its present title, in 1908.

Besides the triple threat business of the Kerndt family, the brothers participated in other community ventures. Gustav was among Lansing's first city councilmen or trustees, and Moritz, whose family of eleven children lived above the store and bank, sat on the city council for eleven years. All three brothers were officers in the city's original. bank, the State Bank of Lansing. (Established in 1859, the bank underwent four name changes and reorganizations with banking law changes.) In 1908 the Kerndts incorporated their formerly private bank, the Kerndt Brothers Savings Bank.