George Bachmann Sr.

George Bachmann Sr., a 62-year resident of East Camden, founded and operated a construction firm which built many large buildings in Camden, many of which are still in use. He built eight schools in Camden, churches, factories, commercial buildings, social clubs, and several large homes in Merchantville NJ. The home he built for himself, at 19 North 30th Street in East Camden, is still in use in 2006.

George Bachmann Sr. passed away at his home on February 3, 1952, at the age of 91.

George Bachmann Sr. was a member of Mozart Lodge No. 121, Free and Accepted Masons. He was elected to a one-year term as the lodge’s Master in 1917.

Professional and Business Leaders Back Camden Man for Governor

Forty-seven more prominent professional and business men yesterday joined the Baird-for-Governor Business Men’s League and pledged themselves to work actively in interest of David Baird Jr., for governor, and add special impetus to his campaign.

The league was organized this week at an enthusiastic meeting of 18 outstanding Baird supporters in professional and business life at the Camden Club, 315 Cooper Street. The league membership is open only to business, professional and industrial leaders who are not holding public office and who are not politicians.

The latest enrollments among community leaders pledging themselves to devote themselves to the Baird cause are the following:

F. Morse Archer, president of the First Camden National Bank; Clinton L. Bardo, president of the New York Shipbuilding Company and of the New Jersey Taxpayers’ Association; George C. Baker, of the Baker-Flick Company; Watson Shallcross, president of the Camden County Chamber of Commerce; Howard J. Dudley, Broadway merchant; Thomas E. French, prominent attorney; J. David Stern, publisher of the Courier-Post newspapers and of the Philadelphia Record; Wellington K. Barto, of the West Jersey Trust Company; Dr. Joseph Roberts, Cooper Hospital; William Clement, of the Clement Coverall Paint Company; Robert Wright, of the Haddonfield National Bank; Arthur J. Podmore, of the Camden Pottery Company; Nathan Leopold, Haddonfield druggist; Dr. J. Edgar Howard, of Haddonfield.

Dr. Alfred N. Elwell, of this city; Edward Preisendanz, Clarence Peters, N. Franks, of Franks & Sweeney; U. G. Peters, Ralph D. Baker, prominent real estate man; Archibald Dingo, George Bachman, Sr., and George Bachman, Jr., Dr. O. W. Saunders, Henry Cooperson, Leon Cooperson, Herman Z. Cutler. Charles Bauman, Harry Rose, George Austermuhl, Walter Gulick, Albert Voeglin, Howard Fearn, John A. Schlorer, Ernest L. Bartelt.

William S. Casselman, George M. Carr, J. Price Myers, Carl R. Evered, former president of the Camden County Real Estate Board; Francis B. Wallen, former president of the Camden County Chamber of Commerce; William H. Alff, Edmund J. Alff, Harry Pelouze, Walter Campbell, Dr. Thomas R. Bunting, Joseph F. Kobus and Henry E. Kobus.

Enrollments, it was announced, may be made through the following committee of the league:

Ludwig A. Kind, Thomas Gordon Coulter, Charles H. Laird, Walter J. Staats, Frank C. Middleton, Jr., Frank J. Hineline, William T. Read, Charles S. Boyer, W. W. Robinson, George R. Pelouze, Paul A. Kind, Dr. Paul A. Mecray, Jerome Hurley, Harry A. Moran, James V. Moran, William J. Strandwitz, former Judge Lewis Starr and Frank C. Norcross.

The Past Masters’ Circle of Mozart Lodge of Masons held its annual outing yesterday at Pioneer’s Grove, Pine Hill.

The circle has been in existence 40 years. A banquet was served in the grove. Sports were a feature. Max Reihman, Jr., and Ferdinand Braun were quoits champions.

The committee included: Arthur A. I Holler, Otto E. Braun, Herman E. Hensgen and Reihman. Officers are: Charles Engel, president; Henry Hess, vice president; William Indicher, secretary, and William Sangtinette, treasurer.

In attendance were: Mr. and Mrs. George Bachman, Mr. and Mrs. Rudolph Korthage, Mr. and Mrs. William Bartelt, Sr., Mr. and Mrs. Ernest L. Bartelt, Mr. and Mrs. Edward J. Baker, Mr. and Mrs. Indicher, Mr. and Mrs. Holler, Mr. and Mrs. Reihman, Mr. and Mrs. Otto E. Braun, Mr. and Mrs. Carl Braun, Rose Braun, Mrs. Frank X. Braun, Sarah Whitaker, Mr. and Mrs. Carl J. Rugart, Mr. and Mrs. Charles Haub, Mr. and Mrs. Hensgen, Mr. and Mrs. Ferdinand Braun, Mr. and Mrs. Sangtinette, Mr. and Mrs. Hess and Mr. and Mrs. Engel, Mr. and Mrs. Frank J. Hartmann, Jr., and Mr. and Mrs. Henry Michelfelder.

George Bachmann Sr., 91, widely contractor and builder in Camden and South Jersey, died Monday at 11:00 PM in his home, 19 North 30th Street which he had built in 1887 and in which had lived since then.

Mr. Bachmann, builder of the Masonic Temple on Fourth Street between Market and Arch Streets in Camden, many public schools in Camden and South Jersey, churches banking buildings, had been ill since August after his 91st birthday.

Born in Schleswig-Holstein, Germany, August 29, 1860. He came to the United States in 1880 and settled in the Cramer Hill area of Camden, where he lived until 1882 when he returned to Hamburg to complete his training in the Bauschule there. He returned to Camden in 1886. He lived in East Camden 62 years.

Mr. Bachmann started in the building and contracting business for himself in 1892. His first construction work was the old German Lutheran Church at Twenty-Eighth and Sherman Avenue, since demolished.

He built many of the landmarks of Camden and vicinity. In addition to the Masonic temple, he constructed the Camden County Vocational School on Browning Road, Pennsauken.

Other Structures

He built parts Courier-Post plant at Third and Arch Streets, a factory building for the Campbell Soup Company, a building for the Highland Shaker Mills, the Camden Embroidery Company plant, the old New Jersey Auto & Supply Company building on Delaware Avenue near Market Street, the old Central Trust Company building at Fourth and Federal Streets and SS Peter and Paul Parochial School, St. John and Spruce Streets.

Mr. Bachmann erected addition to the almshouse and mental hospital at Lakeland and the Camden Municipal Hospital. He built the former home of the Camden lodge of Elks at Broadway and Federal Street, the old Eagles building on Broadway south of Benson Street and the Junior Order of Mechanics Building. He also built the Elks home in Bristol PA.

He also installed the carillon in the tower of the Zion Lutheran Church on Franklin Square, Philadelphia, opposite the Philadelphia approach of the Camden bridge.

Built Many Schools

Public schools which he built in Camden include: Washington, at Twenty-seventh Street near River Avenue; Davis, Thirty-fourth and Cramer Street; Cramer Junior High and Elementary, Twenty-eighth and Mickle Streets; Cassady, Third and Erie Streets; Sewell, Seventh and Vine Streets; Sumner, Eighth and Van Hook streets, and Dudley, Twenty-fourth and High Streets.

He built the Moorestown High School and an addition to the Paulsboro High School, and also erected schools in Laurel Springs, Pitman, Maple Shade, Erlton, Delaware Township, Colonial Manor, Verga, Albion, and Mantua Terrace. At the Masonic home in Burlington County he built the power house and laundry, the boys dormitories and altered and doubled the size of the original main buildings.

He built the Collingswood Presbyterian Church, the Christus Evangelical Lutheran Church, Twenty-sixth Street and Hayes Avenue; Grace Baptist Church, twenty-seventh and Cramer Streets; Temple Lutheran Church, Forty-ninth Street and Camden Avenue, Pennsauken; and the Sunday school building of the First Presbyterian Church of Merchantville.

Erected Many Homes

Mr. Bachmann built the First National Bank building of Merchantville, and also erected numerous homes, among them the Atkinson home, the home of Jesse White of the Taylor-White Extracting Company; the home of Dr. Bryan Smith and that of George Shannon; all in Merchantville.

For 27 years Mr. Bachmann was president of the Westfield Building & Loan Association, a post which he resigned in 1947. Years ago he was active in Republican politics and was Republican committeeman of the Twelfth ward in the days of former U.S. Senator David Baird Sr., and the two were great friends.

Mr. Bachmann was past master of Mozart lodge 121, FAM, and a member of the board of trustees of the lodge for many years. He also was a life member of Excelsior Consistory and a member of the Crescent Temple, Trenton, the Camden Lodge of Elks and a member of the Last Man’s Corner of the Elks Lodge.

He retired from active participation in the business which bears his name in 1934.

Son Operates Firm

Surviving are a son, George Jr., who operates the George Bachmann Company Contractors and builders at 21 North 30th Street; two daughters, Mrs. Norma B. Barton, wife of Lt. Col. William I. Barton, of the Air Force, now stationed in London, England, and Mrs. Adele B. Jennings, Merchantville; a brother, Nicholas in Germany; four grandchildren and five great grandchildren.

Services will be held Thursday at 2:00 PM in the funeral home of B.C. Schroeder & Sons, 715 Cooper Street. The Reverend Werner Eberbach, pastor of Christus Evangelical Lutheran Church, of which Mr. Bachmann was a member, will officiate. Burial will be in Harleigh cemetery. Friends may call at the funeral home Wednesday night, and lodge services will be held in the funeral home that night.