Biographies
CHARLES A. BAUER, M.E., Superintendent of Champion Bar & Knife Company, Springfield. Mr. Bauer is a native of Wurtemberg, Germany; in 1852, his father's family then consisting of the father, mother and four children, of which number the subject of this sketch was the third, sailed for New York; during a long and stormy voyage, the ship was drifted from her course, and the family were unexpectedly landed at New Orleans, where, after the lapse of but ten months, the father fell a victim to the yellow fever. Mrs. Bauer's situation was now a truly trying one — a stranger in a foreign country, surrounded by the depressing influences of a wide-spread epidemic; the little means originally possessed by the family wasted by travel and sickness; but, with that true fortitude which has ever been a characteristic of the German people, she resolved to seek a healthier home in the North, and arrived in Cincinnati in 1853, where she yet resides. At the age of 11 years, Mr. Bauer was employed in the pyrotechnic manufactory of H. P. Diehl; in 1861, he became an apprentice to the gunsmithing business; in 1864, he entered the shops of Miles Greenwood & Co. as practical machinist, devoting his leisure hours to the study of mathematics and applied mechanics; so successful was he in this that, in 1867, he was called to the Ohio Mechanics' U.S Institute as a teacher of drawing; in 1871, he resigned this situation to become Superintendent of the Niles Tool Works at Hamilton, Ohio, which he vacated in 1873 to assume the duties of Consulting Engineer for Lane & Bodley, at Cincinnati. In 1875, Mr. Bauer was tendered the position of Assistant Super-intendent of the Champion Bar & Knife Company Works in Springfield; in 1878, he was promoted to be the Superintendent in charge of the establishment, where he now remains. In 1868, he was married to Miss Louise Haeseler, who came with her parents from St. Goar, Prussia in 1851. Mrs. Bauer is a lady possessed of much refinement and culture with admirable social qualities; the children of this union are three in number — Charles L., William A. and Louis E. Mr. Bauer is a self-made man, and his career demonstrates what can be accomplished by application and economy of time; few mechanical men of this country can excel him in that peculiar faculty which enables one to analyze a difficult problem in mechanics, or trace causes to results, while his natural and acquired resources furnish a constant fund of cultivated ideas, ready for application in any emergency. He has a fine collection of technical works, which, with a choice selection of general and standard books, compose one of the best private libraries in the city.
From History of Clark County, Ohio, W.H. Beers & Co. 1881. Page 788-789