Emanuel Shultz

Who was Emanuel Shultz?

Emanuel Shultz was a shoemaker, merchant, manufacturer, banker and a member of the United States House of Representatives from Ohio.

Emanuel Shultz was born in Berks County, Pennsylvania, the son of George and Mary Shultz. He attended the public schools until he was eleven years old when his father died. He was compelled to leave school and depend on diligent self-study and was soon apprenticed to the trade of shoemaking. In 1838, he removed to Miamisburg, Ohio where he engaged five to fifteen journeymen to make boots and shoes.

Emanuel Shultz married Sarah Beck, of Miamisburg, on July 23, 1840. They had three daughters. Shultz was initiated a charter member of the Marion Lodge the Masons in 1844, a royal arch Mason and a Knight Templar. He was also a member of the Odd Fellows and Knights of Pythias.

Around 1846, he became a trader in general produce, and became one of the largest and most successful commercial operators in the Miami Valley. One success built upon another and he soon was a leader in all the prominent enterprises of Miamisburg. Emanuel Shultz was also a leading tobacco leaf dealer since 1853, Montgomery and Butler Counties being major tobacco producing and manufacturing centers in Ohio and the United States throughout the last half of the 19th century. In 1865, he was one of the founders of the private bank of H. Groby & Co., and a principal in the Miami Valley Paper Company, which he organized in 1871.