Willmar Brick Company | Minnesota Bricks

In 1899 N. N. Flykt, who had been with the company since 1891, bought Mr. Dehlbom’s share. The firm name was then changed from Dehlbom, Johnson & Co. to Willmar Brick Co. Mr. Flykt has had charge of the yard since that time. The total value of the land and plant is placed at $16,000. The plant has a capacity of 3,000,000 bricks per season. The clay is of an excellent quality, and the company has frequently obtained large contracts where the quality of the brick was required to be of the highest standard. (Illustrated History and Descriptive and Biographical Review of Kandiyohi County, Minnesota, Published by Victor E. Lawson and J. Emil Nelson of the Willmar Tribune, The Pioneer Press Manufacturing Departments, 1905, Page 388)

Nels N. Flykt has purchased John Dehlborn’s interest in the Willmar (Minn.) Brick Yard and will hereafter be the manager of it. (Clay Record, Clay Record Publishing Company, Chicago, IL, May 27, 1899, Volume XIV, Number 10, Page 24)

Willmar. Brick Manufacturing – Willmar Brick Co. Second Inspection 1900. Adults – Male - 25. Total No. Employed - 25. No. Hours Labor Each Day - 10. Average No. Weeks Employed in Year – 18. (Seventh Biennial Report of the Bureau of Labor of the State of Minnesota, 1899-1900, Pioneer Press Company, St. Paul, Minnesota, 1900, Page 148)

The Willmar (Minn.) Brick Company’s plant was damaged to the extent of $3,000 by fire recently. (The Clay Worker, T. A. Randall & Co., Indianapolis, June 1901, Volume XXXV, Number 6, Page 614)

Willmar. Brick Mfrs. Willmar Brick Co. 1901. Adult Males - 25. Total – 25. Number of Working Hours Each Day - 10. Average Number Weeks in Year - 16. 1902. Adult Males - 28. Total – 28. Number of Working Hours Each Day - 10. Average Number of Weeks in Year – 18. Number of Persons Working Sundays - 3. (Eighth Biennial Report of the Bureau of Labor of the State of Minnesota, 1901-1902, Pioneer Press Company, St. Paul, 1902, Page 169)

Page 314. Willmar. Brick and Tile – 1903. Willmar Brick Co. Total Number Wage Earners - 28. Adult Males - 28. Number of Hours Each Day - 10. Number of Hours Each Week - 60. Average Number Weeks Operated During 1902 - 18. Number Employed between 6 p.m. and 7 a.m. – Not Listed. Number Persons Regularly Employed Sunday - 3. Established in Year – 1889.

Page 315. 1904. Total Number Wage Earners - 25. Adult Males (Excluding Office Force) - 25. Number of Hours Each Day - 10. Number of Hours Each Week - 60. Average Number Weeks Operated Last Year - 20. Number Employed between 6 p.m. and 7 a.m. - 2. Number Persons Regularly Employed on Sunday - 2. Changes in Name of Firm or New Inspections – None. (Ninth Biennial Report of the Bureau of Labor of the State of Minnesota, 1903-1904, Volume 2, Great Western Printing Company, 1904)

Willmar, Minn. - The Willmar Brick Co. is about to put in a kiln for making tiling. (Brick and Clay Record, Kenfield Publishing Company, Chicago, IL, December 1905, Volume XXIII, Number 6, Page 222)

Lewis Johnson has disposed of his interest in the Willmar, Minn., Brick Co. to N. N. Flykt, the manager, who now owns five-twelfths of it. (Clay Record, Clay Record Publishing Company, Chicago, March 30, 1906, Volume XXVIII, Number 6, Page 42)

The Willmar (Minn.) Brick Co. is putting in permanent kilns, instead of their old-fashioned kilns, also are putting in drying sheds. (Clay Record, Clay Record Publishing Company, Chicago, July 30, 1907, Volume XXXI, Number 2, Page 39)

During a fierce wind and rain storm at Willmar, 200,000 brick were ruined and 1,200 feet of sheds broken to pieces at the Flykt brick yard. The loss was about $1,000. (Brick and Clay Record, Kenfield-Leach Company, Chicago, IL, August 1908, Volume XXIX, Number 2, Page 374)

The laminated clays are the chief clay resources of Kandiyohi County, though gray drift in abundant. A little over a mile west of Willmar, along the Great Northern Railway, is a deposit of laminated clay known to extend over about 25 acres. It consists of 15 feet of yellow oxidized material underlain by at least as much blue clay. The yellow clay contains a few limestone pebbles or concretions. The blue clay is, as usual, more plastic than the yellow and shows greater shrinkage when used alone. Both the yellow and blue clay burn cream-colored at high temperatures but salmon-colored if underburned. The Willmar Brick Co. has been at work here for 20 years, making about 2,000,000 stiff-mud cream-colored brick and some draintile each season. (Clays and Shales of Minnesota, Frank F. Grout with contributions by E. K. Soper, United States Geological Survey, Government Printing Office, Washington, D.C., 1919, Page 181)