November 1941 — Seventy-five dollars

On November 12, 1941, two things happened at 1522 Kane Street. The board of public works sold the house for wrecking, and Peter Nelson and Son began construction and poured the footings.

That same afternoon, a summons was served.

Arthur Schwalbe — reported in October as the low bidder on the general contract — brought suit to enjoin the City of La Crosse and Peter Nelson and Son from building the north side branch library.

How the low bid stopped being the low bid

Schwalbe's base bid was $46,950. Nelson's was $47,000, fifty dollars higher. But the bids had been taken with four alternates, and the council accepted one of them: linoleum floor covering in place of cork carpet.

Schwalbe, base	$46,950
Nelson, base	$47,000
Schwalbe, with the alternate	$46,975
Nelson, with the alternate	$46,900

On the linoleum, Nelson's bid took a hundred dollars off. Schwalbe's added twenty-five. The firm that was fifty dollars high on the base bid finished seventy-five dollars low on the contract, and took the job.

The complaint

Schwalbe's complaint was not about the arithmetic. It was about who the Nelsons were.

He alleged that Orval J. Nelson was a co-partner with Milo Nelson and Bernt Nelson in the contracting firm of Peter Nelson and Son — and a co-partner with Frank Fuchs in the architectural firm of Nelson and Fuchs. The architects of the library, and the firm supervising the job.

The suit asked the court to void the proceedings of the common council in which the contract was let, to enjoin everyone from carrying it out, and to stop the city paying Peter Nelson and Son for any work done.

The defendants were named in full: the City of La Crosse; Mayor J. J. Verchota; City Clerk Fred L. Kramer; City Attorney Fred E. Steele; City Comptroller L. J. Kaiser and City Engineer John H. Barth, the last two with Steele as members of the board of public works; Bernt, Orval and Milo Nelson of Peter Nelson and Son; and Orval J. Nelson and Frank Fuchs of Nelson and Fuchs.

City Attorney Steele said the city was amply protected. Both Orval Nelson and Frank Fuchs had sworn that there was and had been no connection between Nelson and the architectural firm since the first of July 1941. If the Nelson firm wished to keep working, that was entirely up to it — but the city would make no payment on the contract until the suit was settled to its satisfaction.

Orval Nelson said the work would continue while the case ran. The summons required an appearance within twenty days.

The hearing

Then the country went to war, and on the north side of La Crosse the library case went on the calendar.

On Saturday, December 13, 1941 — six days after Pearl Harbor — the court reporter, Clarence Weber, confirmed the date. Circuit Judge Emery W. Crosby of Neillsville would hear Arthur Schwalbe's injunction proceedings against the City of La Crosse and Peter Nelson and Son in circuit court at two in the afternoon on December 22.

Three days before Christmas, two weeks into a world war, a judge was coming down from Clark County to decide whether the north side's library had been contracted for lawfully.

The charge was restated plainly: the contract awarded to the Nelson firm was illegal. Schwalbe had submitted the low base bid, and council action on the alternates had made Nelson lowest. Orval J. Nelson was a member of Peter Nelson and Son, and Nelson and Fuchs were the city's architects on the library job.

And the defense, restated just as plainly by the city and by every other defendant: Nelson and Fuchs had dissolved their partnership in July.

The trial

The case was heard on December 22 and 23, 1941. Jesse E. Higbee, of Higbee and Higbee, appeared for Schwalbe. City Attorney Fred E. Steele appeared for the city and its officials; Lawrence J. Brody and D. S. Law, of Gordon, Law, Brody and Johns, for Peter Nelson and Sons; George P. Ruediger for Frank J. Fuchs.

One fact came out of the first afternoon's testimony that nobody had reported before.

The contract had been signed half an hour before the summons was served.

Higbee called the city's own people as adverse witnesses: Gysbert Van Steenwyk, secretary of the library board; City Clerk Fred L. Kramer; Alderman Fred Kraft, chairman of grounds and buildings; Orval J. Nelson; and Frank Fuchs.

Van Steenwyk — who in April 1937 had told the Business Men's Club that the city had never spent a cent on a library building, and who was still the board's secretary four years later — was put on the stand to trace the library board's own history: its foundation, its appeal to the city for help in financing the branches, and its action in hiring the architectural firm of Nelson and Fuchs, in 1938, to prepare the plans and specifications.

Kramer spent most of an afternoon and a morning identifying council records: the hiring of the architect, and the letting of the contract.

The letter

The plaintiff's star witness arrived on the second morning. C. A. Willson had come up from Madison; he was acting secretary of the Wisconsin Board of Registration for Architects and Professional Engineers.

Willson testified that on October 6, 1941, he had written to Fuchs, having found the firm name "Nelson and Fuchs" listed in a La Crosse telephone directory, to ask about the firm's name and who "Nelson" was.

Fuchs replied on October 15. The letter was put in evidence as an exhibit. In it, according to the report of the testimony, Fuchs referred to Nelson as —

"My partner, Orval J. Nelson."

— Frank J. Fuchs, letter of October 15, 1941, placed in evidence

The affidavits Fuchs and Nelson had furnished to the city, already in evidence, stated that the partnership was dissolved on July 1, 1941. The bids had been opened on October 1. The letter was written on the fifteenth.

M. F. Lindgren, a local tile and floor covering contractor, testified to the prices he had quoted the plaintiff on linoleum and on cork. Under cross-examination he said he had also bid to the Nelson firm — but had not included a bid for cork floor covering.

Against all of this, Brody and Ruediger objected that no evidence should be admitted at all, because Schwalbe had shown no grounds for action: the authorities, they said, require that the public, the taxpayers, be harmed by the letting of such a contract before anyone may sue over it. Steele objected to Van Steenwyk's testimony unless Higbee first showed he was an agent of the city.

Judge Crosby allowed the evidence in provisionally and said he would rule on the motions later.