Multnomah County OR Archives Biographies.....Blaesing, H. J. 
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Ila Wakley iwakley@msn.com October 24, 2009, 5:26 pm

Source: History of the Columbia River Valley From The Dalles to the Sea, Vol. III, Published 1928, Pages 114-115
Author: The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company

     Among Portland's best known business men stands H. J. Blaesing, who, as 
the head of the Blaesing Granite Company, has done a vast amount of memorial 
and other stonework throughout this section of the country during the thirty-
two years of his business career. His work is artistic in the highest degree 
and many of his productions have been widely commended for their beauty and 
workmanship. Mr. Blaesing is a native of Wisconsin, where he was reared, 
receiving his educational training in its schools, after which he learned the 
trade of marble cutter at Wausau. In 1894 he came to Portland, Oregon, and 
went to work for William Young, owner of one of the first marble works in this 
city. His first job was that of carving the inscription on Mr. Young's 
headstone, which had been fashioned by Mr. Young in 1862. In 1894 the Young 
marble shop was flooded and Mr. Young's son, John, who was a captain in the 
city fire department, gave Mr. Blaesing a temporary job on the fire boat. In 
that capacity Mr. Blaesing served on a scow, on which was mounted a fire 
engine, and was the first person in Portland to fight a fire from the water, 
this having occurred at the foot of Washington street. In 1896 Mr. Blaesing 
engaged in the granite business for himself, his first place being at 108 
Sixth street, on the present site of the Columbia theater. In 1898 he came to 
his present location, where his building, which was erected in 1926, is two 
hundred feet deep, extending through from Third to Fourth streets, and has 
three frontages, forty-five and a half feet on Third street, twenty-five feet 
on Fourth street and forty-eight feet, ten inches, on Jefferson street. Here 
he does all of his manufacturing and cutting, getting his material in both 
rough and finished form. Ninety-five per cent of his work is in granite, 
though he does some in marble and limestone. He has done considerable exterior 
building work, but specializes in memorials, in which line he has no 
superiors. He has done many artistic pieces in limestone in fountain seats and 
garden statuary, as well as fireplaces. He made the big memorial, "The Circuit 
Rider," which stands on the capitol grounds at Salem, as well as other 
memorials to many of Oregon's most prominent deceased citizens. He made the 
Roosevelt, Washington and Lincoln memorials, and the Jefferson high school 
memorial to those of its former students who lost their lives in the World 
war, as well as the war memorials at Salem, McMinnville and other places. The 
designing was all done in Mr. Blaesing's shop and his productions have given 
him a marked prestige throughout this section of the coast country. He employs 
an average of twelve expert granite cutters, and has four salesman traveling 
out of the Portland office, while eight other representatives travel from his 
agencies in northern California, eastern Oregon, eastern Washington and Alaska.

     In 1900, in Portland, Mr. Blaesing was united in marriage to Miss 
Katherine Cook, whose family came to this state from Canada, and to them have 
been born two children, Lenore, who is the wife of George LaRoche, an attorney 
in Portland, and Herman, Jr., who also is married, and is a designer and 
architect in his father's shop. Mr. Blaesing is a stanch republican in his 
political views and fraternally is a member of Columbia Lodge, No. 114, A. F. 
& A. M.; Oregon Consistory, No. 1, A. A. S. R.; Al Kader Temple, A. A. O. N. 
M. S.; the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, and the Woodmen of the World. He 
also belongs to the Royal Rosarians, the Chamber of Commerce and the 
Advertising Club and is a member of the board of trustees of the Shrine 
Crippled Children's Hospital. He has shown a commendable public spirit, giving 
his earnest support to those measures which have been advanced for the 
betterment of the community, and his consistent life and sterling character 
have won for him a high place in the esteem of his fellowmen.

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