Hermann Belter

HERMANN BELTER. - No foreign country has given more to our land in the way of persistent industry and valuable staying qualities than the German empire. Its people are distinguished wherever they locate for the endurance with which they labor toward any desired end, and the skill and energy with which they prosecute their efforts. If they build their house in a barren waste it soon blooms around them like a garden. In whatever calling or business they engage they make steady progress and benefit the locality around them.

These characteristics have been prominent in their history in this country, which they always find in need of constructive work, and which they always improve. A member of this race resident in Kansas City, Kansas, who is worthy of commendatory mention in this work because of what he is and what he has accomplished is Hermann Belter, at one time one of the enterprising and progressive business men of the city, but for some years now retired from all active pursuits. He has been a resident of Kansas City since 1869, and during the period of his active life here was a potent influence in helping to build up, improve and beautify the municipality.

Mr. Belter was born in Prussia, Germany, on September 6, 1833. He is a scion of families long resident in that country, whose members have been known and esteemed for many generations as thrifty and most estimable persons, ever faithful to duty and giving worthy examples of usefulness and good citizenship to all around them. His parents were William and Louisa (Schildermann) Belter, natives of Prussia and lifelong dwellers in their native land. The father died there in 1847 and the mother in 1866, having reached the advanced age of eighty years.

Herman Belter remained in the land of his birth until he reached the age of twenty-four years, then, in 1847, came to the United States, landing at New Orleans on his arrival in this country. He had secured a fair common school education and learned his trade as a shoemaker in Germany, and so was well prepared to make his way in a new country overflowing with opportunities for advancement where industry, frugality and perseverance governed the efforts made to secure it.

During the first six years of his residence in America he remained in New Orleans working at his trade. He then engaged in the grocery trade for two years, and in 1865 came up to St. Louis to pass his summers, always returning to New Orleans for the winter. He conducted a thriving grocery business in St. Louis until 1869, when he started a long continuance of zealous attention to a prosperous and profitable saloon business in Kansas City, Kansas, which he conducted on Minnesota avenue until 1881. He then retired from business of every kind, and from that time to the present (1911) has been living at his ease and in the peaceful enjoyment of the fruits of his successful labors of former years.

He own a large brick business block, twenty-eight feet wide and eighty feet deep on Minnesota avenue, and other valuable property in different parts of the city. The business block is two stories high and always occupied with profitable tenants. It is one of the most valuable pieces of city property in its locality. He has helped in many other ways to build up and improve the city and county of his residence, always giving his active support to all worthy projects for the purpose. In politics he is independent and in fraternal life a member of the Order of Odd Fellows. He takes great interest in the work of his lodge and has passed through all the chairs in its government. Twice he has made trips to Germany, remaining several months each time. He has never married.