Person Record

Metadata

Name

Bruehl, Nick

Notes

Nick Bruehl was born on a farm near the town of Sherwood, Wisconsin on February 16, 1877. He was one of nine children born to John and Mary Bruehl. He was a man of many interests including sculpting, free lance writing, artifact collecting, and natural history. Although he maintained the family farm most of his life, his real interest lay in photography. He submitted prints to worldwide competitions and won awards in Italy, France and the United States. He was also a staff photographer for the Milwaukee Journal for many years.

Although he considered his photography a hobby, Bruehl's work is professional quality. Bruehl bought his first camera in 1895 for 65 cents, but it didn't work. He then bought a used 6 1/2" x 8 1/2" view camera from a local photographer for $10.00. He set up a dark room in his home and developed all his own negatives and prints. His subject matter included agricultural scenes, farm life, still life and portraits. He often used his sisters Helen, Mary, Elizabeth, and Maggie as models. Bruehl lived at a time when industrialization was beginning to supercede agriculture, so many of his farm laborer images are highly romanticized and staged. He wanted to preserve through photography a way of life that was vanishing. Some of the best photographs he took were of tradesman working at their crafts.

Bruehl never married and died in New Holstein on December 30, 1958 at the age of 81. The old dark room in his house was filled with thousands of negatives and prints. Carlton Schmitt purchased the Bruehl estate and gave the negatives to his brother Milton. The Oshkosh Public Museum acquired the collection of almost 1500 glass and nitrate negatives in 1980.