Interior view of the Sweet Hardware Company's Store.

Among Concordia's numerous firms with young men at the helm, perhaps none have engaged in business under more favorable auspices than the proprietors of the Sweet Hardware Company, E.D. Foote and Karl Ossmann, successors to Sweet & Browning.

This house was widely known under the name of Sweet Hardware company, and the new members thought it advisable to retain the familiar title. Since Foote & Ossmann assumed control in November, 1902, they have been closing out the extensive line of farm implements heretofore carried in stock, but have doubled their facilities for handling vhicles[sic] and are opening up the most modern up-to-date class of goods in this line ever shown to the trade of Concordia and Cloud county. They carry shelf and heavy hardware and make a specialty of plumbing. Edward Rose, the mechanic they employ in this department, is an expert plumber and was with Mr. Sweet four years. The extended line of harness that occupies nearly half of their large storeroom is all of their own manufacture, under the supervision of that very competent workman, Emile L'Ecuyer. They have a large patronage in this line, as the quality of work and material used are superior. Mr. Foote has been a valued employe of the firm for six years, hence is familiar with the requirements of the business and favorably known to the patrons. He is a Kansan, born and reared in Washington county, and received his education in Washington, the metropolis of his native county where his father, the present clerk of the court, has lived for more than a quarter of a century. Mr. Foote's mother is a sister of C.E. Sweet. Mr. Foote had an experience of six months as a traveling salesman for the United States Supply Company of Kansas City, Missouri.

Mr. Ossmann is a German product, born in the Kingdom of Wurtenburg in 1870. He came with his parents to America when fifteen years of age, and with them settled in Leavenworth, Kansas. Mr. Ossmann did not become a permanent fixture, however, and vacillated considerably. Reared in the wagon and vehicle business, he was employed by a St. Louis firm four years. He traveled two and a half years in Massachusetts, selling his line to the trade in northwest Kansas and southern Nebraska. Mr. Ossmann was married in the summer of 1902, which had a tendency to make him renounce the road and in November he became associated with Mr. Foote, as before mentioned. They are men of the highest integrity and superior capabilities, at the same time conservative in their transactions, and these traits united with the determined spirit inherent in these young men invariably lead to success.