Background
Vogel was born in Kirchheim unter Teck in the Kingdom of Württemberg on May 8, 1823, son of Johann Michael Vogel, a tanner.
Vogel was born in Kirchheim unter Teck in the Kingdom of Württemberg on May 8, 1823, son of Johann Michael Vogel, a tanner.
He received an academic education, and went into the family trade. With Pfister"s help, he built a small tannery which sold its leather through Pfister"s Buffalo Leather Company. In 1853 Vogel and Pfister went into partnership.
During the early 1850s, Vogel also established tanneries in Chicago and Fort Wayne, Indiana.
Soon thereafter, Henry Schoellkopf married Vogel"s daughter, Emily Vogel in 1875. Prior to Henry"s early death in 1880, Henry partnered with Vogel and Guido Pfister and opened a tannery in northeast Wisconsin that eventually “became the largest in the world prior to World War I.”
He was elected as an independent candidate, winning 817 votes to 552 for John Fellenz, the Reform Party candidate (Republican incumbent Galen Seaman was not a candidate).
But chose to identify himself as a Liberal Republican when the Assembly convened for 1874, divided between 41 regular Republicans and 59 identified in the Wisconsin Blue Book as ""Opposition," of all kinds". He was assigned to the standing committee on insurance, banks and banking.
And to the joint committee on penal and charitable institutions.
He did not run for re-election, and was succeeded by Republican Bernard Schlichting. Vogel concentrated on the leather company (known after 1876 as Pfister & Vogel Leather Company), eventually building it into the largest leather goods maker in the world. Vogel was the firm"s expert on bark tanning, serving as vice-president and general manager.
He died on October 23, 1892 aboard a transatlantic steamer during the return leg of a vacation in Europe.
He had been ill for some time.
He had served two terms as a member of the Milwaukee Common Council as a Republican, the first in 1856, before being elected to the Assembly from the 8th Milwaukee County district (the 8th and 11th Wards of the City of Milwaukee) in 1873.