Charles W. Biese

        Charles W. Biese, secretary and treasurer of the Lookout Ice and Cold Storage Company, of Chattanooga, was born in Holstein, Germany, November 8. 1835; came to the United States in 1860 and located at Chicago, where, in 1861, he enlisted in the Federal Army, serving through grades of private, sergeant, lieutenant and captain in the Eighty-Second Illinois Regiment until 1865. He then opened one of the first coal mines in this locality which he operated three years.   He was then connected with Cherokee Mining & Manufacturing Company, and later was connected with the Georgia Coal Company. In 1869 he assisted in building bridges and trestles on the Great Southern Railroad, Alabama. Later he engaged in the same business with the Alabama Grand Trunk Railroad, with office at Mobile, Ala. and was engaged in the commission business for two years. In 1875 he returned to this place and engaged in the agricultural implement business which he lately sold to his son Robert and a Mr. Dickinson. In 1883 Mr. Biese had a company formed to engage in the manufacture of artificial ice, but owing to competition it proved a failure. In 1884 he again formed a company of which the present company is the outcome and of which he is secretary. In 1864 he married Narcissa H. McDonald, of Dade County, Ga., who died in 1873, leaving four children, all of whom are living. In 1875 he married his present wife, Miss Eliza A. Pryor, of Jasper, Tenn., who has presented him with two sons, only one living. Mr. Biese is a Republican, a Knight of Labor, a Mason, and a member of the G. A. R., was Post Commander of Lookout Post, No. 2, during 1886. He is also a member of the K. of P., K. of H., and of the Methodist Episcopal Church South, of which he is a steward.

Goodspeed's "History of East Tennessee" 1887