Death Comes Early Today to Prominent Wisconsin Jurist

A heart ailment of several years standing has ended the life of Circuit Judge Michael G. Eberlein, one of Shawano county’s most widely-known and respected residents.

Death came unexpectedly about 4 o’clock this morning at his home at 125 S. Franklin Street in Shawano. He died in his sleep and his body wasn’t discovered until shortly before 8:30 a.m. Funeral arrangements, which will be under the direction of the Karth Funeral Home, have not yet been completed.

The story of Judge Eberlein’s amazing active and varied career is a tribute not only to the man’s personal character but to the entire American way of life. Born of immigrant parents, he worked his way into a prominence — local, state, and national — that few men attain. His death is a staggering blow to both his profession and his community.

THE JUDGE had been in ill health for six or seven years, but, to the limit of physical endurance, he stayed on the job to the very end. Only yesterday he presided over a case in the Shawano county courthouse and went home at the end of the afternoon in apparent good health.

Eberlein, who was 72 years old at the time of his death, was in his first elected term as judge of the Tenth Wisconsin Judicial Circuit. He was appointed in 1946 to serve out the unexpired term of Senator Joseph McCarthy, then re-elected in April, 1951. His present term would have ended January 1951.

Michael Gustave Eberlein was born in Shawano July 31, 1880, the youngest of fifteen children. His father, Frederick Eberlein had emigrated [sic] to the United States from Germany in 1854. He married German-born Catherine Gerner in Pittsburgh in 1858, and eleven years later, moved to the town of Herman in Shawano county. Judge Eberlein’s parents, the second settlers in Herman developed a prosperous farm but sold it and moved to Shawano in 1879.

Four of the judge’s fourteen brothers and sisters are still living: Frederick and Charles of Shawano, Mrs. Minnie Kellerman, who lives in Florida, and Mrs. Natalie Pludeman of Chicago.

THE FAMILY lived across the street from the courthouse, and young Mike often spent his afternoons living to the long and involved sessions. He was barely out of knee-pants when the ambition to become a judge first struck him. He never lost that urge, and his appointment to the Tenth Circuit post in 1946 was something he regarded as the most treasured event of his life.

Eberlein was one of the finest judges the Tenth Circuit ever had. In December, 1950, he was given a joint endorsement by the Outagamie County Bar Association and the county board for his “outstanding job in clearing up a cluttered calendar of cases” and for “the way that you have disposed of and settled many cases without expensive jury trials, thereby saving the taxpayers much money.”

He was praised for making the Outagamie county law library “one of the best,” and for “freely giving your time to counsel the county board and its committees,” and for “your outstanding judicial ability and the superios manner in which you have handled your court.”

L. Hugo Keller, chairman of the county board, said, while making the presentation, that “the greatest reward any man can receive is the respect of the people he serves. In you we find such a man.”

Judge Eberlein accepted the commendations “with gladness in my heart; they are the finest gifts ever offered me. When I took this job, I had only one ambition … to do a good job. And when I leave I want you still to think so.”

THE THOUSANDS of people in Shawano, Outagamie and Langlade counties (the Tenth circuit) who are mourning his death today bear mute testimoy to Judge Eberlein’s greatest wish.

Eberlein was graduated from Shawano high school with the class of 1897, and a few months later won an appointment to the United States Naval Academy at Annapolis. He lead his class scholastically during the first year at Annapolis, but was forced to resign before the start of the second year because of ill health.

Mike returned to Shawano County, taught three years in the Bonduel grade school and served another year as principal of the elementary school in Shawano. He began studying law about that time and, in 1902, entered the University of Wisconsin law school, where, after only eight weeks, he took and passed the state bar examination.

He continued his studies at the university, however, and won his law degree in 1904, one of the few attorneys in Wisconsin to have argued cases before the state Supreme Court before his graduation from law school.

A 42-year career as one of Shawano’s most successful practicing attorneys followed this auspicious beginning. Mike and his brother, Frederick, were partners until 1913. A year later Mike and the late Albert S. Larson formed a partnership that continued for 17 years.

EBERLEIN  practiced alone from Larson’s death in 1931 until the summer of 1932 when Ovid Strossenreuther, present Shawano county district attorney, joined the firm as a junior associate. Joe McCarthy took Stossenreuther’s place in 1936 and remained in the office until he was elected circuit judge in 1939. Appointed circuit judge by Gov. Walter S. Goodland on December 1, 1946, to fill McCarthy’s unexpired term, Eberlein retired from private practice. Two of his sons, however, have kept the firm alive, Michael, jr., joining his father in 1939 and Frederic in the summer of 1946.

When Judge Eberlein was reelected a year ago last April, it was the first time he had won public office at the polls. Mike was an unsuccessful candidate for
Congress in both 1916 and 1918; he was the Republican candidate for attorney general in the state election of 1930; and he was defeated in the 1940 Republican primary election for United States Senator.

In the course of his law practice, Eberlein argued more than 300 cases before the supreme court of Wisconsin. In six years as judge, he tried more than 2,000 cases, on a handful of which were appealed and fewer still reversed by a higher court. He was admitted to the bar of the United States Supreme Court, the Chicago Circuit Court of Appeals, and both the eastern and western district courts of Wisconsin.

EBERLEIN retained some of his father’s interests in agriculture, and until when giving them up when he began his career on the circuit court bench, was part-owner with his brother Frederick, of several fine farms in Shawano county and one of the state’s largest potato farms, a 1,400-acre tract in Langlade county.

Mike was married July 31, 1906, his 26th birthday, to the former Lora Rather of Fond du Lac, a teacher in the Shawano school system. Mrs. Eberlein survives the judge along with five children, Michael, jr., and Frederic, both of Shawano; William, professor of mathematics at the University of Wisconsin; Dr. Walter Eberlein, a member of the staff at the famed Johns Hopkins hospital in Baltimore, Md.; and Margaret, Mrs. Lester G. Volkman of Oshkosh. One other son, Robert, died at the age of ten during the 1918 influenza epidemic.

Six grandchildren and his four brothers and sisters also survive.

JUDGE EBERLEIN loved Shawano and steadfastly maintained an interest in community affairs even though his duties as judge kept his away for weeks at a time. He was an active member of St. James Lutheran church, a charter member of the St. James Men’s Club, and one of the founders of the Wolf River Council of Lutheran Men’s Club.

He was a charter member of the Shawano Rotary Club, a member of the local board of education for many years, and an original trustee of the Shawano Municipal hospital.

A conservative Republican politically, Judge Eberlein always respected the opinions of the opposition, and enjoyed nothing better than the chance to argue politics wherever and whenever the opportunity presented itself. He built a successful law practice through hard work and extraordinary application of the one of the sharpest legal minds in Wisconsin, Yet he remained at heart the small town boy with a fine sense of practical living and exemplary moral character.

AN UNCOMMON common man, the judge lived a rich and full life. The first of his two greatest ambitions were realized when he became a judge. The second, to be remembered as a fair and honest judge, will be recorded in the hearts and memories of the thousands that he has served.

But there is one more achievement in Judge Eberlein’s career, that of becoming a respected leader of men. The sadness his death brought today to the people of Shawano and those who knew him everywhere is the finest  memorial any man could have.

Source: Shawano Evening Leader, Tuesday, 23 September 1952, page 1.