John Boepple

By Vance Polton

Today, I thought we would take note of the anniversary of the passing of John Boepple. On January 30, 1912 John Boepple, founder of the pearl button industry in Muscatine and later in his life, the shell expert at the Fairport Biological Station, now known as our Fairport Fish Hatchery, passed away from blood poisoning. One of his duties as the Station's shell expert was to acquire the shells of new mussel species and to document the locations and size of new mussel beds. During the fall of 1911, while working for the Biological Station on a river in Indiana, John stepped on a mussel shell and cut his foot. Soon afterwards the wound became infected and developed into blood poisoning. In October of that year he was hospitalized for blood poisoning. Treatments failed (the first antibiotics were invented in 1909/10, penicillin not until 1928) and by January of 1912, Boepple had been moved to the Bellevue Hospital in Muscatine where he was made "comfortable" until his death on January 30,1912. When the first lab building at the Fairport Biological Station was dedicated on August 4, 1914 the building was dedicated to John with a bronze plaque with the following inscription: "In the memory of J. F. Boepple, founder of the freshwater pearl button industry and late shell expert of this Station presented by those who have built an important industry upon the foundation so well laid by Mr. Boepple."

I have attached a reproduction of a newspaper article from the Wednesday January 31, 1912 edition of  "The Muscatine Journal" on the passing of John Boepple and his life and impact on the city of Muscatine.  If you have read any short biographies or other texts on Boepple's life you will soon recognize this article as most others have borrowed from it.  Once again, for ease of reading I have retyped the original article but have made no other changes to it.