File:Mr. & Mrs. C.M. Wenner.jpeg

Summary

Portraits of the young couple Charles Malcolm (C.M.) and Edna Garrott Wenner, circa 1880s. The Wenners raised 8 children, including Brunswick Distinguished Citizens E. Virginia (Educator) and William B. Wenner (Farmer & Merchant), as well as grandson William W. Wenner (MD Appellate Judge).

Like his distant cousin, W.W. Wenner in the west end of early Brunswick, C.M. Wenner had visions of prospering his growing family by selling lots on the 500 acre family farm that bordered both sides of N. Maple Avenue that was established by his father C. F Wenner in the middle part of the 19th Century. The business was called Brunswick Land & Improvement Co. Wenner and a partner also operated a brickyard off Second Avenue that was visible from the family farmhouse, which still stands across from the Brunswick Community Library. Due to bad investments, C.M. Wenner lost the family farm in the 1890s, but was permitted to continue farming it by Adamstown landowner William Baker, who bought the farm in receivership. Wenner died tragically on the farm in 1920. The Wenner family story took a positive note when son Bill bought back 50 acres after he established his grocery business in 2 locations by the 1930s. When you see the shopping center, businesses on both sides of N. Maple off Souder Road, the development and the library, that was the location of the last working farm within the old Brunswick city limits. It operated until the early 1970s.

We old timers know this land as "Wenner's Hill".

(Courtesy of Ann Wenner Osteen)