Monroe is home to two of the country's oldest family-owned businesses.
Two Monroe shoe stores hold the distinction of being some of the oldest continually running and family-owned business in the U.S. Martin’s Shoe House, located at 43 S. Monroe St., and Yaeger’s Shoes, located at 1271 N. Telegraph Rd.
Both businesses share several distinctions, including being founded in the same year during the 1840s and being active in local civic and religious communities.
According to a press release and Bulkley’s History of Monroe County Michigan, George Martin was a shoe cobbler, born in 1819, who emigrated from Germany in 1840 in New York. He migrated first to Newark, New Jersey and set up his first cobbler shop there. In 1844, he married Odelia Gerweck (born in 1821) and settled in the German neighborhoods of Monroe in 1846. He had the opportunity to share his craft in his new home and started what was known as Geo. Martin & Sons the same year.
George Martin built shoes from scratch for nearly 30 years for his customers. In 1860, he built a 20 x 80 feet three-story building at the current location to enable the business to grow. In 1870, George Martin expanded the reach of the business to include ready-made boots but continued to build shoes up until the early 1880s, when shoe factories started to manufacture shoes across the United States. George Martin passed away in 1896.
In the early 1900s, George's two sons, Jacob (born 1861) and John A., changed the name of the shoe store to Martin Brothers. Jacob Martin began the first of his five terms as mayor of Monroe. He had also been Monroe’s fire chief from 1893 to 1901. Mother Odelia Martin died in 1904. Due to the increase in mass production of shoes, Martin Bros. continue to grow as a retail facility specializing in custom shoes and shoe repair.
In 1929, the next generation of the Martin family changed the name of the shoe store again, to Martin's Shoe House, and in 1980, Martin's Shoe House became a privately held corporation.
Similarly, Emmanuel Yaeger brought the shoe cobbler’s craft to Monroe and joined forces with Sebastian Lauer who had emigrated from Landshausen (in the Baden Württemberg region of Germany) to Monroe in 1843 where he began his boot and shoe business (Son Edward George Joseph “G.J” Lauer — born in 1858 — would go on to buy out Bulkley’s dry goods business and start Lauer’s at 25 Front Street).
Like George Martin, Emmanuel Yaeger would build shoes from scratch and, later, sell manufactured shoes. Michael Yaeger (born January 23, 1938) would buy the business from his father and uncles, Edwin and Leo Yaeger, in 1964, having started working there in 1957. Michael Yeager would continue the strong work ethic started by his great grandfather by encouraging his five children and his wife, Lois (nee Heckel who he married in 1959) to be part of the business operations.
Michael Yaeger would later move operations from S. Monroe St. to the current Telegraph Rd. location and open additional stores in Lincoln Park in 1977 and in Toledo in 1982 (with partner Norm Johnson who he had mentored). An additional Toledo location would follow in 1989 (operated with son Steve) and another in Canton in 1992.
Both the Yaegers and the Martins would put their Catholic faith at the forefront of their lives, with Michael and Lois serving as Eucharistic ministers and on the Parish Council at St. Mary’s. Michael Yeager died on December 7, 2020, and Lois Yeager passed away on May 22, 2024.
Martin's Shoe House Inc. remains the oldest shoe store to operate in one location in Michigan.
This article originally appeared on The Monroe News: Two of the country's oldest family-owned businesses call Monroe home.
