Charles Sleeper, manufacturer, Union Center, was born in Vermont in 1833, and in 1837 the family moved to Erie Co., NY., where he received a common school education; learned the wagon-maker's trade, and at the age of eighteen concluded to see some of the county, and accordingly traveled over a great part of the United States for about five years, working at his trade in different localities, after which, in 1860, he was married to Julia Peterson, a native of Wisconsin, born in Dane County, in 1834, and lived in Illinois until 1864, when he moved into Wisconsin, settling first in Green County, where he was engaged in farming about one year, when his wife died, leaving two children, Mildred and Ira. He then sold his farm and was traveling around in different localities until January, 1876, when he was married to Mary E. Jackson, born in Binghamton, NY., in July, 1851, and engaged in the manufacture of staves at Lavall, Sauk Co., which business he followed about three years, when he sold his interest and acted as machinst for the Wonewoc Manufacturing Co. about eighteen months, putting up all their machinery and making all their patterns and teaching their men how to build wagons by machinery, after which he was foreman of the factory until the company failed and changed hands. He then, in May, 1880, purchased the Forbs & Thompson mill property, which he has greatly improved, and is now running the same. Is a Democrat, but takes little interest in politics except to perform his rights as a citizen.
Source: History of Northern Wisconsin. Publisher: Western Historical
Co., Chicago 1881 p. 394