Maze Lumber - Celebrating 175 Years!

Celebrating 175 Years!

Wow – 175 years! That’s a mighty long time for any company to keep changing with the times! Maze Company has endured a Civil War, two World Wars, recessions, depressions and many other challenges over time.

The goal of this publication is to say THANK YOU… to our loyal and talented employees, our quality-conscious customers and our wide variety of vendors for their products and services. Of course, there are many other pieces to the puzzle – including the City of Peru for being a great partner to Maze Lumber over the years. This booklet assembles a fun mix of local history, old and new photos of all sorts, fun ads from yesteryear…and a few other surprises as you page through. In the center is our full photo listing of current team members – and if you’re local, you’ll likely know quite a few!

We hope that you’ll always consider Maze Lumber – which is the oldest lumberyard in the State of Illinois – as you plan your future projects. That’s how we hope to hit our bicentennial year in 2048! As the 6th oldest business in the state, we can all be proud of the “staying power” over the years of this small, family-held local enterprise in Peru, Illinois.

Browse with pleasure!

Roelif

M. Loveland – Pres. (5th Generation)

Original Maze Lumber office and lumber shed - looking northwest - Circa 1910

Congratulations on Your 175th Year in Business in the City of Peru!

Maze Lumber continues to provide quality products and amazing customer service to the Illinois Valley.

I am honored to be one of Peru’s thirty-one mayors –and to serve the city that Maze Lumber has helped build!

Ken Kolowski – Mayor

Congratulations on Reaching this Incredible Milestone of 175 Years in Business! Maze Company and its employees have shown their commitment and dedication to our communities through their continued support of local organizations and programs, and IVAC is proud to be one of them. The trust and understanding you’ve built with your customers, your partners, and across the industry is a testament to how a business can and should be run. The Illinois Valley Area Chamber of Commerce wishes you many more years of success, growth, and making a positive difference in our community and to those you serve!

Bill Zens – Executive Director, Illinois

Valley

Area Chamber of Commerce and Economic Development

Maze Co. has been a Trusted and Loyal Supporter of Illinois Valley Community College throughout the college’s nearly 100-year existence. We celebrate and are in awe of the company’s selfless dedication to building a stronger Illinois Valley. Whenever IVCC needed them – be it our capital campaign for the Community Technology Center or for scholarship support – Maze Co. delivered. Congratulations, Maze Co. on achieving this remarkable milestone.

Fran Brolley – Executive Director of Community Relations and Development

Celebrating

MAZE LUMBER

1848 Founded by Samuel Maze in Peru, Illinois

1886 Purchases First Nail Machine to Produce Nails from Pure Zinc

2023 Maze Lumber is the Oldest Lumberyard in Illinois

MAZE NAILS

1900 First Manufacturer to Pack Nails in 50 Lb. Boxes

1905 First Manufacturer to Pack Nails in 5 Lb. Boxes

1914 Produces the First Hot-Dipped Nails by Hand

1930 Designs and Launches Spiral Shank Nail Product Line

1934 Designs and Launches Ring Shank Nail Product Line

1955 Develops Exclusive Stormguard Double Hot-Dip Galvanizing

1996 Founded S.S.E., our Collating Division

2006 Earns Miami-Dade County Approval on Selected Roofing Nails

2008 Certified by Scientific Certification Systems for Recycled Content

2011 Fifth Hot-Dip Galvanizing Production Line Installed

2011 Highlighted on ABC News, Diane Sawyer’s Made In America

2016 Installs Second Paint Production Line for Trim Nails

2023 EVERY Maze Nail still 100% Made in the USA

AMERICA S PREMIER SPECIALTY

Back in the old days….

At one time, all nails in the Maze factory were transported in 100-lbs steel kegs as they moved from department to department. The kegs were stacked 3 high (300 lbs!) – and pushed on beefy 2-wheeled hand carts. Because the floor of the old plant had many cracks and bumps at the time, one wrong move and the entire stack of kegs would come crashing to the ground. This was followed by loud clapping from entertained fellow workers.

There was just a single towmotor (forklift) in the nail plant many years ago – and it was in high demand. Over the years, Maze added to the fleet. Today, every per person in the plant has his/her own dedicated forklift. This has led to much better maintenance of the equipment….“That’s mine!”

Prior to the commonplace use of pallets, Maze nails were stored in the warehouse and sent out to customers box by box. That meant plenty of handling at the Maze end – and on the transportation end! This photo shows a truck driver muscling more than 100 50-lbs Maze boxes into his trailer.

The daily routine at Maze Lumber was hard work as well. Boxcar loads of lumber were hand unloaded, stacked and stickered - one piece at a time. Deliveries were made by mule drawn wagons, and items such as 100-lbs bags of cement, pebbledash and rock lath (the predecessor of drywall) were stacked atop the lumber to hold it secure.

In those days, construction was much more seasonal, with the yard providing building materials in the good weather, switching to coal in the winter. Thousands of tons of coal were unloaded from train cars with a large clam bucket, stored in a giant covered silo, and hand shoveled into basements during the heating season. This was a dirty, labor-intensive business, but it kept the yard busy during the off season. We delivered to the last of our coal customers a few years ago. Technology has dramatically improved virtually every aspect of our operation.

During this Demisemiseptcentennial Anniversary, our 175th year, we celebrate the 1848 founding of Maze Lumber.

When Samuel Nesbitt Maze entered the lumber business in 1848, he began an enterprise that would grow and flourish for a century and a half, and beyond.

An Irish immigrant from Castleblayney, County Monaghan, Maze arrived in the United States in 1836 and was a masonry contractor for several years before deciding to try his hand at the lumber business.

He located his modest yard along bustling Water Street in the small town of Peru, Illinois - on the banks of the Illinois River. The yard stood just a few hundred yards from the south end of the new Illinois - Michigan Canal. Dug by men and horse power, it was also 1848 when the canal first linked Peru and the Illinois and Mississippi rivers to Lake Michigan.

Maze had a small barge built - named the Elk - and used mules to haul loads of local grain to Chicago by way of the I-M Canal. Before making the 96 mile journey back to Peru, the Elk was loaded with white pine from huge timber stands in Wisconsin. Upon return, it was sold to Samuel Maze’s contractor friends, farmers, and others who asked him to bring them lumber. Thus the yard was born.

Today, the 5th and 6th generation of the Maze family continues to provide quality construction materials to help build America and the world!

In the late 1800’s, the Maze Lumber yard was selling a great many cedar shingle roof jobs. The shingles lasted fine - but the bright steel cut nails that Maze Lumber sold, though they were the best available at the time, just didn’t last very long. The lumberyard, at that time being run by Samuel Maze’s son, Walter, bought a used nail machine so they could make their own, higher-quality nails from pure zinc strips.

It was fortunate that LaSalle-Peru was also home to M & H Zinc and Illinois Zinc - suppliers of the zinc needed to make the cut cedar shingle nails that the small nail machine produced. Maze Lumber promoted its cedar shingle roof packages far and wide. So the little nail machine now had to run more hours a week to keep up with the growing demand.

As Maze Lumber began selling nails to other lumberyards, the nail machine eventually ran full timethen was joined by additional machines as nail orders poured in. So was born the Nail Division of W.H. Maze Company.

In 1916, Maze engineers designed equipment to Hot-Dip Galvanize steel nails - for a dependable but more economical product. In 1955, equipment was built to Double Hot-Dip Galvanize the nails - and business really took off.

Maze Nails was now famous for their dependable hand-driven nails. But times change - and pneumatic nailers gained widespread acceptance.

In 1996, the SSE division of Maze was established - to take our quality Maze Nails and collate them into sticks and coils for the hundreds of air-driven tools on the market. Along with collating nails, SSE also packages stainless steel trim nails in over 100 colors.

W. H. MAZE COMPANY

Illinois-Michigan Canal completed - dug primarily by Irish immigrants

1848

American

1861

1914

1917

1836

1848

Maze

1886

1922

100 Church Street facility built to expand nail manufacturing

Samuel Nesbit Maze emigrated from Ireland

Civil War begins

Lumber founded by Samuel Maze

Maze begins hot-dip galvanizing Zinclad™ steel nails by hand

Maze Lumber enters nail business with pure zinc cut nails

US enters WWI

THROUGH THE YEARS

US enters WWII Continued product development and expansion to current 250k sq ft facility

Maze enters collated nail business

W. H. Maze Co. celebrates 175 years serving the Illinois Valley across six generations

2023

1955 1990 2013

Maze engineers commission automatic hot-dip galvanizing line

Independent Nail Company acquired

Illinois River historic high flood (34.44 ft)

1941 1996

1960 - 1990

Thanks to Our

DALE ROSSI - 1975

TED OBERHOLZ - 1976

DOUG JOST - 1977

RJ WHITECOTTON - 1977

ANDY RIOS - 1978

DAN GAPINSKI - 1978

ROELIF LOVELAND - 1979

JIM LOVELAND - 1981

PETE LOVELAND - 1983

CRAIG JUSTI - 1984

JUNE HOLDCRAFT - 1984

MIKE DIMOND - 1984

ROGER WASIK - 1985

STEVE PEARSON - 1985

JIM KASZYNSKI - 1987

JIM TIPTON - 1990

JEAN WHITFIELD - 1997

LEN KASPERSKI - 1997

ARLETTE MARTIN - 1998

BOB TONER - 1998

CINDY DIAZ - 1998

JOE SALZ - 1998

JEAN PAROCHETTI - 2000

JENNIFER SMITH - 2000

LISA MARTIN - 2001

ANGELINA OLIVARES - 2004

CHADD KREOFSKY - 2004

DAVE JACOBSON - 2004

RYAN WHITECOTTON - 2004

JAMIE KREISER - 2006

ANDREW KREOFSKY - 2008

KYLE LOVELAND - 2008

DAVID KREOFSKY - 2011

JARED HARRISON - 2012

MIKE SOUSA - 2012

SAM LOVELAND - 2012

CHUCK LOEBACH - 2013

DAVID LOVELAND - 2013

NICK STERLING - 2013

JOHN ZERMENO - 2014

ANDY JALLEY - 2015

CHAD ERRIO - 2015

Maze Lumber

Maze Nails S.S.E.

Maze Family!

CHRIS KELLETT - 2015

CHRIS REED - 2015

JAMISON SCHOLLE - 2015

JIM KESSEL - 2015

JOE THOMPSON - 2015

JULIE DUFF - 2015

PATRICIA REASONS - 2015

SUSAN MCCORMICK - 2015

MONICA GAPINSKI - 2016

STEVE MILOTA - 2017

AMANDA BILLINGS - 2018

DYLAN CATALANELLO - 2018

NICOLE ANDERSEN - 2018

ANDREW KUCHAR - 2019

DWIGHT BROWN - 2019

GREGORIO GARCIA - 2019

JOAN ARKELS - 2019

JOE KUDELA - 2019

MIKE RIOLLANO - 2019

PAULETTE VICKERS - 2019

BILLY VICKERS - 2020

CAROLYN LOLKUS - 2020

JP PEREZ - 2020

MATT LIGHTLE - 2020

HEATHER MAZE - 2020

ALEXANDRA McCANN - 2021

JACOB GONZALES - 2021

MELANIE MORELAND - 2021

NATHAN BOWEN - 2021

PATRICIA LILES - 2021

RON BAPP - 2021

SPRING GONZALES - 2021

AMY DAVENPORT - 2022

BEN SOUSA - 2022

DIANAH PITTMAN - 2022

JESSICA BROWDER - 2022

JESSICA SHAW - 2022

NATIONAL SALES TEAM

Maze Lumber

Maze Nails S.S.E.

Our People are Our Competitive Advantage!

It’s a Fun Work Life

We Volunteer In The Community

We Embrace Safety

Giving Back

Without support from the community, a local, family-owned company cannot thrive. It is equally important for businesses to give back to the communities in which their customers and employees live. Volunteerism and charitable giving have been longstanding values within the Maze companies. While the specific organizations have changed over the past 175 years, the sentiment has not. Thousands of hours have been donated to charitable causes by Maze employees over the years, below are just a few of those stories.

UNITED WAY OF ILLINOIS VALLEY

The United Way of Illinois Valley was founded as a local chapter in 1966. According to Julie Sloan, the current UWIV executive director, “the Maze companies have been great supporters of United Way for many years, quite possibly since the very beginning. We have been greatly impacted by their unwavering financial support, volunteerism, and leadership via service on our board of directors.”

Maze Co. is a participating member in the United Way Pacesetter program, meaning that a financial contribution is made at the beginning of every annual campaign drive to kick off the fundraising season. The Maze Co. employees also play a huge part in the initiative, many of whom choose to make pledges to the United Way’s campaign with their paychecks.

Maze Nail employee Kyle Loveland has served on the UWIV board of directors since 2014. “Our local United Way chapter funds many Illinois Valley agencies that are providing critical services within our community,” said Loveland. While the agencies fundraise on their own, they also have the peace of mind knowing that they’ll be receiving consistent monthly contributions from the United Way. “Our goal is to help our partner agencies operate with more peace of mind and breathing room knowing that the United Way is working diligently to secure the funds that are critical to their operations,” said Loveland.

As of 2023, UWIV’s partner agencies were LaSalle County CASA, Youth Service Bureau of Illinois Valley, Prairie State Legal Services, Mendota Area Senior Services, Illinois Valley Center for Independent Living, Horizon House, Safe Journeys, Illinois Valley Food Pantry, Alternatives For You, Child Advocacy Center, Center for Youth & Family Services and Bridges Senior Center.

Maze employees and their family members participating in the United Way’s “Dash @ Dusk” 5k run.

Volunteerism and charitable giving have been longstanding values within the Maze companies.

HABITAT FOR HUMANITY OF LASALLE-BUREAU-PUTNAM COUNTIES

If you visit the local Habitat For Humanity ReStore in Peru, you’ll likely find materials donated by Maze Co. The store specializes in selling building and household materials that are either donated or salvaged, often giving the items a second chance when they might otherwise end up in a landfill.

Over the years, Maze Lumber has donated unsold merchandise such as decking material, windows and doors. “We know that Maze materials are the best you can find. This makes a difference,” said Todd Volker, executive director of the local Habitat for Humanity. “With the Habitat ReStore, our reputation relies heavily on the quality of merchandise we source. The Habitat ReStore is being run to generate profits that go back into the community through our house builds and critical house repair program.”

“The Maze Companies have long been great assets to the Illinois Valley Community,” said Volker. “It’s more than contributions of material and money. It’s also a matter of providing solid leadership to local organizations. We are currently working out a spring fundraiser – a playhouse build for children of veterans – and the project has been greatly helped by a knowledgeable Maze employee.”

Maze Nails has donated tens of thousands of pounds of nails to Habitat for Humanity projects throughout the country.

JUNIOR ACHIEVEMENT

Many Illinois Valley classrooms have seen Maze Co. volunteers contributing their knowledge as Junior Achievement educators, including Pete Loveland, Jim Loveland, Arlette Martin, Chadd Kreofsky, Andrew Kreofsky and David Loveland.

According to David Loveland, a 10-year Maze employee, “Volunteering for Junior Achievement has been very rewarding. I have taught many classes from 2nd grade up through high school, and while the material may vary, I always find the students’ enthusiasm inspiring.”

“Since 2006, employees from Maze Co. have been volunteering their time in a total of 47 classrooms impacting over 700 students. The Junior Achievement mission is to inspire and prepare young people to succeed through lessons in financial capability, work/career readiness and business ownership,” said Monica Telschow of Junior Achievement.

“It’s impactful for a student to see a volunteer from a local company that they may drive past every day or has a friend or family member work at. They look up to these individuals because they can relate to them, and maybe see themselves in that same career or industry when they grow up. It helps them connect what they are learning in the classroom to life after graduation,” said Telschow.

Employees of the Habitat for Humanity ReStore unload a delivery of donated goods from Maze Lumber.

Lee McCullough, Habitat board member, receives a donated pallet of nails for the ReStore.

Bathrooms Through the Years

Our bathroom remodel experience was seamless due to the experienced and knowledgeable staff at Maze Lumber. They sell quality products that we know will last. We love our new bathroom! — John and Melanie Thompson

The Thompsons’ new bathroom features Onyx brand shower with ship lap panels in the color Glacier, Onyx brand Barn Style shower door, Jeffrey Alexander Katara vanity in the black finish, Viking Lakeshore LVT flooring in the Rockport color.

Kitchens Through the Years

The process with Maze Lumber went very smoothly. Working with Nicole was a pleasure as she was knowledgeable, present, and helpful. Everything was right the first time, and we are very happy with our kitchen. — Candy Brady

The Bradys’ new kitchen features WoodHarbor cabinets with the Madison door style in a Black Enamel finish, Cambria Quartz countertops in the Pendle Hill color, Scubaseal LVT flooring in the Pebble Beach color, Vent-A-Hood liner over the cooktop.

Doors Through the Years

Shane Burrows is another Maze Lumber satisfied customer.

The Burrows’ new front entry features the Fiber-Classic Mahogany Shaker-Style Fiberglass Door with Simulated Divided Lite and a Vented Sidelite with Bronze Screen surround. Both the door and sidelite are stained in the Barley finish. This unit is surrounded with the White Stipple Dura-Tech frame and Brickmould. With both the Handleset and Vented Sidelite hardware being finished in Aged Bronze, this look is complete.

Maze Nails What’s Not to Like?

Maze Nails, made right here in the U.S.A. in a modern, 250,000 square foot manufacturing facility, is located on a bluff overlooking the Illinois River. You’re now in Peru, Illinois, and once inside this plant, you’ll like everything you see - clean, efficient manufacturing, strong customer focus and the company’s commitment to protecting the environment.

Steel Rod purchased primarily from Liberty Steel in Peoria, Illinois70 miles south-west of Peru, is made from recycled steel.

Hydroelectric Power from Illinois River Turbines (at Starved Rock Lock & Dam) supplies a good part of Maze Nails’ needs.

Zinc By-Products are recycled into zinc metal and ingredients used in paint pigments, car tires, sunblock, etc.

Maze Packaging is made from recycled content cardboard.

Used Machine Oil is recycled in Rockford, Illinois and returned to us.

Forklift & Automotive Batteries recycled. Sawdust is used to clean nails . . . no solvents.

Nail Whiskers sold for various uses.

Life Along the Beautiful Illinois River

1916 Flood 1916 Flood

1943 Flood

2013 Flood

Jack Rosenfelder & George Maze - 1943 Flood

“You have to take the good with the bad.”

Illinois’ longest operating lumberyard continues to thrive along Peru’s historic riverfront. Maze Lumber, family-owned since 1848, has been providing top quality building materials to Illinois Valley contractors and homeowners for over 175 years.

Located in a 15,000-square foot showroom and office, we offer building materials for the modern home as well as a full line of the traditional lumber items used in home building, commercial construction, and industrial applications. Our experienced sales staff takes pride in their ability to provide knowledgeable assistance along with prompt delivery at reasonable prices.