Frederick Brockhausen

Frederick Carl Brockhausen, Jr. (May 20, 1858 – 1929) was a cigar maker and trade union activist from Milwaukee, Wisconsin who spent four terms as a Socialist member of the Wisconsin State Assembly.

Brockhausen was born in Fredericia, Denmark on May 20, 1858. He attended public schools and became a journeyman cigar maker in 1877. While working on the German island of Föhr in North Frisia, he joined both the Social Democratic Party and the cigarmakers' union. He migrated to the United States in 1879, and to Milwaukee soon after; but later spent some time in New York, Iowa, Montana, Chippewa Falls, Wisconsin, and St. Paul, Minnesota, before finally settling permanently in Milwaukee in 1894. He joined the Cigar Makers' International Union in 1890 while working in St. Paul, and in 1897, after participating in the People's Party during the 1896 election, joined the Milwaukee branch of the Social Democracy of America. He was an associate of fellow Socialist Frank J. Weber in the early years of the Wisconsin State Federation of Labor, and served as its unpaid secretary-treasurer from 1900–1912; the Wisconsin Historical Society's Dictionary of Wisconsin History describes him as "in effect, its executive officer and legislative representative". In 1903 he was among the leaders of the push for worker's compensation: statutory recognition of an injured worker's right to compensation without court action.