Paul J. Sorg
| Paul John Sorg | |
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1896 photograph
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| Member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Ohio's 3rd district |
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In office May 21, 1894 – March 3, 1897 |
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| Preceded by | George W. Houk |
| Succeeded by | John Lewis Brenner |
| Personal details | |
| Born |
September 23, 1840 Wheeling, Virginia |
| Died | May 28, 1902 (aged 61) Middletown, Ohio |
| Resting place | Woodside Cemetery |
| Political party | Democratic |
| Spouse(s) | Susan Jennie Gruver |
| Children | Paul Arthur Sorg, Ada Gruver Sorg |
| Profession | Tobacco merchant |
| Signature |  |
Paul John Sorg (September 23, 1840 – May 28, 1902) was a businessman and member of the United States House of Representatives from Ohio.
He was born in Wheeling, Virginia (now West Virginia) on September 23, 1840. He attended public school. He was the youngest son of Henry and Elizabeth Sorg, immigrants from Hesse-Darmstadt (or Hesse-Kassel or Hesse-Cassel), Germany. Paul Sorg moved with his parents and siblings to Cincinnati, Ohio in 1852 where he was apprenticed as an iron molder. He attended night school in Cincinnati.
He served in the Union Army during the Civil War.
In 1864 Paul J. Sorg met John Auer, a German-born tobacco roller in Cincinnati. Auer could make tobacco, but he couldn't keep books; for his part, Sorg knew nothing about tobacco, but he was a good bookkeeper. These two men organized a firm for the manufacture of tobaccos, starting a plant in Cincinnati. In 1869 they partnered with another tobacco firm in Cincinnati. One of the new partners lived in Middletown, Ohio and urged the newly formed company, Wilson, Sorg and Company, to relocate there and a new plant was constructed.
Sorg and Auer soon sold their share of the business and immediately formed another company, P. J. Sorg Tobacco Co., to manufacture cut filler and plug tobacco. One of their brand names was "Biggest and Best." This new firm they built up to become one of the largest of its type in the world and Sorg became Middletown’s first multi-millionaire.
On July 20, 1876, he married Susan Jennie Gruver (1854–1930) in Middletown; they had two children, Paul Arthur Sorg (1878–1913) and Ada Gruver Sorg (1882–1956). In 1888, he completed a $1 million, 35-room stone Romanesque mansion that still stands in Middletown, converted to apartments at one time the mansion is currently under restoration by Mark and Traci Barnett and being converted back to a single family residence. Being a public-spirited man, he made many civic and charitable contributions to build up the city of his adoption, including the 1891 Sorg Opera House (designed by Samuel Hannaford) that is the performance center of Middletown’s Sorg Opera.
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