On March 9, 1858 Gustav Stickley was born in Osceola, Wisconsin.  He was one of eleven children of German descent.  The eldest surviving son, Stickley experienced the rigors of life upon a small Midwestern farm, forgoing his formal education in 1870 to continue work in his father’s field of stonemasonry and help support his struggling family. By early 1876, Stickley’s mother and siblings moved to Brandt, Pennsylvania, where Gustav worked in his uncle’s chair factory – his first formal training in the furniture industry.