Wesley was a thriving community in 1907 with, among other businesses, two elevators. The Farmers' Cooperative Elevator Company, headed by C.J. Sherman as president, was organized that year and the company was to purchase the old Reliance Elevator when according to Ben Reed's History of Kossuth County, "the destructive fire of June 14, 1907, burned not only the elevator but the Sherman house and several other buildings. These before-and-after photos belonged to George Detmering of Wesley.