Joseph Hagelin was born in Grunern, Breisgau-Hochschwarzwald, Baden-Württemberg, Germany.  After the death of his father he and his brother Frank emigrated to America where they both found employment in the Nunning Brewery in St. Joseph, Missouri.  There Joseph met Emma Jacobine Ziebold, the sister of co-worker Herman Ziebold.  The two married in October of 1870 and by 1871 the two families had relocated together in Atchison, Kansas

In Atchison, Ziebold and Hagelin purchased the brewery owned by Hotelier John Stamm.  They ran the brewery together for 20 years until Ziebold's death in 1891.  Hagelin contined on as sole proprietor for another two years before he himself died on the 25th of January, 1893.  Thereafter the brewery was run by the widows and sons, who managed it ably into the next century.  The firm finally shut its doors in 1903.

Ziebold and Hagelin's Southwest Lager & Beer Brewery made national news in the 1880s for holding out in the face of the Prohibition laws of Kansas.  It was involved in a lawsuit that made its way all the way to the Supreme Court.  The court ultimately allowed the brewery to remain open so long as it's product was sold in territories where it is legal.  The Southwest's extensive distribution across the Missouri State line kept the brewery afloat, despite the efforts of the desiccatious Kansas legislature.

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Associated Breweries