Peter Arbes was born in Austria. He emigrated to America before the age of 20 and moved to the German colony of New Ulm, Minnesota. There he found work at Jacob Bender's New Ulm Brewery. He married Mary Seifert in that town in 1875. In 1878, at age 28 he went north up the Minnesota River to establish his own brewery in Le Seur. Arbes operated the brewery until his death on March 23rd, 1895. Within the month his wife sold the brewery to local wagon maker Emil Vollbrecht and moved back to New Ulm. The brewery burned to the ground on November 30th, 1898. It was never rebuilt.