During the Second World War, he rose to the rank of colonel and served under General Dwight D. Eisenhower as chief of the Intelligence Branch in the Army's European theater of operations.

He went into international trade and partnered with European enterprises to provide goods and services to consumers in Europe, the Middle East, and elsewhere where democracies were struggling.

He underwrote a modern bakery in Haiti, providing jobs for hundreds of workers and thousands of individual distributors at a difficult time in that nation's history.

He also set up a school in Florida that taught people from developing countries how to run a fully automated bakery and provide good jobs in their local economy.

His philanthropic efforts can be seen in higher education institutions in the West Michigan area: at Grand Valley State University, his contribution made possible the founding of the Hauenstein Center for Presidential Studies, whose mission is to inspire a new generation of leaders devoted to public service.

[9] Hauenstein was inducted into Omicron Delta Kappa honor society as an honoris causa initiate at Grand Valley State University in 2012.