Bakery once thrived in Gallatin

The Fitterer Building, at the southwest corner of Gallatin’s business square, sits empty today. But once – when this community was bustling as the crossroads of two railroads – this store was a busy bakery producing some 5,000 loaves of bread each week!

In the late 1800s, Gallatin had two enterprises, Fitterer Grocery and Bakery and the Daviess County Milling Co. (Cline & Cline), that had some similar products. Both of these businesses ceased long ago.

The Fitterer Grocery and Bakery, Gallatin’s second largest business establishment, was founded by Enos Fitterer in 1877. He learned the baker trade in Ohio and later he had his own business at Carthage, Ill., until 1861, when he enlisted in the Civil War.

At the end of the war, he located in Trenton and established the bakery business which he operated until he sold the business and moved to Gallatin, where he and his wife started the grocery and bakery business when their son Frank was four. The store operated on a cash basis and no books were kept.

The first Fitterer store building was a frame building and was destroyed by fire in March 1899, and was replaced with a two story brick building where Gallatin’s Corner Café is located today. The store was said to be one of the most attractive and best appointed grocery and bakery establishments in Northwest Missouri.

The bakery reached its peak around 1900 when some 5,000 loaves of bread were produced each week, along with many cookies and pies and cakes. In those days a baker and as many as three helpers worked all night shifts to make enough bread and pastry to supply the demand. There wasn’t as much bread produced on Saturday night because the stores were closed on Sunday. Deliveries were made to most of the surrounding communities. Shipping in bread was unheard of. At that time, a large loaf of bread sold for a nickel.

Enos Fitterer died on Feb. 18, 1884, and after his death, Mrs. Fitterer kept the bakery opened with great success. Later, her son Frank was taken in as a member of the firm.

Mrs. Fitterer died on April 19 1908, and following her death, Oscar Fitterer, the younger son, became a member o the firm and the two Fitterer boys formed a team to keep the store and bakery in operation. The new store was named the M.E. Fitterer’s Sons Grocery and Bakery.

According to the Gallatin Democrat in 1949, Mr. Frank said, “Times have changed. Now all a housewife has to do is add water to a factory-prepared cake or panroll mix and there it is. It’s hard to compete with that kind of efficiency.”

Other factors were the large city bakeries and their daily truck deliveries. By 1949, less than 1,000 loaves of bread were being produced and pastry-making had dwindled accordingly. Their baker, Dean Welch, and an assistant could handle the baking very easily. In March 1949, the old brick ovens became cold and unattended. Disposal of the bakery equipment was a problem and it was hoped it could be sold or leased to someone else.

When the bakery closed, the established store remained in operation. In 1903, some of the store’s features were 57 varieties of apple butter kept in stone crocks and sold by the pound. Farmer’s products were purchased and they often received 12 cents per dozen for eggs which could be used either for cash or for trade. Among other products purchased were potatoes and butter.

During the same time span that the Fitterer bakery was in operation, the Daviess County Milling Co. — known by some as Cline and Cline — operated a flour mill. The mill was equipped for the production of high grade flour, meal and feeds. Flour was flour to some people, but many other people in Daviess County wouldn’t buy flour unless the sack carried Cline’s label of “Sunbeam” or “Old Dutch.”

W.G. Cline of the original firm of Cline Brothers, and the managerial and executive head of the Daviess County Milling Company, came from a miller family. His father had been a miller in the days when old fashioned millstones ground the farmer’s wheat.

The first mill was a frame structure built in the late 1800’s. Unfortunately, the mill that replaced it burned to the point it wasn’t salvageable. The fire originated from a hot box. On the night the fire started, the mill was operating until about midnight in order to produce an order of 300 sacks of flour for Princeton.

Thus ended the history of Fitterer Grocery and Bakery and the Daviess County Milling Co. Both were greatly missed by the local people and the local economy.