Pages 8 and 9 contain a large image of the Bud Briggs painting of the Baird home at 512 Hemphill. The text continues on page 10.
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While they were chatting and deciding what they wanted to buy, the horse would most likely be sampling a customer's lawn. "Sampling" meant grabbing a mouthful of grass and pulling it out by the roots. If the conversation at the back of the wagon lasted too long, Ned the horse might step up on the lawn with both front feet for a better go at the grass. Lawn owners didn't like this. A housewife, at the back of the wagon, would suddenly yell, "Get that horse of my lawn!"
When a group of customers had been served, the driver would quickly close the wagon's rear doors. The moment Ned heard the doors close, he took off. He was on his way to the next customer, and some greener grass in the next block. Ned knew all the stops. He would stride down the street and, when he came to a customer's house, wouild stop abruptly. There were times when Hoyt would be off the route for a day or two. When he returned, Ned might suddenly stop in front of a strange house. Sometimes it took a lot of urging to get Ned to move on. Later, Hoyt would learn the house was a new stop added while he was gone.
As Hoyt drove his wagon along the sales route, he often saw Bruno Reich, who operated a wholesale bakery route, serving stores with a truck. He could not help envying Bruno and longed for the day when he could have a truck for his route. That day came sooner than he expected.
In 1917, the family bought a Ford car. They had a panel body built for it, took off the passenger seats, and bolted the panel body in place to make a panel truck. The truck was painted a cream color and "Eat More Mrs. Baird's Bread" was lettered on each side. About this time the Bairds took on three wholesale accounts. These were the Telephone Exchange at Rosedale and Jennings, which bought only pies; the Telephone Exchange at Lamar and 10th, which also bought pies; and the Sandegard Grocery at 10th and Houston.
Sandegard's was a large store that also had a delicatessen. The delicatessen served sandwiches and lunches. At first the store took only cakes, and built a special case for these. The store was served daily, with delivery twice on Saturday. Later bread was added. It was displayed on top of the cake display case. People would often stop Hoyt when he came in with a basket of bread and take the freshly baked loaves out of the basket before he could put it on top of the display case. No one back at the little bakery realized, as the first grocery store was added to the sales route, that this was a most significant event. For it was with the grocer and his customers, not house to house, that the organization's future would lie.
Wholesale Begins
In September of 1918, Hoyt entered the army and the sales route had no driver. The family decided to discontinue the retail route and go wholesale. Dewey hired the bakery's iceman, Charlie Longguth, to operate the new wholesale route. Longguth was to remain the bakery's No. 1 route salesman for many years. (He retired in 1951.)By this time Sandegard's had 15 or more small stores and had become a sizable local chain. Apparently Manager Harry Adams had been impressed with the way folks in his first store liked Mrs. Baird's Bread. He put Mrs. Baird's Bread in all Sandegard stores. This took amost all the bread the little Washington Street bakery could bake. But not for long.
In early 1919, the family bought a lot at Sixth Avenue and Terrell from a Mr. Casey, who operated a drug store across the street. They built a brick building on the lot. It was the first bakery they had built themselves and they were justly proud of it. The building was 30 feet wide and 72 feet long. The family installed a Peterson Peel gas-fired oven. The oven had a capacity of 400 one-pound loaves. They also purchased a hand wrapping machine.
Total investment for the 6th Avenue and Terrell bakery was $8,800.00. The oven cost about $3,500.00. It was purchased on credit from the Peterson Oven Company.
In June 1919, the bakery began operating in the new building. The business continued to grow. The family bought a second truck, also a Ford, and put on a second sales route.
Shorty after, two routes increased to four, and Fort Worth distribution looked like this:
Route No. 1 - Charlie Longguth, serving the South side.
Route No. 2 - Ben Dollins, who operated the downtown restaurant route.
Route No. 3 - Howard Townsend, whose route reached from Rail Road Avenue to Magnolia on the South side.
Route No. 4 - Arlie Whitley, who served the North side.
These four routes covered all of Fort Worth except for the East side. Route No. 5 was later added to serve the East side, which included Polytechnic area. Claude Leath was hired as salesman for this new route.
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