The First Baird Employee

Mr. Lipps being the first driver for the Baird business is referenced in a few articles about Mrs Baird's Bread.

On the Mrs Baird's Bread website in the story "Meet Mrs. Baird", it refers to him as the company's first employee. The hiring of Mr. Lipps happens on or after 1915 in the inferred timeline.

The first company employee, Mr. Lipps, who was not a Baird family member, was hired to drive the wagon.

In the Star-Telegram in 2002 the article "Bread Firm Asks Texas, Oklahoma Route Drivers to Buy Their Sales Territories" states Mr. Lipps was hired in 1915.

Mrs Baird's announced Wednesday what could be the most radical change in the way it distributes bread since 1915, when deliveries got too much for the founder's four sons and the first nonrelative, a Mr. Lipps, was hired to drive the wagon and its horse, Ned.

Finally, the document "The Mrs Baird's Story" says

A Mr. Lipps was hired to drive the wagon. Whenever he was ill, 13-year-old Hoyt relieved him as driver. Later Hoyt became the regular driver.

Hoyt was born in October of 1896, and would have been 13 in 1909, when the document says he relieved Mr. Lipps as a driver This infers that Mr. Lipps was hired on or before 1909.

As I'm finding with a lot of Baird history, there's conflicting evidence yet again. Two articles, including the official Mrs Baird's Bread web site state Mr. Lipps started around 1915. Then an official document, "The Mrs Baird's Story" shows him starting on or before 1909. The city directories infer him being a driver on or before 1911, and definitely driving for the Bairds by 1914, leading one to believe the old document "The Mrs Baird's Story" was more correct.

Curiosity drove me to check the Fort Worth City Directories to see if I could turn him up. I found his name to be Theodore A. Lipps, and in 1911 he lived at 517 Hemphill, which would have been across the street and a couple of houses down from where the Baird's lived at 512 Hemphill a few years before. The 1911 directory lists him merely as a "driver", but by the 1914 directory, he's listed as a driver for Mr. N. L. Baird. He is shown as living on Concho Street, which was renamed East Myrtle Street. The house would have been near East Myrtle and Yuma today (Allen Street turns into Yuma a few blocks after you cross I35 today).

By 1916, there is no entry for Mr. Lipps, which is also when the city directory lists Hoyt as the driver for Mrs N L Baird.

1909-1910
Lipps Theodore A., r. 1502 E 2th 3.

1911
Lipps Theodore A., driver, r. 517 Hemphill. 4.

1912-1913
Lipps Theodore A., r. 1412 E Myrtle. 3. Ph. Rose-
dale 1960

1914
Lipps Theodore A., driver Mrs. N. L. Baird, res
1412 Concho

1916
No entry for Theodore Lipps

Bairds in the City Directories

I finally made time to go through the Fort Worth City Directories to document the Baird names associated with the home at 1015 Cactus and the bakery at 1811 Washington. They are in five directories, 1911, 1912-1913, 1914, and 1916, and 1918.  They are listed in the 1909-1910 directory as living at 512 Hemphill and the business is not listed under the Bakeries section.

Some interesting notes from this compilation are

• The first time the bakery shows up in the business listings is 1911.
  
• The bakery at 1811 Washington shows up in the 1914 directory, with the name of the bakery being "Mrs. Ninnie L. Baird".
  
• Bessie Baird works at the E. E. Fosdick company, matching a section about Bessie in "The Mrs Baird's Story".
• Deward Baird moved out of the house, two streets over and a block south by 1916.
• W. Hoyt Baird was a clerk at the Fort Worth and Denver City Railway.
• A "Norman Baird" shows up in the 1916 directory.
• By 1916, W. Hoyt Baird quits his job at the railway and becomes a driver for the bakery.
  
• The name of the bakery in 1916 and 1918 appears to be "Mrs N L Baird".
  

1911
Baird Bessie Miss, steganographer, E. E. Fosdick & Co.,
    h. 1015 Cactus
Baird Deward, hlpr, h. 1015 Cactus
Baird Ninnie (Mrs. W. A.), bakery, 1015 Cactus, r.
    same, Ph. Rosedale 1511
Baird William A., r. 1015 Cactus. 8

Business Section

Bakeries

Baird Ninnie Mrs., 1015 Cactus

1912-1913
Baird Bessie O. Miss, steganographer, E. E. Fosdick &
    Co., h. 1015 Cactus.
Baird Deward C., baker, h. 1015 Cactus.
Baird Hoyt, clk, Ft. W. & D. C., h. 1015 Cactus
Baird Ninnie (wid. W. A.), bakery, 1015 Cactus, r.
    same, Ph. Rosedale 1511

1914
Baird Bessie O. Miss, steno E. E. Fosdick & Co.,
    bds 1015 Cactus.
Baird Deward C., baker Mrs. Ninnie L. Baird,
    res 1015 Cactus
Baird Ninnie L. (wid Wm. A.), baker, 1811
    Washington, res 1015 Cactus.
Baird W. Hoyt, clk Ft. W. & D. C. Ry, bds 1015
    Cactus

Business Section
Bakers
Baird Ninnie L., 1015 Cactus

1916
Baird
" Deward C. baker Mrs N L Baird, res
    1917 S Henderson
" Ninnie L. (wid Wm A), bakery 1811
    Washington av, res 1015 Cactus
" Norman, baker, bds 1015 Cactus
" Roland, baker Mrs N L Baird, bds 1015
    Cactus
" W Hoyt, driver Mrs N L Baird, bds 1015
    Cactus

Business Section
Bakers
Baird Ninnie L. Mrs. 1811 Washington

1918
Baird
" Deward C, baker Mrs N L Baird, res
    1106 W Bois d'Arc
" Ninnie L (wid Wm A), bakery 1811
    Washington, res 1015 Cactus
" Roland, baker h 1015 Cactus
" W Hoyt, driver h 1015 Cactus

Business Section
Bakers
Baird N. L. Mrs. 1811 Washington

George W. Blue's Plastering Business

George W. Blue ran a plastering business from his home and office at 1015 Cactus in Fort Worth from about 1901 until perhaps has late as 1906 when the Blue family moved out.

These two ads are from the classified section of The Dallas Morning News.  I don't have a publication date, but I suspect it may have been around 1903, give or take a couple of years.

The ads read:

WANTED - Ten union plasterers, three months' work.  Apply 1015 Cactus-st.  Fort Worth.  GEO. BLUE.

and

WANTED - Two plasterers at once.  union or non-union.  Apply or address GEORGE BLUE, 1015 Cactus-st., Fort Worth, Tex.

Read more about George W. Blue on these posts:

• The Blues, the Cowans, the Kuhlman's and the Flatiron Building
• Kuhlman & Blue Research
• More City Directory Research (1902 - 1906)
• City Directory Research
  

Fort Worth Society: Bessie Baird

Published in The Dallas Morning News on February 16, 1913, Page One, Page 10.

Fort Worth Society

...

The Jinx Club met Tuesday afternoon with Miss Bessie Baird of Cactus street. Refreshments were served the following guests: Misses Beatrice Allen, Bessie Baird, Myrtle Edsall, Pearl Smith, Hattie Voight, Estelle Pfantz, Kate Harrison, Fay and Ray Nance, Messrs B. F. Brewer, Henry Marsh, J. R. Griffin, C. K. Bullard, Eugene Ward, M. M. Slagle, Hoyt Baird, Atkin Harris.

Miss Ray Nance will be next hostess.

...

Mrs. Baird, Founder of Bakery, Dies at 92

Published in The Dallas Morning News on Sunday, June 4, 1961, Page 16, Section 1.

Mrs. Baird, Founder of Bakery, Dies at 92

Mrs. Ninnie L. Baird, 92, from whose modest kitchen of 1908 grew the nation's largest independent baking company - Mrs. Baird's Bakeries, Inc. - died Saturday morning in a Fort Worth hospital after a long illness

Mrs. Baird, a resident of Fort Worth since 1901, opened her first commercial bakery in Fort Worth in 1908, when she organized her "brood" into bakers, businessmen, and route men. Today, her bakeries are sprinkled throughout Texas, including Dallas, Houston, Abilene, Victoria, Lubbock, Waco, Austin and Fort Worth.

Born May 23, 1869, near Trenton, Tenn., she was orphaned while a young girl and reared by an aunt who taught her a unique skill - how to bake a loaf of bread people would pay money for.

The skill remained latent until the age of 17, when she married W. A. Baird and moved to Fort Worth.

Here, she baked all the family's bread. The oversupply she gave to neighbors. The neighbors liked it and asked if they could buy it from her regularly.

Mr. Baird became too ill to work in those days, but requests for bread continued. It was then that Mrs. Baird, to support the family, organized her home into a bakery.

Her eldest son, Deward, 16, became first assistant baker to his mother, and the three younger boys, Hoyt, Roland and C. B., became the "route men" - they delivered their first loaves piping hot in baskets.

The family's daughters kept the household running.

The customers named the bread by requesting "Mrs. Baird's Bread, please."

In 1912, Mr. Baird died.

"If we're going to get along, we've got to bake more," the young widow said, then purchased a second-hand wood-burning commercial oven. The bakery was in big business with an oven capacity for 40 loaves.

She didn't have enough cash for the oven's price, $75, so she paid $25 cash and the rest in bread and rolls.

From the beginning, the bread firm grew under the management and direction of Mrs. Baird. A horse and delivery wagon were purchased to peddle the bread which came from a small wooden building in the back yard of the Baird home on Fort Worth's Washington Street.

By World War I, demand sparked the firm's moving to a large bakery. The bread was then sold through the grocery stores for the first time.

Today, the firm is still a family operation, with sons and grandsons managing the business operation and supervising the baking.

Surviving are four sons, Deward C. Baird of Houston, W. Hoyt Baird of Fort Worth, Roland W. Baird of Dallas, and C. B. Baird of Fort Worth; three daughters, Mrs. A. H. Beitman, Mrs. E. C. Cummins and Mrs. Edd Hyde, all of Fort Worth; two sisters, Mrs. Curtis Sargent of San Francisco and Mrs. E. M. Townsend of Parsons, Tenn.; 23 grandchildren; 48 great-grandchildren and eight great-great-grandchildren.

Funeral services will be held at 3 p.m. Monday in University Baptist Church, 2221 Wabash in Fort Worth, with burial in the Greenwood Cemetery.

Pallbearers will be her grandsons, William D. Biard, Vernon Baird, C. B. Baird Jr., R. W. Baird Jr., Clay Cummins, and Baird Tripp.

Bairds at 1015 Cactus on a State Document

It's been a busy week of discoveries about the Cactus home. After a couple of months of back and forth emails, I finally obtained an official Texas state document showing the address of the Bairds at 1015 Cactus in 1911. It's probably the most official document that we've found so far and it brings the total number of documents showing this to be the Baird home to six. The list includes this state document, several Fort Worth City Directories, two Star-Telegram articles, a reference in the book, Sweetie Ladd's Historic Fort Worth, and "Page 6" from "The Mrs Baird's Story".

The section of the state document showing the address of 1015 Cactus accompanies this post. I didn't want to include the full document because of privacy reasons, even though it is a public domain document. I may change my mind about this in the future.

Origin of Page 6 Discovered

I've finally found at least part of the document that "Page 6" belongs to. I visited the Fort Worth Planning Department to take care of some business and I showed them Page 6 and asked if they had seen it. They did - it was part of a larger document (which in turn, is part of an even larger document) that is in the city file for the house.

The document is titled "The Mrs Baird's Story" and they only had a copy of the cover page and pages four through seven of it. I'm not sure what the document really is, or when it was published. It looks to be some sort of pamphlet or handout used at the bakery.

If you know of a full copy of this document and can somehow connect me with it, or you know what the document is or what it was used for, please let me know.

I've updated the original "Page 6" post with information that states I've found the source.