"Roadside stands and chemical warehouse also family tied" from the August 15, 1978 Door County Advocate
By JOHN ENIGL
Roadside stands and chemical warehouse also family tied
By JOHN ENIGL
In this final installment of the story of family involvement in the cherry industry, we will be looking at the family fruit stand operation, and a few other related pursuits.
One of the latest entrants in the fruit and vegetable market business is Montgomery's Garden Center, located two miles north of Carlsville on Highway 42. If you read a previous article about the Montgomerys, you know that they got into the business by accident and luck. Warren was forced to turn a greenhouse that was given to him into a business. He had been permanently disabled by a shipyard accident and can work only, when his injuries don't bother him.
Now, Warren and Margaret have planted many varieties of fruit trees so they can be as diversified in their offerings of fruit as they are in vegetables.
Warren and Margaret have 50 of the Montmorency trees most common to Door county - the sour pie cherry. Ten of the sweet, dark large Bing cherries were also planted. With the spraying of Mesural, a bird repellent, these cherries that ripen earlier than Montmerencys should survive. In earlier times, the birds would get them as soon as they got red.
There are 10 yellow cherry trees, 20 plums, 15 pears, 10 Viking apples, 10 Paula Reds, plus a number of other fruit trees to provide a variety of fruit at different times during the season.
Warren and Margaret had a problem with their peach trees, which don't take to our winters too well.
For now, the Montgomerys buy their tree fruit from local orchards, which provides another outlet for the growers.
The Montgomery stand sports a new display wagon that has attracted a lot of attention.
It's the cheerful attitude of the Montgomerys that one finds most interesting, however. Warren's always up on the local news and ready with a comment on it, usually a witty one. I remember the old Dale Carnegie course gimmick, where you had to get up in front of a group and say, "I am enthusiastic! " Warren could teach the course on that subject.
Tomjanovich's stand on Highway 42-57 just south of where the two highways divide near the Mill supper club is gone. It was one of the longest surviving, and most successful in the county. John and his wife raised cherries and vegetables for the stand which was discontinued when John died. Their hard work and good care of their garden and orchard reminded me of the gardens in Europe, small, well cultivated by hand. The Tomjanovich's product was good and their service is missed.
At a cherry grower's dinner sponsored by the Red Cherry Institute in June, I asked Laurence and Grace Sahs how they and their son Larry got started in the fruit stand and orchard business.
I should explain that Lawrence Sahs is retired, a former officer of Continental Bank in Chicago. Alex Drier, the news commentator used to describe it as "The big bank with the little bank inside." Lawrence is a scholarly, spry little gentleman with a winning smile, who is considering going back into the banking business if he can spare the time.
Grace Sahs is a charming complement to her husband, always willing to talk about the business.
"I inherited some money and we bought the place on County S across from Len Schartner Implement where we have the stand," Grace told me. "Then we built a new home further south."
I asked Larry why he decided to leave the Chicago area and come up here.
"It started with coming up here to work on a relative's house on the corner of the road going to Potawatomi Park. We got to like the area, and when the orchard went up for sale we bought it. We moved a house from near Babe and Ray's over to the property and started the stand.
Larry had been a plasterer in Chicago, so he re-did the house in large part himself.
There were years when the Sahs thought Larry might have to go back to work. but with this year's crop and price, and the success of the stand, that seems unnecessary.
(Larry and I are look-alikes. I am told, for several times people have mistaken me for Larry. This happened once at Kriers on the scales, when I weighed my cherries in. This year, with the price of cherries, I wish the mistake were the other way around.)
August Kreft came back to Door County from northwestern Wisconsin with his wife Agnes to start a highly successful orchard and fruit stand business. Both taught in the same school until 1939.
August Kreft was a well educated and highly rated grade school teacher when his teaching career was ended by his becoming deaf. Agnes was a teacher also, who served as a supervisor of teachers in Iron and Douglas counties.
Something had to be done to earn more income to support the family. The Krefts bought some land near the Bay Shore west of Carlsville and planted a cherry orchard.
Partly to provide work for people they knew in northern Wisconsin, and partly to
ensure a supply of cherry pickers, the Krefts built a pickers' camp next to the orchard. It was a model pickers' camp, much like a motel, but not quite as fancy. It was attractive, like a little vacation hideaway. It no longer is a pickers' camp and never was a migrant camp and now houses several friends who work with the shaker.
Agnes, who is also a talented singer and piano player who plays at clubs in town, told us a few years ago she would never shake the trees in her orchard. Yet migrant camp restrictions became stricter and stricter so she had to back down on that resolution. Now Bill Anschutz shakes her orchard.
Not long after getting the orchard established, the Krefts bought land on the corner of Highway 42 and County I at Carlsville and set up a stand to market fresh cherries. The original stand was small, and often unmanned. The honor system was used: you take the cherries and leave the money.
Agnes says the system worked very well. Nearly always the amount of fruit sold came out correctly with the amount of money left. Here the Krefts demonstrated an old Door county trait —trust. As I said in a previous story, our trusting ways sometimes get us in trouble when we leave Door county, but it worked even better than usual for the Krefts.
Agnes says, "I'd leave the stand and come back and the money would be there. Everything was hunky-dorey. I once got a letter from some nuns saying they were glad to see that someone trusted people."
The new Kreft stand is really an old Door county landmark — the concession stand from the Reynolds Brothers Preserving Company. Many times did owners Karl and Don Reynolds come to that stand for refreshments, as did the black and Mexican American pickers.
All the other stands that sell cherries are family affairs, too — Koepsel's near Baileys Harbor, Harmann's and Norm LeFevre's south of town, Zahn's Green Thumb and others.
The family affairs extends into other cherry industry related fields too. Francis Pederson (the "d" is Irish) manages the Niagara Chemical warehouse near to B and T Television Service just north of town.
Francis sits back in his chair in his office attached to the chemical warehouse and gives you a hearty greeting as you enter. He knows all his customers by first name, of course. His daughter, Nancy Schroeder, is his secretary.
The grower tells Francis what chemicals he wants to buy; for example, Benlate for leaf spot control.
Francis may reply, in slow, deliberate tones. "Well, you can use that if you want to. But it will not control leaf spot if you keep on using it. Cyprex will do a better job and it's one heck of a lot cheaper. They're both on Cliff Ehlers (Extension Horticulturist) list but you'll be better off and cheaper off if you use Cyprex."
That's just the type of help Pederson gives growers, based on many years experience in the fruit business. You can rely on his advice. Consequently, he sells to orchard owners hundreds of miles away.
I once told him that my wife picks apples for Rim's Edge Orchard near Richfield. I said that I taught with the daughter of a nearby orchard supply owner and supposed her father sold Rim's Edge its spray materials.
Francis laughed. "No, I sell Rudy Schwartz all his stuff. He just calls me and I bring it down, even if it is 160 miles away."
Francis, who has been pictured and quoted in several Milwaukee Journal publications, has his own ideas about pesticide dangers. He laughs.
"Look at me. I live with the stuff every day. I'm over 70 years old. Does it look like it hurts me?"
And he dances a jig.
Dr. Clifford G. Ehlers is a Door county native and he makes the Extension Service recommendations for spray materials to be used on cherries. His family grows cherries, too, so he practices what he preaches.
Cliff's wife knows about cherries too, for Mary Ann is the daughter of a well-known grower, the late Al Kroll.
Cherry picking, too, is a family affair, especially if you hand pick. Migrant workers are no longer used. since there is tremendous expense in meeting housing standards.
We, in our orchard, rely on local residents for picking. Most of our pickers are American Indians we have known for years, and their relatives. Many of them prefer the outside work to other jobs they hold, and will take vacation time in order to pick cherries. It's like a two week long family reunion.
Just how closely knit Indian families are was evident to me when Clyde LeMieux died. Often Clyde had to go out of town to work, but he kept his family and community ties strong, and often came to the orchard on Saturday with his family.
When Clyde died unexpectedly, he had one of the largest funerals the Sturgeon Bay United Methodist church ever had.
At the wake and funeral, hundreds of Indians came from all over, many of whom I knew from our orchard. There were also many whites present, among them Chet Ostram sr. and jr., for whom they picked cherries before they came to our orchard. There was also a large contingent from the Door County Stock Car Association, of which Clyde was president.
From this story and the previous installments you can see that all facets of the cherry industry in Door county are influenced by family interest and family control. That influence is a truly American trait worthy of preservation. Perhaps this year's good price and good crop will help this tradition to continue.
Courtesy of the Door County Library Newspaper Archive