Blue Valley Creamery Wants Your Cows!

Michael Bushnell
Publisher


This week, we offer this advertising postcard from the Blue Valley Creamery Company, spotlighting three of the company’s facilities in Sioux City, Iowa; St. Joseph, Mo.; and Chicago.


“Churners of the celebrated Blue Valley Butter” is noted on the front of the postcard. The Blue Valley Creamery Co. had twenty one large butter making plants in the United States and was noted for paying the highest price for cream. The views on the front of the card show three of the company’s factories as well as various views inside the plants, such as the Test Room, the Churn Room and a general office view


Blue Valley Creamery was founded in St. Joseph, Mo., in 1899 by Huston Wyeth and James A Walker. Wyeth, whose father founded the Wyeth Hardware Company as well as the Artesian Ice company years before, built up the business to be one of the largest cream producing operations in the country by 1917. By 1920, the company headquarters had moved to Chicago and plants were located in almost 30 Midwestern cities.


The Kansas City plant was located at 501-503 W. 25th Street, just to the west of where Studio Dan Meiners is today.


According to historical documents, the Creamery’s Sioux City plant produced the best butter of all the plants in the system. The Sioux City location had a regular staff of 35 people, which was increased to 60 or more during the busy spring and summer season. Blue Valley was also one of the innovators of selling butter in one-pound packages in the early 1900s.


Prior to 1900, due to limitations in transportation and storage, creameries such as Blue Valley were primarily local operations, buying cream from family-run, local dairy farms, supplying farmers with shipping tags that were attached to the producer’s milk or cream cans. The tag guaranteed shipping of the full can to the creamery as well as return shipping back to the originating dairy farm.


Modernization in the railroad network and cold storage facilities combined with newer, cream separating techniques allowed creameries to serve a larger geographical area. Dairy processing plants often dispatched trucks to area farms that transported full cans to a nearby rail depot or back to the creamery directly for processing.


In 1939 Blue Valley Creamery was acquired by the Beatrice Creamery of Chicago and survives today under the ConAgra umbrella of companies, although I think we’d be hard-pressed to recognize Mr. Wyeth’s original operation given today’s vast modernization and corporate structures.


The advertising message typed on the back of the card is dated Sept. 1, 1908 and relates to a promotion where anyone who refers new cream vendors to the creamery would receive a commissioned piece of artwork. The ad copy reads: “Dear Sir, we are writing you to thank you for your recent letter with the list of names of parties who have cows and are not now patrons of ours. The picture will be forwarded to you as soon as completed. The process of making these pictures is somewhat tedious, as it requires an immense amount of work and the exercise of great care. The artist tells us that it will not be safe to figure on being able to deliver them before September 15th anyhow. We are sure the quality of the work will justify the wait. Thanking you again for the names and in advance for your patience, we beg to remain, Yours very sincerely, Blue Valley Creamery Co.”


The card was sent from St. Joseph, Mo. on September 7, 1908 to R. Julien of Amsterdam, Mo.


Source citation: 1940 Tax Assessment Photo and Sanborn Fire Insurance Map images are courtesy of the Kansas City Public Library, Missouri Valley Special Collections.

Want Northeast News articles sent straight to your inbox each week? Subscribe below!
Enter your email address and click on the Get Instant Access button.
We respect your privacy

Comments are closed.

  • Remember this? Petticoat Lane

    March 22nd, 2023
    by

    Decades prior to being officially renamed by the City Council, a two block section of 11th Street had earned the […]


    Newspapers essential to community vitality

    March 22nd, 2023
    by

    This real photo postcard spotlights Mr. Roy Powell, former Publisher of the Holt Rustler and the Gower Rustler, two weekly […]


    Remember This?

    March 15th, 2023
    by

    Dorri PartainContributor America’s largest cookie sale began with one Girl Scout troop in 1917. The “Mistletoe” troop of Muskogee, Okla., […]


    Dining and Dancing at Sni-a-bar gardens

    March 15th, 2023
    by

    Michael BushnellPublisher No publisher’s mark exists on this card postmarked Feb. 18, 1938, which shows the Sni-A-Bar Gardens in Kansas […]


    Remember This?

    March 8th, 2023
    by

    Dorri PartainContributor For centuries, books, documents, and letters were written with a simple quill pen that was dipped into ink. […]


    Scarritt Building dominates early KC Skyline

    March 8th, 2023
    by

    Michael BushnellPublisher The Scarritt Building was built in 1907 by the Scarritt Estate Company, formed in 1903 by the children […]


    Remember This?

    March 1st, 2023
    by

    Dorri PartainContributor The development of flash photography was, quite literally, explosive. In order to get the lumens necessary for indoor […]


    Mellier Place: an up and coming subdivision of the early 20th century

    March 1st, 2023
    by

    Michael BushnellPublisher Around the turn of the 20th Century, it was not uncommon for local photo-postcard companies to go door-to-door […]


    Remember This?

    February 22nd, 2023
    by

    Dorri PartainContributor The handiest gadget in today’s kitchen drawer was invented several decades following the invention of canned foods. While […]


  • Blossom House, Union Depot key to West Bottoms Economy

    February 22nd, 2023
    by

    Michael BushnellPublisher The Blossom House Hotel was opened at 1048-50 Union Ave. in 1882 by Major George Newton Blossom to […]


    The Living Flag

    February 15th, 2023
    by

    Michael BushnellPublisher This extremely rare, hand-colored postcard depicts the Living Flag presentation done under the auspices of the Women’s Christian […]


    Remember This?

    February 15th, 2023
    by

    Dorri PartainContributor Whether wearing sneakers, playing a guitar, or donning a superhero cape, the cartoon cats drawn by artist B […]


    Swope Park, an admirable site for the country’s best zoo

    February 8th, 2023
    by

    Michael BushnellPublisher “Kansas City cannot be a metropolitan area without a quality zoological garden,” said Barron Fradenburg, founding partner of […]


    Remember This?

    February 8th, 2023
    by

    Dorri PartainContributor Whether one thought the embroidered logo was an alligator or crocodile, the Izod Lacoste polo shirt was the […]


    Reclaiming West Terrace Park

    February 1st, 2023
    by

    Michael BushnellPublisher West Terrace Park was one of Kansas City’s first parks, originally proposed by landscape architect George Kessler in […]


    Remember This?

    February 1st, 2023
    by

    Dorri PartainContributor Living 20 minutes into the future and tagging Coke drinkers as “Coke-ologists,” Max Headroom was developed as the […]


    Kansas City, a national leader in flour milling

    January 25th, 2023
    by

    Michael BushnellPublisher This week, we feature a promotional postcard for the Southwest Milling Company showing the company’s A and B […]


    Remember This?

    January 25th, 2023
    by

    Dorri PartainContributor Can you do “The Flake?” If you can, you know the “crazy new dance that’s the talk of […]


  • Northeast Newscast


  • Remember This?

    Remember This?

    January 18th, 2023
    by

  • Want articles sent directly to your inbox each week? Subscribe below!
    We respect your privacy and will not distribute your information.