Chapter 25
-- Compiled by the Cumberland Women's Club
and Published by the Cumberland Advocate
1874-1974
(used by permission of the Cumberland Advocate)
Donated by Linda Mott
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Dairy
The following article was written by Earl Chapin, Staff Writer for the St. Paul Pioneer Press, November 7, 1965.
The City Dairy in Cumberland represents a family tradition of 150 years in the dairy industry, starting with the late Frank Cook, who taught buttermaking to his nephew, S.B. Cook, whose son Keith operates the City Dairy. For good measure, Keith's son, John, also works at the Cumberland Dairy.
The patriarch of this family is S.B. Cook, still hale and hearty at 89. Cook holds membership in the Pioneer Buttermaker's Club, and an honorary life membership in the Wisconsin Buttermaker's and Manager's Association, and has won many citations during his many years in the industry.
Cook has seen many changes in his profession during the years he has worked at it. Born in Richland County in 1876, he went to work for his uncle Frank Cook, buttermaker at the Blue Mounds Creamery, at the age of 17. During his first season his pay was his room and board.
The next year his uncle purchased the creamery from the stock company and Cook began to receive $25 a month plus room and board. The Blue Mound Creamery was making about 150,000 pounds of butter per year, which was considered quite a big operation then.
Creamery procedure in 1895 is described thus by Cook: "Milk came in by wagon in 40 gallon cans and was picked up by a derrick and dumped in the weigh can. The milk was graded and the poor milk was sent back home.
The milk was aerated by letting it drain into a vat from an 8 gallon can on legs with holes in the bottom
It was hard on those days to convince some farmers that it took good milk to make good butter. Once we set aside the milk on one farmer and made butter of it separately and put it in the jar he had left. After he learned that the bad butter he complained about was from his own milk we got a better product from him."
"Steam pipes going through the tank heated the milk to 90 degrees, necessary for separation."
"We had two separators, one 2500, the other 3000 pounds. They were operated by a rope off a line shaft."
"The
separated cream was run into a vat to ripen. When the cream commenced to
thicken ice
would
be brought in from the ice house, washed and broken up and put directly
into the cream,
which
then was stirred with a wooden rake until cold enough for churning the
next morning."
"At
3:30 A.M. we would go to the creamery, build the fire and pail the cream
into the box
churns,
filling the one while the other was churning. The resulting butter was
then worked on a
Mason
butter worker which kneaded the butter until it would not break when turned
with a
ladle.
The butter was packed into the ice box by 6 A.M."
Cook said that today one hears little of commercial starters for butter, but in the early days a starter was used. In his estimation this gave a flavor better than that of the sweet cream butter of today.
Cook
went from Blue Mound to the Hudson Road Creamery at Menomonie. He remembers
this as a "poorly constructed frame building,
standing on posts about two feet off the ground. Hot water thrown on the
floor would at times freeze to the floor during the winter. This creamery
had a hollow bowl type separator called a Jumbo. This bowl weighed 135
pounds and was
hoisted
by a block and tackle."
Cook subsequently served as the first buttermaker at Tilden, where he helped build the creamery. He also worked at Bruce, Taylor's Corners and Cumberland. While at Taylor's Corners, Cook helped organize the Northwestern Buttermaker's Association, an organization he served as president for two years and subsequently as secretary-treasurer. Cook also served as president and treasurer of the Wisconsin State Buttermaker's Association.
Cook came to Cumberland where he has since made his home, about 1911. The creamery at Cumberland was then owned by the Island City State Bank.
Cook was subsequently appointed dairy and food inspector for the state with territory of 15 counties in northwestern Wisconsin.
"The
new weights and measures law had just been passed and it was my duty to
check sotres
on the
weights of goods sold, check contents of berry boxes and check scales in
cheese
factories
and creameries."
"In
those days I went about with horse and buggy, which made slow travel and
long days. All
samples
that were suspected as watered or skimmed were sealed and sent to the laboratory
in
Madison."
When the department of the markets organized creamery districts, Cook accepted a job as field man for District 4. This ushered in a new period of education and improvement in methods for the dairy farmer.
"After
two years of this kind of work, creameries were able to get premium prices
for their
butter",
Cook said.
Four of Cook's five sons went into the dairy business.
Cook is still a partner in the Cumberland City Dairy with his son Keith and son-in-law Roy Riebe, Jr.
The Cumberland City Dairy was incorporated after World War II. It sells milk and cream and manufactures ice cream.
The Dairy
was started by Axel Larson
in the year 1944 and was purchased by the Cooks in 1945. During its operation
it made ice cream, bottled milk, cream and buttermilk. At present it is
a distributor of dairy products. The Manager is Roy Riebe, Jr.
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