The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1885-12-02
AN 7.
How the Staff OF Life 10 Made In a
BIG Establishment.

How the Staff OF Life IL Made in a
Big Establishment.
A New York World reporter who has
been through an immense Brooklyn
bakery--the largest in the city-says
Here bread is turned out by the ten
thousand loaves and enough is made
daily to supply the wants OF many
thriving village. The proprietor of the
bakery was kind enough to conduct the
reporter all through the various depart.
ments and explain the whole process OF
bread making, from the time the barrels
of flour arc rolled in and hoisted by ele-
vators to the loft to the hour when the
bread is delivered to the retail stores all
over the city.
The two upper floors are used for the
storage of the flour. They will hold
about 80, 1000 barrels and arc piled in
great tiers and taken down again at the
rate of 800 barrels a day to be worked
up into bread. The lower floor is used
for the delivery of the finished product.
In one part is a blacksmith's shop for
the repair of the wagons and harnesses
and the making of h%orseshoes. The
stable for the horses occupies the half of
another block a few hundred feet away.
In order to make the business lucrative
the scale on which the work is done be-
ing 80 large that the margin of profit is
very small, it must be as self-sustaining
as possible. Hence the firm has its own
| stables, its W wagons and its W re-
pair shops. In fact nearly everything is
done by the establishment except the
growing of the wheat and the grinding
of the flour. That is bought already in
barrels as it come from the West.
The lower floor was covered with lit
tie carts on wheels to transfer the boxes
of fresh-made loaves from one part of
the building to another. There is about
an acre and a half of ground under roof
and every inch is economical. One lit
tie room is used for the sale of bread
returned from the retail bakeries, q sign
con%spicuously posted stating that mo re-
turned bread more than one day old will
be allowed for" That which is less than
one day old is taken back at full rates
and sold in the little room at half price.
Crowds of people from the neighboring
tenement houses we're squeezing in to
purchase the rejected bread. This vas
being emptied from the large crates 4
feet by 2 and about p feet deep and
rapidly transferred to barrels, whence it
was sold over the counter.
In the basement all the preliminary
processes of mixing and kneading are
carried on, while around under the side
walks are the immense ovens. The flour
is first poured into great mixing pans,
six barrels at a time. The pans are Of
iron. about eight feet in diameter and
four feet deep. Two bent bars of iron,
V.shapcd and connected with machinery
that rises in q cylinder in the center of
the pan, serve to mix the dough. They
are moved in a peculiar manner up and
down and through every part Of the
pasty mixture, thoroughly comming-
ling all its componunts.
The yeast is made in a small room and
transferred to large cullenders, where a
little salt and milk and water is added
in varying proportions according 10 the
style of bread desired. Then it is shaken
up with q little flour and finally squeezed
by hand through the holes in the bottom
of the cullendcr into the mixing pans.
Then the machinery is started, the great
iron bars begin to r~evolvc, and the pasty
mass is stirred for a little while until it
attains the proper consistency. In this
manner six barrels of flour can be made
up Into dough in from twelve to four
teen minutes. The flour is emptied from
the barrels into bins on the doors above
and falls through wooden shutes into the
pans beneath.
After the dough is properly mixed the
machinery is stopped and the two strong
kncndcrs who stand by begin to punch
and mold the dough into round masses
about three feet in diameter. 1t then
sticks together pretty firmly, like a large
lump Of molasses candy. Then with a
jerk the men lift the ball of dough and
throw it into a large trough standing
near by. These troughs arc exactly like
wooden washtubs on wheels. The dough
is, thrown in, ball after ball, until the
trough is full. 1t sinks down and coal
csccs into one mass even with the top of
the tub. There it standsu unit proved"
about four or five hours. The weather
has much to do-with the process. In
cold weather warm water is used to mix
the dough and in hot summer seasons
ice-watcr must be employed.
The kncading rooms are about q hum
drcl feet square, all open underneath.
ana a large shaft about forty by twenty
feet with brick walls gives air and light.
There are several party walls with iron
doors, so that the different sections may
be isolated in case Of fire. The upper
floors are separated by walls into so
many different buildings, and they could
be turned into dwelling houses, as their
outside appearance indicates.
The weather causes the length of time
for "proving" to vary from four to six
hours. At the end Of this time The
dough- is taken ont in small quantities
and transferred to tables, where thirty
or forty kncadcrs make it up into loarcs
of the proper shape. Then it is placed
in shallow pans and stands a short time
for further "proving" in high wooden
crates with shelves, each crate holding
forty or fifty pans. ,
There are forty ovens around the build
ing, under the sidewalk. Each one is
about twelve feet square and one foot or
eighteen inches high. In each oven can
be baked from forty to hundred loaves.
Some can hold nearly three hundred OF
the smaller kinds. This part OF the
work is done by hand. In fact ma
chincry is just beginning to be used in
the business. One Of the large mixers