Heinz Ketchup Week, 1923.
This was a new to me photo of the Mann Bros building with a ‘Ketchup Week’ sign out front. I believe this would have been from 1923 based on the Gleaner page below. If you look closely you can see a piggly wiggly there too. That store opened Saturday, January 28, 1922 at 204 N Main.


Boyett: H.J. Heinz cannery took a couple of years before ketchup flowed freely
Heinz has long marketed its ketchup by illustrating how long it takes to come out of the bottle. That seems appropriate considering the company’s initial experience at its Henderson cannery.
Coquillard Wagon Works of South Bend, Indiana, erected the main factory building at the southeast corner of O’Byrne and Atkinson streets in 1903 on the site of a pond where John James Audubon used to catch turtles so he could make his favorite soup. That factory did business as the Henderson Wagon Works, but it was never profitable and was sold at the courthouse door in 1911 to James R. Barret.
Sebastian “Seb” Mueller, a vice president of the H.J. Heinz Co., came to Henderson around the first of 1918 and impressed local officials with his detailed knowledge about the community. He bought the factory Feb. 14, 1918, before he left Henderson.
Renovations began in March and for several months the factory was abuzz with activity installing equipment. Manager Nathaniel J. Simpson arrived about the first of June 1918 to supervise the factory’s completion; he remained until 1922.
Production began in mid-July 1918, but a problem quickly arose. The Aug. 18, 1918, Gleaner reported that Mueller had sent a letter to the local factory expressing concerns about a typhoid outbreak here. He instructed them to either boil or distill all water being used in the cannery and went so far as to consider having the company drill its own well.
The first year Heinz contracted with local farmers to grow 1,000 acres of tomatoes. But it didn’t get that many tomatoes. In fact, the Henderson County tomato harvests the first two years were largely failures.
Heinz had about 16 acres so it had plenty of room to build a large greenhouse to sprout the seeds and built glass frames on about six acres to protect the seedlings before they were distributed to farmers. It also grew some tomatoes on its own.
But Henderson County farmers were wary about growing a new crop, and some of them apparently didn’t know what they were doing. The first part of the 1918 growing season was too dry and too much rain in the latter part of the season kept the plants from thriving, according to the Feb. 7, 1919, Gleaner.
That same story said seedlings would be donated to farmers, as well as baskets for the harvest. The company wound up contracting for 1,500 acres in the 1919 season.
But it also began looking for other crops, to keep the factory running for a larger part of the year. The Feb. 12, 1919, Gleaner said it was considering taking on strawberries. The Oct. 23 edition said contracts had been signed for the delivery of apples, so the plant could make apple butter.
The strawberry idea apparently never caught on, but apple butter became a reality, according to a Gleaner story of 100 years ago. “As soon as the busy season with tomatoes is over the force will be put to work on apple butter,” plant manager Simpson said in The Gleaner of March 12, 1920. That was going to require about 30,000 bushels of locally grown apples.
The second season failed partially because Simpson miscalculated the weather. The Gleaner of April 20, 1919, reported Heinz had 3 million tomato plants reading for transplanting by farmers and urged farmers to begin planting soon.
“Mr. Simpson states that he feels that there will be no more frost this season and that the plants should be planted by the first week in May.”
But a frost hit April 26, killing many plants that had already been set out. Continued rainy weather through much of May hampered setting out plants for those who had not previously prepared their fields. Time was running out and there was about 400 acres left to plant.
But things were not all doom and gloom. The company sponsored its first annual picnic in Atkinson Park for its employees and their friends June 14, 1919, although the cannery was operating on a small scale at that point. By August it was employing 300.
The 1919 harvest was further hurt by a lack of rain in the latter part of July, “and ripening is seriously delayed for that,” according to the July 26 edition.
Gleaner stories from late 1919 and early 1920 acknowledge the failures of the first two crops.
“The farmers have had two bad seasons for the raising of tomatoes and if the next season is better for these plants the company will have a much larger output,” reported the Nov. 9, 1919, Gleaner.
The Feb. 22, 1920, Gleaner reported Simpson and one of his field men had talked to a joint meeting of the Chamber of Commerce and the Henderson County Farm Bureau. “They have not met with the success they expected but are not discouraged.”
Also, the Nov. 9 story said, Heinz “will likely add other lines to their output in Henderson.” Rev. Edwin McCollom, who is generally credited with being father of the local apple industry, probably sold apples to Heinz. The Gleaner of Feb. 20, 1920, carried an endorsement of Heinz by McCollom, who had contracted to grow five acres of tomatoes.
“I am thoroughly in earnest in backing the Heinz Company and shall do all in my power to make my tomato venture a success.” Three weeks later Heinz announced plans to can apple butter.
Within a few years the local Heinz factory was running smoothly, according to a story in The Gleaner of July 24, 1927. It said company policy dictated that tomatoes be cooked and bottled within 24 hours of leaving the vine. By that point, the company had four local field representatives, who advised farmers on every aspect of growing and harvesting tomatoes.
The Great Depression put a cork in the local Heinz plant. It did not operate 1930-33 and closed for good in 1938. Atlas Tack Corp. of Fairhaven, Massachusetts, announced Dec. 12, 1940, it intended to use the building, which opened in 1941 and operated until Oct. 28, 1970. The main building was used for storage until it burned June 16, 1978, in what was probably Henderson’s largest fire.
References:
Henderson Morning Gleaner • Sun, Feb 11, 1923
Boyett: H.J. Heinz cannery took a couple of years before ketchup flowed freely