A Tale of Horse-Drawn Crackers and the Advent of the Electric Truck
by Joy Santlofer
During the early years of the twentieth century, horses ruled the streets of New York. In addition to pulling carriages, omnibuses, and some of the trolleys that ran along the avenues, they hauled the wagons that delivered food and beverages through the clogged and busy streets in the expanding metropolis. Crescent Biscuit Company, a recently opened cracker factory, was one of many food producers in New York that used horses to deliver their products to the scattered grocery stores that stretched from Battery Park to Harlem.
Covered delivery wagons, each with its owner’s name elaborately painted on its sides, were part of the landscape of the city and the horses that pulled them were expensive assets that companies treated well. The cracker deliveryman riding his horse-drawn wagon traveled slowly, stopping at each shop along his route to restock the ornate glass cases that held loose crackers or to refill shelves with newly designed boxes of Uneeda Biscuits or Jinjer Wafers that were made by the National Biscuit Company. It was the city’s largest cracker bakery, and the country’s first food corporation, formed by a consolidation of many venerable old cracker makers when it was incorporated in 1898 and it had a large fleet of wagons that blanketed the city. Their success had spawned many imitators, including Crescent Biscuit.
On an August morning in 1903, Crescent Biscuit salesman Morris Green began the day as he always did. He took his horse out of his comfortable stall in the six-story brick factory on Avenue D and harnessed him to a wagon filled with the day’s cracker deliveries. He then headed uptown to make the deliveries on his route, which included the new and busy neighborhoods above 86th Street. Arriving at 96th Street at about nine o’clock, something spooked his usually well-mannered horse, which bolted, throwing Green to the ground and dragging him eastward towards Third Avenue.
At the intersection, a policeman named Foley grabbed the bridle but the horse kept going, running onto the sidewalk where the wagon overturned, spilling crackers everywhere and leaving an unconscious Green lying on the ground. The New York Times reported that the horse then took off for Lexington Avenue with the policeman hanging on for dear life and the fifty-ton wagon careening down the street on its side. After hitting a lamppost, the terrified horse finally slowed down and dashed down a flight of steps into a basement vegetable store. The wagon crashed into the doorway, the impact breaking the harness allowing the horse to saunter into the shop and terrify the greengrocer, Vito Collino, who made a quick exit. Left alone to gorge on the copious displays of lettuce, carrots, and tomatoes, the horse spent the day leisurely nibbling as a crew from Crescent Biscuit removed a wall to finally extricate him.
This wasn’t an isolated event. Horses may have been treated like royalty but they could be unpredictable and the newspapers reported many similar incidents. Considering the ruckus a horse could make, the first models of electric trucks that had begun to appear on streets would have seemed a godsend, and many were eager to try them. There was much that was familiar about the new machines. They had a pace similar to that of a horse and wagon, and their ten-mile range perfectly suited to the short distances and numerous stops made during city deliveries. The initial cost was also comparable and their cabs were designed to be almost identical in shape to that of the wagons.
A Tale of Horsedrawn Crackers
by Joy Santlofer
During the early years of the twentieth century, horses ruled the streets of New York. In addition to pulling carriages, omnibuses, and some of the trolleys that ran along the avenues, they hauled the wagons that delivered food and beverages through the clogged and busy streets in the expanding metropolis. Crescent Biscuit Company, a recently opened cracker factory, was one of many food producers in New York that used horses to deliver their products to the scattered grocery stores that stretched from Battery Park to Harlem.
Covered delivery wagons, each with its owner’s name elaborately painted on its sides, were part of the landscape of the city and the horses that pulled them were expensive assets that companies treated well. The cracker deliveryman riding his horse-drawn wagon traveled slowly, stopping at each shop along his route to restock the ornate glass cases that held loose crackers or to refill shelves with newly designed boxes of Uneeda Biscuits or Jinjer Wafers that were made by the National Biscuit Company. It was the city’s largest cracker bakery, and the country’s first food corporation, formed by a consolidation of many venerable old cracker makers when it was incorporated in 1898 and it had a large fleet of wagons that blanketed the city. Their success had spawned many imitators, including Crescent Biscuit.
On an August morning in 1903, Crescent Biscuit salesman Morris Green began the day as he always did. He took his horse out of his comfortable stall in the six-story brick factory on Avenue D and harnessed him to a wagon filled with the day’s cracker deliveries. He then headed uptown to make the deliveries on his route, which included the new and busy neighborhoods above 86th Street. Arriving at 96th Street at about nine o’clock, something spooked his usually well-mannered horse, which bolted, throwing Green to the ground and dragging him eastward towards Third Avenue.
At the intersection, a policeman named Foley grabbed the bridle but the horse kept going, running onto the sidewalk where the wagon overturned, spilling crackers everywhere and leaving an unconscious Green lying on the ground. The New York Times reported that the horse then took off for Lexington Avenue with the policeman hanging on for dear life and the fifty-ton wagon careening down the street on its side. After hitting a lamppost, the terrified horse finally slowed down and dashed down a flight of steps into a basement vegetable store. The wagon crashed into the doorway, the impact breaking the harness allowing the horse to saunter into the shop and terrify the greengrocer, Vito Collino, who made a quick exit. Left alone to gorge on the copious displays of lettuce, carrots, and tomatoes, the horse spent the day leisurely nibbling as a crew from Crescent Biscuit removed a wall to finally extricate him.
This wasn’t an isolated event. Horses may have been treated like royalty but they could be unpredictable and the newspapers reported many similar incidents. Considering the ruckus a horse could make, the first models of electric trucks that had begun to appear on streets would have seemed a godsend, and many were eager to try them. There was much that was familiar about the new machines. They had a pace similar to that of a horse and wagon, and their ten-mile range perfectly suited to the short distances and numerous stops made during city deliveries. The initial cost was also comparable and their cabs were designed to be almost identical in shape to that of the wagons.