P.J. Ritter Company - pt1 A Walk Through History

Welcome back to the Bridgeton Beacon. In 1854, Philip J. Ritter went into business in the Kensington section of Philadelphia, selling in part his wife Louisa's canned preserves. His son, William Sr., recognized that it was the ketchup line that was the future of the company.

Joining me for a literal walk down memory lane are Philip's great-great-grandson, Paul Ritter III, and my dad, Bob McCormick, who worked here at the plant from 1963 to 1970. Gentlemen, welcome. Thank you.

So I wanted to start out, Paul, by asking you. Your great-grandfather, William Sr., purchased land here in 1960, 1916, and it was 60 years that P.J. Ritter Company was on this site. Why did he choose this particular area? Of course, the company originally in Kensington, Philadelphia, but the company had a lot of growth after the Civil War and into the early 1900s.

They needed more space to expand their operations. The reason they picked the banks of the Kansas River here in Bridgeton was twofold. First, it was the center of agriculture in southern New Jersey.

Many of the crops that they used for their food processing, tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, were all grown here in south Jersey. So they were very close to the markets for that produce and the farmers that produced it. Also, very importantly, is most of their products were packaged in glass.

In south Jersey, not only being a big farm community, it was also the center of glass manufacturing in the middle Atlantic coast. So you don't want to ship empty bottles a great distance because that adds to the cost of your product. So to site the food processing plant in the middle of farm country where they could get their produce and also as an additional bonus where the glass manufacturing was located, made it an absolute perfect location.

Finally, it was a hub of transportation. A couple of railroads traveled into Bridgeton all up and down the east coast and also the river. Tomatoes were brought in from Maryland and Delaware by river early in the growing season.

And the river was also a place where some of the tomato peels found their place after the processing of the tomatoes. So the river, the railroads, glass manufacturing, and abundance of farms and farm produce lent ridders to come and locate here on the banks of the Kansas in Bridgeton, New Jersey. This was one of six plants on the east coast, is that right? Correct.

Okay, and why do you think this was the one that survived for so long? The other plants on the east coast were much smaller than this. This was really the hub of operations. Over time for efficiencies, it made sense to put all the production in one location.

So this location, for the reasons I mentioned earlier, ended up being the place where operations were consolidated. Okay, so I was just asking you, you are going to give us a tour, and I was reading the history that you wrote back in 1997, I think, 97 and 98. And we're going to walk around and you're going to show us the brick and mortar location.

But I thought it was really neat because one of the quotes that you had in your history was that although this was a brick and mortar location, it was more than that. It was more than just the wood and the steel. It was the individuals.

So as we walk around, I'm going to ask you two to tell us about the individuals and what made this place so special to work. This will be a pleasure. I have to tell you, I've been very excited to get back here.

It's been probably since I left that I haven't been here. And there have been a few changes, but everything is very recognizable. Do you want to start back at the beginning? This is the yard, we called it.

And across this way were all production facilities. You can't see everything here. The cafeteria, quality control.

Quality control was where I started. I came down here because I had an idea. It might be kind of nice to work at the Ritter Company.

So many people had and they talk about it. And so I was 17 and I went into the personnel office, which we'll see where it was. And Earl McCormick was the director, director of personnel and public relations.

And Paul, as we've talked, and Megan, you've heard, he was a great friend to many people. He was actually a highly regarded figure in the profession of personnel work. Rutgers used his planning and way of operating.

His relationship with the unions, right up to the national presidents, was very close, great friendship. And a lot of that, along with the attitude toward employees and taking care of them, had so much to do with the fact that there was never a work stoppage here. Everything was fine.

And so, you know, I went in there and there was Earl, who I learned later on, my father-in-law, Jim Myers, who had been a plant manager before Philip Ritter, I think, hired Earl during the depression. Gave him his first job. Earl never forgot that.

And we all remain lifelong friends. Not closely related, but we'd introduce each other as my close friend and distant relative. McCormick, McCormick.

Actually starting out in New York. But anyway, I go in and get an application. He's out here.

Oh, you're 17. You're not old enough to work. Oh, gee.

I thought, okay. He said, put you, you're 19. And I did.

And the funny thing was, I got the job and I made a lot of friends and had good relationships. I was working in quality control. And two years later, they gave me a surprise 21st birthday party because I thought I was turning 21.

Quality control was where I worked all through college. Howard Lacey, who became the, I think he was also ended up general manager at Brooks. Your grandfather told him, you know, go out there.

It'll be a good move for you. But Howard had been here for a long time. He was a big guy.

You talk about what they call a stentorian voice deep. You would hear Lacey's voice all over this yard everywhere. And we all loved working for him.

And Roy Thompson and Tom Metzger were the supervisors. June Lyme was his assistant, always in a white lab outfit. And then all the temporary crew would come in.

And it was a family from the start for me. I would come here every college vacation, come down at Christmas. Sometime, one time I wrote Howard as a joke, a terrible letter about the party time drink mix.

And my description was awful. And Howard looked at that and he was, people told me that he said, oh my God, can you imagine anybody writing a letter like this? He found out it was me. And that next summer, right here were the kitchens where they made ketchup in the back.

And you'd have these giant thousands of gallons boiling, 10 of them, cookers. He put me up there to be the tester of each batch before it dropped. And I would spend a whole shift running from one to the other.

There's no, no air, not even any windows. And John Carter was the plant's production manager. He'd be up there.

Come on, get moving, get moving. John and I became very great friends later on. And so then Howard relented and brought me back home into the lab, work out up to get the test.

We take little samples every half hour and run them through a whole batch of tests to make sure it was in good shape, thickness, whatever. If you're doing a double A fancy or a C that would go to like A and P for a lower price. And then over in the actual quality control office, there was where research was also done, but in the quality control office, there were a series of microscope stations.

And that was a real cushy job. And I actually got in there and you would, every half hour, you would do slides of the ketchup to check the insect and egg cell content from the tomatoes. And believe it or not, there is an allowable amount permitted in ketchup by federal standards.

And so, yeah, that was it. And in between, you just talk to each other. But I probably enjoyed working in the shop area more.

My great friend Ed Monahan, who was in our wedding, Neil Carroll, whose dad had Stanley Liquor, the older man, Pop, we called him, and Zeb Hall and Irving Karman, you know. And, you know, you were busy all the time, but you were talking and enjoying yourselves. Fred Weber, Weber's Candy Store, the oldest candy store in the United States.

In summers, he was a foreman for there. And he was such a great boss because you never wanted to let him down. The whole thing of loyalty and being treated well by the Ritter Organization.

And Fred, my friend until he died, a wonderful man and his wonderful wife, she was just at our home for lunch recently. Relationships, all of it, relationships. Roy Thompson, later on, when I was fortunate enough to become what's now a county commissioner, the Board of Health was under my purview.

And I went to Roy, we had an opening, and I said, Roy, you know so much. The food industry, everything, would you serve? He served for 20 years on the county board of health. Terrific guy.

Tom Metzger, his life, Audrey, had the dance studio. Meg, you're a little girl at Miss Audrey's dance studio. And it was painful for you, I know.

He was in the lab and then so many of my other friends. In fact, you know what they did? They gave me a surprise wedding shower before Jane and I got married in August of 68. And you had some pictures up on the Facebook page, PJ Ritter Company.

And there we are, paper hats, you know, and all the presents. And they even put an article in the newspaper about it. Loyalty, friendship, great relationships, they never stopped.

And I'm sure I would leave out names because I've read your history that you published in South Jersey Magazine from 98 through 98, 97 and 98. And you listed all the Ritter employees. Every one of them is a face and a memory for me.

And I love those people. They were just tremendous people. Years later, when a lot of them be retired, they'd be sitting on the bench in front of the high rise, just meeting in the mornings before breakfast, I'd pull in my car.

Hey, why don't you bums get a job somewhere? You've been like this your whole life. They loved it. Everybody laughed and all that.

So that was the lab. This was where labeling was done. Over here was production.

And, you know, when I got out of college, I was due to go to grad school. My wife and I were getting married. And I had an immense life goal change.

And I learned that there was an opening. My friends in quality control told me. So I said, I'd like to work for the company.

And I met with Mr. Funk. He was a tough guy. And John Maddock, the plant manager, talked, told me what they wanted.

George McCouch came in on it. And it was a great relationship. And I go like that with Mr. Funky, because they were all afraid of him, because he was a he was a fair, but very stern guy.

And started out as a young man in the electrical shop. He was Penn State graduate. He was a championship runner.

And I believe an Eagle Scout, as was your guy. No, your grandfather, Paul Ritter, was an Eagle Scout, because he was my host for the Eagle dinner with Dean Togwa and Hugh O'Neill, along with Belford Seabrook and Frank Hankins. And they drove us all down to the Anglesea Inn for the big dinner at the year we got our Eagle awards.

But Paul, Al Funky, took a great interest in my career when I was working here. And actually, any time he had to go to the airport with his wife to go up to Rochester, to the corporate office, when that happened, he would have me drive him. Just big thinking.

Because he wanted to talk about my career and give me advice. You know, probably one or two people in the organization, a little like, how come he gets to drive Mr. Funky, you know? What's he telling him? That was a great relationship. And he was very helpful.

And one thing he told me, learn the boilers, Bob, learn the boilers. Because he was a plant man. He did all the plant stuff, engineering, that type of thing.

So I reached a point where I was an assistant. I was a, not an assistant, I was a management trainee. And so I would rotate production here.

And then I would go up to the corner there for personnel for part of the year. And the good news for me was they both wanted me. So I figured, well, at least I'm doing okay.

And so Earl cut a deal that in the off season, I could be with him. And in the season, I'd be in production. And that worked out very well.

Maggie, you look like you have a question. So I have a question. And I just want to thank you, Dad.

I just want to go back in time a little bit. So Paul, it's my understanding that William Sr. purchased the convention center in Philadelphia, had it disassembled, brought down here and reassembled on this site. Is that right? And can you tell us about that? That's correct.

It was during World War I. And of course, there was a shortage of materials. So during that time, the company needed to expand. There was a lot of demand for their food products from the military.

So they were able to work a deal where Philadelphia was replacing their convention center. So they disassembled the old wooden one, shipped it down here, and then reassembled it here to use for a production space. So that worked out well for them.

And I guess worked out well for Philadelphia. Now, some of the things Bob mentioned really bring back some memories. When I was about seven or eight years old, I remember going into that lab.

And it was really a cool thing to look in the microscopes and see what we could find on those slides. Hopefully it looked pretty good at the time. Not too many, hopefully.

Also, I remember Earl McCormick was very instrumental in getting the POWs to work at Ritter's during World War II. During World War II, there was a labor shortage. Ritter's had nearly 100 of their employees serving in the military all over the world.

In the Far East and in the European theater, they needed employees. Several POW camps of German prisoners that were captured during the African War over in World War II, they were housed in Harvin State Park. So they worked here during the World War II as POWs.

There was armed guards, barbed wire around the plant, but there was never any problems because they felt themselves fortunate that they were in a safe place while war was raging around them. So it was a very interesting time. Ritter's shipped food stuff all over the world at that time.

We hope you've enjoyed part one in this walk through history. Please come back for part two and subscribe at bridgetonbeacon.com.