Edith Daley Pyle Cannery article
PYLE PLANT OF INTERESTING PIONEER ORIGIN
By Edith Daley
July 25, 1919 San Jose Evening News
In 1846 the westward trail of the Donner party was crossed and recrossed by a caravan from Missouri. Children from each pioneering cavalcade picked wildflowers together and looked with round-eyed wonder at the strange animals and terrifying red men. At Donner Lake the parties separated, the Missouri pioneers heading southward. In this party were a man and wife named Pyle. One of the wondering babies was their little son “J. F.”
Stopping for a time in Sacramento, the family came to the Santa Clara valley in 1855. Property purchased at that time is still the Pyle family home on the King road. In the years that followed the pioneer father and mother passed on. To J. F. Pyle and wife came two little sons Harry and Frank. Twenty-five years ago, when the Pyle boys were little fellows, they gathered flowers in the valley’s immense grain fields or watched the herds of cattle that dotted the valley from rim to rim.
There came a certain season when J. F. Pyle planted a considerable acreage of tomatoes. Though some inadvertence the crop was not purchased by the local cannery. This pioneer packing plant must have been the old Golden Gate, for it and E. E. Chase, who “grew up in the business”, have been here for forty years. Those tomatoes had to be canned. Pyle did it himself. That was the beginning of the industry now known in more than one continent as J. F. Pyle and Son. Harry and Frank, boys grown tall, sturdy men of pioneer parentage, competently guide the family’s business caravan.
Back of this firm is a solid foundation of farm experience. They are very practical orchardists. Among their properties are 130 acres of land in Pacheco Pass, highly improved and planted with prunes, peaches, and pears; 100 acres of apple orchard near Watsonville, and 130 acres in the Evergreen district on the bank of Coyote creek. On the latter tract pole beans and tomatoes are raised and there is considerable acreage in apricots. There is also the home place at Berryessa.
Not to every employe does the story of the firm’s business success make an appeal, but Miss Gertrude Carter, whose cleverness and dependable efficiency are attested by eight years of continuous service, sits in the neatest office in San Jose, and tells you with glowing eyes this story of pioneering and accomplishment. She knows the story, too, and doesn’t have to “look it up.” She is conversant with it all from the chapter when that caravan would across the plains to the amount of yesterday’s pack-which amounted to about 1800 cases of apricots.
The average number employed approximates 300, two-thirds of them women. Beans, tomatoes, and all fruits are packed. Last year’s output of string beans, sold for local consumption, was 50,000 cases. That means more than 500 tons of string beans! Last season’s fruit pack equalled that of beans, about 50,000 cases, but this year it will go beyond that figure. The 1918 tomato pack reached 100,000 cases.
Miss Carter finds this a unique season for the reason that the fruit is running almost too largely to high grade stuff. The pack is practically all sold before it is canned, and this year the difficulty is getting enough of the lower grade fruit to fill orders.
Last year, J. F. Pyle and Son made an interesting experiment. Many of the apples, Pippins and Bellfleurs, at the Watsonville ranch were solid but very small. These “little apples” were brought to the cannery and turned into delicious cider. The experiment was highly successful, as those who purchased some of the “experiment” are still asking for more. The firm does practically all its own hauling and a conveyor that counts automatically brings in tin cans from the American Can Company just across the street. Four tractors take care of the farm problem. All pumping plants, boilers, and factory machinery are strictly up-to-date.
Room is this company’s handicap, but not a serious one. They have learned economy of space and simply built up instead of our. A purchase of the Fig-Prune property near the plant has given them room for a modern brick warehouse. Being centralized, the employment problem is solved. At the canning factory yesterday there were women workers who helped with the cutting and canning 25 years ago. The same people return year after year. This enterprising company rejoices in the improvement that has come about in the valley’s fruit industry, not only in equipment but in better sanitation and everything giving more comfort and convenience to the workers. Inspectors are welcome visitors here, whether they represent the government, the board of health or the industrial welfare commission, whose representatives are apt to “just drop in any time.” This pioneer plant is progressive. Its whirring machinery that hums to the insisting obligato of its neighbor, the American Can Company, sings very popular songs called “Success”.