Ovson Egg
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[edit] Introduction
Before there was a frozen egg business, breaking and freezing of eggs began in cold storage warehouses in the 1890’s in Minneapolis, Minnesota. George Dole, who owned one of the first cold storages assisted a school teacher, H.J. Keith in starting the first egg breaking business in the United States. In 1898, H.J. Keith made a deal with H.A. Perry in Salina, Kansas to increase volume of the H.J. Keith Company.
Morris Ovson immigrated to the United States in 1904. He was born July 21, 1884 and became a United States citizen on September 27, 1909. Morris Ovson, started work as an egg candler for the H. J. Keith Company. Morris learned English quickly at night school at the Civic Service House in Boston. Morris eventually became director of the Civic Service House. Morris Ovson’s job was to inspect the processing operations for H. J. Keith and open new operations for the company. He was sent to Europe to learn their methods of packing dried eggs. In 1917, Morris went to Shanghai, China to open the Amos Bird Company, packers of Chinese dried and frozen eggs.
On October 24-25, 1912, H. J. Keith sued the United States in a trial heard by the United States Supreme Court called “Four hundred and forty three cans of frozen egg products v.s. the United States”. The United States filed libel alleging that 443 cans of frozen egg with Merchant’s Refrigerating Company at Jersey City, NJ were filthy, decomposed, and putrid animal and requested condemnations. The district judge dismissed the libel. However the United States appealed and the circuit court of appeals reversed the ruling. H. J. Keith appealed that ruling to the United States Supreme Court and the Supreme Court declared that the court of appeals didn’t have proper jurisdiction in the case. The future of the frozen egg industry was dependent on this Supreme Court case.
He did not like the idea of taking his family to China. He married Ida Karelitz in New York City on January 15, 1910 who came to the United States on October 10, 1905. Their three kids were Leo D, Eugene P, and Henry S. Thus, he came back to the United States in 1919. In the United States, Morris formed a partnership with his boss H. J. Keith himself and formed the Ovson-Keith Egg Company. When C. J. Bowman and W.F. Priebe became associates of the firm, the company was known as the Bowman-Priebe-Ovson Company. H. J. Keith passed away in 1923 at age 66. In 1928, the H. J. Keith Company was sold to Armour and Company meatpacking for $2.5 million. Also part of the deal was H. J. Keith's large interest in Amos Bird Company of Shanghai that he help start. Then in 1929, Bowman-Priebe-Ovson was reorganized and became the Ovson Egg Company and was associated with the National Dairy Products Corporation in New York. Leo D, and Eugene P were both graduates of the University of Chicago and both joined their father, Morris, in the frozen egg business. Henry S. went to Northwestern University and went into the shoe business in Birmingham, Alabama.
One of Morris’s inventions was Mocoyolk (1,429,559) in 1922 which is 95% yolk and 5% glycerine, which helps preserve the consistency of the egg and keeps the baked products moist.
[edit] The 1930's
In December, 1933, Leo Ovson, wrote an article in “Food Industries” about the frozen egg business. The industry started as a Chinese business but shifted to the United States as economic conditions improved due to war and tariffs changes. The frozen egg industry was mostly in Iowa, Illinois, Nebraska, Missouri, and California. Egg breaking season runs from March through September. The frozen egg industry grew due to changing modes of living such as salad preparations.
Frozen eggs have modern egg-breaking plants, which have a room for chilling eggs, a chilled candling room, a refrigerated breaking room, a room for sterilizing apparatus, and churns to break yolks and mix with whites. The eggs are chilled for 12-24 hours at 31 degrees Fahrenheit to stiffen the whites. Then in the candling room, the eggs are graded according to freshness, size, color, cleanliness, and soundness. They are graded using an electric light with a dark background. The good eggs from the candling room are then taking to the breaking room. A good egg consists of a whole yolk, a clear white, and a normal odor. It is possible that an egg classified as good has a bad odor and is then removed.
After that, the eggs are churned where yolks are strained and slightly beaten and the whites are also strained to remove shell, meat, or feed spots. Then the yolks and whites are placed into shipping cans of about 30 pounds and go to the sharp freeze room for 72 hours at 12-15 degrees Fahrenheit. Then they are put into a second freezer at 0-5 degrees Fahrenheit to prevent pressure on the cans. The cans are then thawed using cold running water when the egg products are purchased.
Some of the major products that use frozen eggs include Biscuits, cookies, cake baking, candles, custards, doughnuts, egg noodles, beverages, ice cream, icings leather tanning, macaroni, mayonnaise, flours, pie, salad dressing, puddings.
The advantages of frozen eggs include frozen eggs have greater leavening power to products made, they save time and labor by just thawing out the frozen eggs needed for daily requirements, the egg breaker can provide the customer with the exact type of egg product needed by separating the white from the yolk. Egg breakers only operate when egg supply is greatest to buy materials at lowest prices. Frozen eggs save space.
Whites and yolks are separated during the breaking process because certain industries require only yolks and other industries requiring only whites.
By 1937, the two largest frozen egg companies were Standard Brand Eggs and Ovson Egg Company. Ovson Egg had seven plants located in Chicago Illinois, St. Louis Missouri, Dallas Texas, Davenport Iowa, Moberly Missouri, Great Bend Kansas, and Parsons Kansas.
Leo and Morris Ovson opened their newest plant in Neosho, Missouri in 1948 at the corner of North Wood Street and East Coler Street in downtown. The plant was built by Robert Haas, owner of Haas Cold Storage. Haas leased space to Ovson Egg, and Haas Cold Storage handled the processed eggs.
[edit] Indictment against owners
In 1952, The Ovson Egg Company was transferred to Kraft Foods of Chicago, Illinois (now Glenview, Illinois) as a subsidiary company of Kraft but the Ovson offices remained on Grand Avenue in Chicago. Unfortunately, shortly after the transfer to Kraft, Morris and Leo Ovson were indicted for giving false testimony in a labor racketeering investigation on June 14, 1955. They were indicted for lying about giving money to union labor leaders, Joseph Glimco, leader of local 777 AFL Taxicab Drivers Union and also a leader in the Fulton Street Egg Market, and Max Podolsky, organizer for the AFL Egg inspectors Union. An accountant for Ovson Egg, William Holloway, was also indicted. There were three indictments against Morris, and one against Leo, where each one has a penalty of five years. Leo and Morris did not have to serve jail time for their indictment. Morris made a plea bargain with the district attorney to drop two charges against him and the one charge against Leo in exchange for pleading guilty to the one last charge against Morris. The district attorney agreed and Morris pleaded guilty to one count of racketeering with the other two charges dropped against him as well as the only charge dropped against Leo. Both paid the $1,500.00 bond.
Morris could have been sentenced to five years in jail for the charge against him. However, due to his age, poor health, and he has been retired from the business since 1952, he was sentenced to one year of court supervision.
[edit] Other Indictments
The trials of Glimco and Podolsky were set for later in November, 1955 but were then postponed. Joseph Glimco was quite a character. He was an official with the Teamsters local 777 and was making about $70,000 per month in extortion payoffs as a labor racketeer. He was a business representative of the Chicago Poultry Handlers Union local 650 from June 1937 – January 1939. Glimco spent $124,000 of local 777 money defending himself in an extortion indictment and used over $10,000 for a country club, neither expense had anything to do with local 777 but it was paid for with local 777 funds. Judge Dickinson ordered Teamsters president Jim Hoffa to remove Joseph Glimco in 1959 but Jim Hoffa would not comply. However, less than two years later, local 777 had a secret election supervised by the National Labor Relations Board. Dominio Abata was running against Glimco for president. Abata himself had to kick back 50% of his weekly salary to Glimco. The vote was in favor of Abata 2,122 to 1,760. Because Mr. Abata’s life was in danger, the Chicago police started guarding him since 1958.
Joseph Glimco was also a suspect in an investigation for an August 18, 1954 murder of Charles Gioe, another Chicago gangster. About three months prior to the murder, Howard Johnson’s on North Harlem Avenue was bombed and Joseph Glimco was believe to be responsible due to disputes over labor and suppliers. Glimco was never charged with his murder and the murder remains unsolved today.
[edit] References
Who's Who in Chicago and Illinois, Page 681 (Ovson, Morris), John William Leonard, AN Marquis and Company, 1945.
Mergers, Time Magazine, August 13, 1928.
Frozen Eggs, Time Magazine, April 12, 1937, Page 81-82.
Leo D. Ovson, Converving the "Goodness" of Eggs by Sharp Freezing, Food Industries, December, 1933, Page 502-508.
Leo D. Ovson, Converting the Breaking of Eggs to a Science, Nation's Business, September, 1937, Page 70-71.
Chicago Daily Tribune, June 21, 1955, Indict Three for Perjury in Glimco Probe, Page One, Section 1.
Chicago Daily Tribune, June 22, 1955, Predicts More Action against U.S. Witnesses, Page 25, Section 1.
Chicago Daily Tribune, June 25, 1955, Trial of Glimco and Podolsky set for November 7, Page 11, Section 1.
Labor, This is a Trend, Time Magazine, July 28, 1961, Page 16.
Labor, Pal Joey, Time Magazine, September 7, 1959, Page 13.
http://www.americanmafia.com/Allan_May_7-3-00.html
Joplin (Missouri) Globe, May 8, 1948, Page 8.
Joplin (Missouri) Globe, August 9, 1947, Page 8.
The Egg Products Industry of the United States 1900-1959, Joe Woudele and Edwin Heinsohn, Department of Agricultural Economics, Kansas Agricultural Experiment Station, Manhattan,
United States Supreme Court, 443 Cans of Frozen Egg Product v.s. the United States, 226 U.S. 172 (1912), October 24-25, 1912.
US 12th District Court Archives, case 55.340 and 55.341.
