Lost Tables: Speck Confectionery

Speck Confectionery

THE SUBSCRIBER, Offers for sale, at private sale, his LOTS, lately laid out on the hill, west of the town of St. Louis. A plat of the same may be seen at the printing office.
For terms or other particulars, apply to Auguste Chouteau.
Missouri Gazette, June 15, 1816

Early on, the village of St. Louis extended no farther west up from the Mississippi than Fourth Street. The top of the hill was a burial ground reserved for Indians and others not granted access to the churchyard.

Auguste Chouteau, one of the city's founders, acquired title to the property in this area and donated a parcel of land to be "used forever as the site on which the courthouse of the County of St. Louis should be erected." In 1815, he gave notice he would not "suffer his land, adjoining the courthouse, in the town of St. Louis, to be used as a place of burial." He laid out "lots" on the property and sold the town's first real estate subdivision.

On June 18, 1816, the western half of the city block bounded by Market on the north, Fifth Street (now Broadway) on the west and Walnut on the South was purchased by Joseph Charless, founder of the Missouri Gazette, the first newspaper west of the Mississippi. Charless built his residence, a two story brick building, at the northwest corner of the lot, with a large garden extending to Walnut.

In 1822, the eastern half of Charless' lot was sold to his daughter, Ann. Upon Ann's death in 1832, the property was acquired by her daughter, Elizabeth. On June 10, 1848, Elizabeth and her husband, Taylor Blow, built a four-story building on the site, fronting Market, across the street from the courthouse.

Taylor Blow died in 1869. The building he had constructed on Market Street was sold by his estate on the courthouse steps in 1875. The high bidder was Henry Shaw.

Shaw was a buyer of real estate, never a seller. He held onto the property and subsequently willed it to the Missouri Botanical Gardens, which he founded.


Joseph Charless	Elizabeth & Taylor Blow	Henry Shaw

Taylor Blow's building at 414-416-418 Market Street soon had neighbors. Wyman's Hall was built immediately to its east in 1848. The six-story Granite Building was constructed in 1874 on the corner of Market and Fourth. And the German Bank was constructed to the west in the late 1860s on the corner of Market and Broadway, at the site of the Joseph Charless residence.


Granite Building, Market & Fourth, 1925 (click image to enlarge)	German Bank, Market & Broadway, 1870 (click image to enlarge)

The first tenant in Taylor Blow's building was the Rutherford & Day dry goods store, occupying two large ground floor rooms at 416-418 Market. In 1855, Nicholson's Family Grocery Store moved into the same space, followed by Crow & Farrel Dry Goods. The Lowenstein Hotel, Mielke's Hotel and Grace Hotel occupied the upper floors in succession.

Sanborn Map Company, December 1908
(click image to enlarge)

The occupant of the ground floor space at 414 Market from 1848 to 1865 is detailed by William C. Eager in an October 10, 1932 article he wrote for the Minneapolis Tribune called "The Old Coffee House."

The coffee house, while an institution in London that, in its time, served the purpose of a club and headquarters for the discussion of political and social questions, and was the forerunner of English clubs, never flourished to the same degree in America. There were, of course, coffee houses in New York, Boston, Philadelphia, Baltimore and other seaboard cities during colonial times and afterwards, and some of them became celebrated, but, in the cities of the west, the coffee house did not flourish, its place being taken by inns and taverns.
Whenever there were French or German elements in the population, however, coffee houses found support before the coming of the beer-saloon in which noonday meals were often served. As early as 1818, a visitor to St. Louis mentioned its "odd little coffee houses, with their homely billiard tables, cozy balconies and settees."
These were designed not only for refreshment purposes but to afford comfortable and convenient loafing places for their patrons, where they could exchange gossip and discuss the news of the day. The times were leisurely; business and professional men were accustomed to linger over their luncheons and to play a game or two of dominoes or backgammon while they drank their black coffee.

Eager describes a St. Louis coffee house established in 1848 by Jean Philippe Manck and Peter Gisler on Market Street, opposite the Old Courthouse.

Manck had been a confectioner in Paris and seen military service under Napoleon Bonaparte. Later he became Burgomaster of a Bavarian town and a threatened revolution caused him to emigrate to St. Louis. Gisler was an early emigrant from Germany, who married Manck's daughter. Besides being a confectioner, he was a musician, playing the clarinet in a German musical society.

Manck and Gisler's coffee house was a favorite of St. Louis' leading citizens. Among its regular patrons were Colonel George Knapp and his brother, John, then owners of the Missouri Republican, General John C. Fremont, General Frank P. Blair and representatives of the Chouteau, Benoist and other old French families.

Gisler's son, August, became associated with the business as soon as he was old enough. Father and son manufactured the first chocolate cream cakes and introduced a machine for making lemon drops. They also put into operation the first soda fountain. The drink they dispensed from it was called New Orleans mead and was made from a recipe brought from France.

* * * * *

Paul Adam was the confectioner at 414 Market following Manck and Gisler. He was listed at that location in the St. Louis City Directory as early as 1872.

And by 1889, Jacob Speck took over the space.

Kunkel's Musical Review, June 1889

Jacob Speck came to St. Louis from German in 1853 at the age of 12 with his brother and two sisters. He enlisted in the 4th cavalry during the Civil War, serving as a Union soldier throughout the conflict.

By 1871, Speck worked as a confectioner at Leonhard's Confectionery at 320 Market. Conrad A. Leonhard founded his confectionery in 1844. Early on, it was more a coffee house, serving nothing but coffee and coffee cake. Leonhard did the baking and his wife made the coffee.

In 1889, when Jacob Speck opened his own confectionery one block west at 414 Market, it was much like Leonard's, serving coffee and coffee cake. Both confectioneries gained city-wide reputations. Ironically, both owners died within months of each other, Speck at age 60 on December 14, 1901 and Leonhard at age 73 on March 27, 1902.

* * * * *

Hugo G. Goerner was born on July 27, 1858, in Springfield, Illinois and came to St. Louis with his parents before the outbreak of the Civil War. After working almost 25 years in the wallpaper business, he decided to become a restaurateur.

In 1903, Goerner and his brother-in-law, C. Louis Hammerstein, purchased the Speck Confectionery at 414 Market from Jacob Speck's widow. A short time later, they bought Leonhard's Confectionary at 320 Market from Conrad Leonhard's estate.

Goerner's eldest son Frank became a partner in the business when Hammerstein died in 1912. Eventually, all five of Goerner's sons were in the business.

The Goerners took care to preserve the atmosphere at both Speck's and Leonhard's. The curiously carved and curved old tables at which the patrons sipped coffee and the ancient gilded full-length mirrors which cast back their reflections were retained.

Interior of Leonhard's Confectionery
Simmons' Spice Mill, 1919

Business and professional men lunched regularly at both places. Until the Circuit Court moved from the Old Courthouse across the street in 1930, judges, lawyers and litigants were regular customers. Dominoes had been a popular pastime, but the gaming gradually died out, even in the upstairs smoking rooms.

The Goerners had a policy of retaining old employees and employing "home girls" as waitresses.

Girls are not employed as waitresses unless they live at home and can satisfy the Goerners by their statements and appearance that they have learned the trade of serving from their own mothers; and the result has been that the girls have been respected by the customers and treated much the same as the women of one’s household are treated when they choose to serve at the family meal.
Simmons' Spice Mill, 1919

Leonhard's original building at 320 Market street was razed in 1919 to make way for a fur warehouse and the Goerners moved the restaurant to 117 North Eighth. In August of 1930, the Goerners opened a second Speck's location at 1116 Locust.

Speck's and Leonhard's clung to their "confectionery" class, although both were celebrated as restaurants. Their city-wide fame was derived from their coffee, which was served in heavy white china cups on antique tables of marble or hard woods.

In the early days, the coffee was purchased green and roasted the day before it was served. Later, it was purchased roasted, the blend a secret of the Goerners and their trusted employees.

From it they get the flavor which is the envy and the despair of other restaurants. They are jealous of that flavor and watch it constantly, as one’s chief asset may well be watched, and no sooner does it get a little "off" than a hurry call is sent for an expert to come over and discover what ails it and take prompt measures to tone it up to the required nicety of flavor.
Simmons' Spice Mill, 1919

No liquor of any kind was served and there was no demand for it due to the quality of the coffee.


Speck Confectionery Menu, 1930s (click image to enlarge)

Speck Confectionery, 414 Market Street, 1935
(click image to enlarge)

William Eager's 1932 Minneapolis Tribune article recounted Speck Confectionary in the early 1930s.

From its founder, the old coffee house has descended, without a break in its operations, to its present ownership, passing through the hands of several who, in their time, were famous caterers. For 84 years it has assimilated the interesting traditions of its neighborhood, and has been a part of the city's life and history. It has been doing business in one location longer than any other enterprise in St. Louis, and has preserved its distinctive individuality through the years.
Although it is now termed a restaurant, it has preserved the attributes of the old coffee house, in its associations and in the character of its habitual frequenters. The business and professional center of the city has moved to a remote district, and its once flourishing neighbors, the theaters and hotels of more than local fame, are no longer there, but its patrons have not deserted it, counting, as well repaying the time and effort necessary to reach it, the quality of its refreshment and the pleasure of old habit and association.
The traditional coffee house characteristic of coteries, meeting daily at certain tables, still obtains here. The waiters are familiar with the gastronomical tastes of their individual customers, so that the detail of giving an order from the bill of fare is hardly necessary. Here are dally meetings, as of yore, and here, as in 1848, over the fragrant coffee, important business deals are consummated.

In 1945, the German Bank building on the corner of Market and Broadway was torn down to make way for a parking lot. Revealed on the uncovered brick wall was the Crow & Farrel Dry Goods sign, an early occupant of the of the Taylor Blow building, with Speck Confectionary still a tenant on the ground floor.

Taylor Blow Building, 414-418 Market Street, circa 1950
(click image to enlarge)

The Speck's menu included a popular potato salad, sold for 20 cents a side portion. For years cooks throughout the area came up with their own versions of the Speck's specialty, but something was always lacking. Finally, the recipe appeared in a January 2, 1949 St. Louis Globe-Democrat article. According to the article, "it took Thelma R. Leson, home economist for an advertising agency, to spy out its secret."

Speck's Potato Salad

In June of 1951, the Speck Confectionary at 1116 Locust was closed when its lease expired.

In November of 1953, a fire swept through the Speck Confectionery at 414 Market, causing extensive damage. The restaurant did not reopen. The Goerners moved operations to their Leonhard's location at 117 North Eighth, changing the name to Speck. The historic Taylor Blow building at 414-416-418 Market was razed in June of 1954, the site used as a parking lot for Boatman's Bank.

In early 1957, liabilities of over $67,000 threatened to close the remaining Speck location. A group of 29 St. Louisans, including Morton J. May, Sidney Schoenberg, Tom K. Smith, Senator Michael Kinney, Arthur Baer Sr. and Aloys P. Kaufmann put money into a reorganized company in an attempt to revive the historic restaurant. But continued losses and the need to replace outmoded equipment resulted in Speck Confectionery closing its doors on January 13, 1958.