Monday, August 19, 1996

Collin Street Bakery a Corsicana fixture

By JOHN FLORES
Corsicana Daily Sun

CORSICANA - Franklin D. Roosevelt was campaigning for his first term as president when 17-year-old H. Maurice Pollack hired on at the Collin Street Bakery 64 years ago.

He started as a "roustabout" with duties such as hand-wrapping the bakery's chief annual product - bread. Today, he's the company's vice-president and treasurer, overseeing a $33 million annual account.

Pollack, reclining at his desk in a modest office on the bakery's second floor, exudes the easy smile of a life well spent.

"I don't know when I'm gonna retire," he says. "They're kinda slow about pushing people out the door."

Pollack, 81, said he applied for a job at the bakery for financial reasons. It's a legacy started by his father, Harry Pollack, who worked for 50 years at the bakery.

"I needed some money, and kinda liked the work, and hung on," he says.

The Collin Street Bakery started 100 years ago. It was also the year the Original DeLuxe Fruitcake was created by the bakery's founders: a German baker, Gus Weidmann, and master salesman Tom McElwee.

The bakery was bought by Lee McNutt, Bob Rutherford and Harry Montgomery, in 1946. That's when the fruitcake's afterburners were kicked in, and along, steady ascent into the sales stratosphere.
Pollock's wall has been a picture of a fruitcake suspended amid the stars, a succinct statement of his 64-year philosophy. An oscillating fan is positioned near the door, giving the office a tone of informality. Pollock's first office typewriter, an old Royal, sits on top file cabinets that house the company's financial records.

William McNutt, 71, started in the family business in 1959 after graduating from college and working for Dr Pepper for a short time.

"I've known Maurice since 1946 ... I've never known a more honest, reliable, friendly, capable, happy person than Maurice," he says. "His father, Harry, died while on active duty here (after 50 years at the bakery) in 1952. Collin Street Bakery has gotten a lot of mileage out of the Pollacks."

Pollack says he can't seem to retire. He's still proud to be part of a "dream team" that is the Dallas Cowboys of the fruitcake industry. With worldwide sales to 195 countries, and an annual growth of between five and 10 percent, Collin Street Bakery is arguably the world champion fruitcake maker.

In 1979 the bakery's cake accounted for 3.8 percent of all surface packages sent overseas, and it's grown in sales every year except one - during the recession of the 1980s.

"Thank you" letters and autographed photos of celebrities such as Frank Sinatra, Ernest Borgnine, and Vanna White are framed in a glass case on a wall at the stairway leading to the executive suites.
Fairly recent stories by the Los Angeles Times, and The New York Times profiling the Deluxe Fruitcake are framed on a wall in the hallway.

"The best thing about our fruitcake is, you can go most anyplace and someone knows about the Deluxe Fruitcake," he says, as the fan turns to his wife, Aleene, whose desk is on the other side of the room. She started with the company as a pineapple cutter in 1966. The two were married five years ago.

Pollock remains philosophical about his odyssey with Collin Street Bakery.

"I still want to put my two cents into making it a good fruitcake," he says. "We still use the same recipe. Nowadays we use computers, and everything is darn near perfect. Each cake is hand-decorated, like it always was. And the taste has not changed, except it might have gotten a little better with all the new equipment."

McNutt's only critique of Pollock is also a self-indictment.

"The only thing I've noticed about Maurice is that he doesn't come up the stairs quite as fast as he used to," he says, between casual drags on his cigarette. "But then, neither do I."