Edina Historical Society

Here it is.... (drum roll please)...the famous Ray's Dairy Store.

If you didn't grow up in the neighborhood, you might not have even heard the name much less have ventured inside. But any kid within walking distance of the store (3907 W. 54th Street) knew Ray's was the place to go for candy. I had heard about the store from several people as we prepared our "Growing Up in Edina" exhibit, now on display.

Jeff Thompson wrote: "I grew up in the sixties near 60th and France Avenue and our "corner store" was Ray's Dairy Store on 54th Street just west of France. It was operated by Ray (Carlstedt) and his wife Dorothy. I remember Ray always seemed fond of us kids but his wife did not seem very happy whenever we came in. Ray was a small man but his wife was a rather large woman who with one look told us we had better behave while in the store. They lived in an apartment above the store. The building still stands today as a craft or needle point shop."

Sherry Ott also fondly remembered biking to the store. "Ray's Dairy Store on 54th and France had the best selection of penny candy in town. If you were lucky, you might hear the sounds of Ray's daughter, Susanne, playing piano upstairs." Bob Herman also included Ray's among his happy childhood memories.

Children's author and illustrator Nancy Carlson turned her childhood memory of shoplifting a candy bar from Ray's into a picture book, Arnie and the Stolen Markers. Although Arnie steals markers instead of candy, Nancy said her drawings of the store with its myriad choices of penny candy are true to what she remembers of Ray's.

The book is out of print, but is part of a display on Nancy Carlson as part of the "Growing Up in Edina" exhibit.

For more on Nancy's childhood in Edina, see previous blog post here or check out her web site.

Of course, Ray's sold more than just candy. Parents also picked up necessities at the little market between trips to the larger grocery stores in town.

What businesses would you like to see featured on Photo Friday? Supply an address, if possible, to make look-up easier. We don't have photos of every business, but if we do, I'll post the photo on a future Friday. Make your wishes known by commenting here or emailing me.

Dr. Walter Bonnett opened Edina Pet Hospital in 1958 at 5237 Eden Avenue. In this August 1959 tax assessor photo, it looks like landscaping is still on the "To Do" list, judging from the pile of dirt off to the left side.

But maybe not. This was a different Edina, after all, with this end of Eden Avenue being home to industrial buildings like Danen's excavating, Wanner Engineering, Roto Press and a taxi company instead of retail shops, condominiums, library and senior center. Look at those wide open spaces around the clinic -- quite different from the address today.

In 2001, the City of Edina acquired the land by eminent domain for redevelopment, and the Edina Public Library and the Edina Senior Center were built there.

At that time, Edina Pet Hospital was owned by Dr. Dan Shebuski, who had worked with Bonnett at both his Edina and Southdale practices. Edina Pet Hospital, now in its 53rd year. still endures in Edina  at 7701 Cahill Road.

Dr. Bonnett died in 2010. His obituary (published in the June 27, 2010 Minneapolis Star Tribune) noted that he founded the Edina, Southdale, Eden Prairie, and Eagan Pet Hospitals.

Magnolia boys, Cedric and Walter
As a side note, Bonnett was born in Magnolia, MN, the same small town as another Edina resident, Cedric Adams, popular radio host and owner of Cedric's restaurant in the same Grandview area. With Magnolia's population at 261, it can't be a coincidence that Bonnett and Adams both moved to Edina and set up businesses within blocks of each other. They weren't classmates, though, by any means; Cedric was born in 1902, while Dr. Bonnett was born in 1921. Hmmm.... a mystery to be solved on another day. Does anyone know more? If you remember Dr. Bonnett and the early days of Edina Pet Hospital, please comment here or email me.

Happy Friday, everyone!

Note: Because I've posted only twice this week, I will publish a bonus Photo Friday later this afternoon.

What do you call this building, located at 5701 Normandale Road?

a. Edina-Morningside Junior and Senior High School, as it was called when it opened in 1949?
b. Edina High School, as it was called after the villages of Morningside and Edina merged in 1966?
c. Edina East, as it was called after Edina West (below) was built in 1972?
d. Edina Community Center, as it is now?

Careful, your answer will no doubt reveal your age -- or at least your longevity in Edina. People often tell me to go to the high school, when they mean the Community Center. Believe me, I was confused the first few months on the job here.

A recent Photo Friday featured the Ernie Davis farm, site of the new Edina West High School below. (Excuse me, that's now just "Edina High School." I guess I'm revealing my age a little.) So this week I thought I'd give you a closer look at the high schools, both old and new.

I should have noted in the original post that Edina West was the second school building constructed on the Davis farm.  Valley View Middle School (square lighter building at left) was built in 1964. West was built in 1972. (See current map of buildings here.)

Happy Friday, everyone!

Reminder:
Free tours of Edina's historic buildings: St. Stephen's Episcopal Church, Minnehaha Grange and Cahill School on Tuesday, May 8. For more information, see our home page. Hope to see you there!

This article first appeared in the Spring 2005 issue of the Edina Historical Society newsletter. I thought of it again after my seven-year search for the Santrizos of the Convention Grill came to fruition. Here's the back story on how this journey began.

I’m no Indiana Jones. I don’t travel the world, swing over pits of poisonous snakes, and machete my way through a jungle to find ancient artifacts. But nonetheless, I am a treasure hunter.

Sure, many times people just walk in our door and give us great things. But sometimes, we have to hunt down things we want. Okay, so I’m never in any danger… I just search the Internet or the Edina directory, pick up the phone and simply ask (or sometimes gently nag) to get treasures for our collection.

To get items for our (2005) Morningside exhibit, we sent out flyers to the Morningside neighborhood, made personal pleas at Edina-Morningside Women’s Club meetings sent emails, and called dozens of people.

In response, we got several photos, Boy Scout and Edina-Morningside Church items (on loan), a Morningside phone book, papers from the re-annexation vote, and Constable George Weber’s handgun. (That's George with the gun in the photo at left. Yes, I know the quality of the photo is horrible. I scanned it from an creased newspaper clipping, undated and unnamed, but I'm guessing the source is the Minneapolis Tribune.)

While it seems un-Minnesotan to be so forthright, I also ask exhibit visitors to add to our collection.

As a result, Susan Linhoff Peck  (whose parents started Linhoff Photo in Morningside) brought in a 1914 Morningside color map she found at a St. Cloud auction, and Betty Helmerichs O’Neil donated her 1939 Morningside Girl Scout uniform. Wendy Anderson sent us the mayoral badge and a photo of her grandfather Oscar Seidemann, former mayor of Morningside who “never left the house without his hat.”

We knew we wanted more information and photos about the Morningside businesses, so we tried to find the original owners. Finding women is especially difficult because their names change with marriage; some names like Carlson are just too common to be useful.

EHS volunteer Martha Johnson went to school with Marilyn Carlson, whose mother ran Carlson’s Odd Shop on Sunnyside and France Avenue. After some digging Martha found her, back in Edina after living in other states for several years. Marilyn was happy to share her photos with us.

I also wanted childhood photos of Curt Carlson, (not related to the Carlsons of Carlson’s Odd Shop) one of Minnesota’s wealthiest men who started his business career as a Morningside paper boy. I called Carlson Companies and was promised a call back. When I didn’t hear anything, Martha contacted the Carlson family, her former neighbors in the Country Club neighborhood. We got a photo of Curt and neighborhood friends at one of his birthday parties (see below), as well as his parent’s wedding photo.

Carlson’s parents ran a Morningside grocery store that they later sold to Lars Belleson. (Belleson's grocery is now the new co-op, but you might know the name from the 50th and France men's clothing store founded by son Wes Belleson.)

And yes, sometimes great stuff just walks in the door. One man asked why we didn’t have any photos of Joyce’s Bakery. When I said we were looking for the former owners, he said, “Well, that’s me.” Stan Rice bought the bakery from the Joyce family in the 1950s, and kept the name because of its fame in South Minneapolis and Edina. He turned out the same great breads and little cherry pies as his predecessor. He’s going to sort through his business stuff and return with items for our collection.

Flash forward to today:  I spoke (wrote) too soon regarding Joyce's Bakery. Stan did not return with photos and it should come to no surprise to you after reading this post that I didn't leave it at that. I called him and found he had been having health issues. Understandably, looking through old business files didn't fall at the top of his list but he planned to get to it when he felt better. After some time, I called his number again and found it disconnected.  I've called a few Rice families since then, all very nice, but not related to the Joyce's Bakery owner. The search continues.....

You might notice that the 2005 story didn't mention the Santrizos or the Convention Grill. At that point, we had some photos of the Convention in our collection  so I wasn't looking for more necessarily. It wasn't until people talked so warmly about the former owners that I started my search for the photos of Pete and Christine Santrizos that were published on the blog yesterday - seven years after my quest began.

You can help!
Join us in our treasure hunt. See our wish list below, or look through your own boxes of memorabilia for anything that tells Edina’s story. These are just a few of my many wants for the museum:

• Edina neighborhood history. I would love to document every neighborhood in Edina as well as we have the Morningside neighborhood.
  
• Morningside phone directories. We have a complete Edina phone directory collection, but we have only a couple from Morningside when it was a separate village from 1920 to 1966.
  
• Photos by Edina professional photographers, including Don Berg, Dick Palen, Powell Krueger, and Dwight Miller. We would especially like any taken of Edina news events.
• Southdale businesses over the years. And we'd love to know where the original bird cage went.  (See lower left in the 1963 postcard below.)
• Other Edina businesses, whether they are retail shops at 50th and France, restaurants, or industry like the southwest area gravel pits and the dump.
• Edina's history-making teams, such as the first girls' sports teams or our many state champions. I'd like to have all the state tournament programs, team photos, action photos, jerseys, etc.

For more information on donating, please email me or call me at the museum at 612-928-4577.

Many of you remember Pete Santrizos, as he is pictured in the Edina Sun photo (dated Nov. 6, 1973) below. Pete held court behind the counter of the Sunnyside and France business and knew every customer, even if they had visited only once before. "His memory is terrific," reporter Debbie Pint wrote. "When someone walks in, he can usually recall their name, who they married, what they're doing."

The photo was taken after Pete had run the business for 32 years, taking over the struggling new restaurant on Nov. 1, 1941. At that point, he had no plans of closing, but his customers urged the local newspaper to write about the grandfatherly man who dispensed wisdom behind the counter as well as juicy hamburgers.

See the menu boards on the wall behind Pete? Here's one for those famous burgers ("hamburger steak") saved by the family:

Pete pointed out that in all the years that he ran the Convention, the only thing that changed were the prices. Even now, while the ownership has changed, the Convention's decor has changed little from when Pete bought the Convention in 1941 with a $200 loan from a relative.

Here Pete is pictured about the same time he bought the Morningside restaurant.

Pete came a long way from a lonely 15-year-old boy immigrating to the United States without his family in 1911. He started in the restaurant business washing dishes and sent money back home to his parents in Greece.

His wife Christine (below) was his life partner as well as his business partner, who worked in the kitchen creating nine homemade soups and was famous for her "Christine salad."  They lived in southwest Minneapolis, just seven blocks away from the Convention. Pete walked to work every day before 8 a.m. and returned home after 10 p.m. The Convention wasn't just their home away from home; it was home, where they spent nearly all of their waking hours with their three boys: Nicholas, Harry and Mario.

A 1942 photograph (below) in the family photo album shows the boys standing on Sunnyside Road with the Convention in the back ground. (You can also see the partial sign for the Westgate Dairy Store, which shared space in the building with the Convention. The dairy store, which was better known as simply Dennison's, later moved to the small building west of the parking lot. But that's another story for another day.)

"We never felt like we were working for our customers... they were our friends," Christine told Edina Sun reporter Jane Sims Podesta when the Santrizos retired in August 1976 after 35 years in the business.

Aren't these the greatest photos? I especially love the last one, with the distinct exterior of the Convention in the background. I have searched for photos of the much beloved Pete and Christine Santrizos ever since we created an exhibit about the Morningside neighborhood in 2005. Finally, seven years later, I have connected with the family, who graciously allowed us to copy photos from their albums.

I have a long wish list of photos and artifacts for our collection. Since we're on the topic of Morningside businesses, we have successfully hunted down photos of Burr Cheever's barber shop and Carlson's Odd Shop. I still want photos of the interior and owners of Morningside Hardware and Joyce's Bakery, among others.

If you know these owners or their families (or know someone who knows somebody who does), please contact me. Also, please share your memories of the Convention Grill and Pete and Christine by commenting here.

If you missed last Friday's post, check out the 1941 Convention ad here as well as two other Convention Grill posts here.

Here are the Hornettes dance line when they began 53 years ago, as pictured in the 1959 Whigrean, the Edina High School yearbook.

Here are the Hornettes today. (More specifically, at the Homecoming Football Game in 2011)

The Hornettes have danced at Edina games for the past 53 years. (If you wonder at the "blue skinned" reference in the yearbook story, just think of performing in a skirt on a chilly autumn night.)

Next year, the team might be the "Hornets" as the school district plans to initiate consistent naming for all its teams. (If you've missed the news stories... where have you been? Most of the major TV news stations, the Star Tribune, and the online newspaper Edina Patch have all covered the story.)

Former Minnesota First Lady Mary Pawlenty was among the crowd that showed up at last week's School Board meeting to make a case for keeping the name the same. "Do not mistake this as a small concern over a name change," said Pawlenty, who was a Hornette in the late 1970s.

Here's Mary back when she was Mary Elizabeth Anderson (far right) when she attended Edina East High School. A 1979 graduate, she was the co-captain of the Hornettes.

The Edina Historical Society has a Hornette costume from the early 1980s, donated a couple of years ago by Suzy Mears. (Note her initials on the letter E.) The girls normally had to turn in their handmade uniforms at the end of the year, but Suzy's team was allowed to keep theirs because the line was getting new uniforms the following year.

Whether the dance team is the Hornets or the Hornettes, the Edina Historical Society will continue to document and preserve their story. We would love to have actual photos of the team's activities, rather than only the photos from the yearbooks. (As you might have noticed, it's difficult to get a good image from a yearbook, especially  if you don't want to break the binding.)

If you have photos or artifacts to donate to the museum, please contact me.

We have an almost complete set of yearbooks at the Edina History Museum. Feel free to come in during regular museum hours and browse.