Archives West Finding Aid

Tape recorded interview covering the years 1898 - 1940, conducted by Meta Kaplan and Karyl Winn on 19 Jan 1973; transcript.

Ralkowski tells how his father and Sam Mosler knew each other from Poland where they were both apprenticed to bakers. In Seattle, Sam started the New York Bakery in 1898, and Walle Ralkowski came to Seattle a few years later and worked with him. Ralkowski remembers the other bakers in town and the location of key shops and the names of shop owners. He talks about how Sam Mosler was a pioneer in "health food" and how he was always inventing something new to eat. He started toasting cereal before Kellogg's came out. Ralkowski tells how his father and he both went to work for Lippman. Gus Rasmussen and B. B. Skinner started a big bakery, the Continental, about that time. Ralkowski traces the development of bread baking, how an old-time bakery had very few utensils and didn't use bread pans. With the development of packaged bread, everything changed. He talks about all the bakeries in town and how they delivered bread by horse and wagon to all the local restaurants. He also talks about the difficult life of all the Jewish small businessmen and how their entire families were dedicated to keeping it going. Ralkowski remembers all the small shops and families in his old neighborhood.