One man in Milford history left an indelible mark on the town and many are unaware of the legend of John Mulholland. A man of many talents, Mulholland adopted Milford as his home and spent the majority of his adult life promoting its virtues.
John Hanna Mulholland was born October 17, 1865, in Ireland. He lost his mother when he was young. His father remarried and had a second son, William. At the age of 15, Mulholland boarded a shop for Canada where he began performing odd jobs while roaming the eastern portion of the country.
Eventually, Mulholland joined the Montreal Garrison Artillery, a local branch of the militia and later the Northwest Mounted Police. His unit was dispatched to Saskatchewan in 1885 to quell a rebellion led by Louis Reil, an eccentric settler who had unsuccessfully led a rebellion in 1869. Reil and his band attacked a party of Northwest Mounted Police, killing 14 and wounding 25.
“Canada raised an army of militia from various cities and provinces in the east under the command of General Middleton,” a newspaper at the time read. “By May 1885, at the Battle of Batouche, the rebels were routed and Reil was captured. He was imprisoned at Regina, Saskatchewan.”
Later, Reil was found to be insane and hanged along with eight other members of his group. This early military campaign allowed Mulholland to prove his ability as a solider. He remained enlisted until May 1887 and received the Northwest Campaign Medal for his service in Saskatchewan.
Mulholland decided to return ot Ireland for a visit where he was able to obtain passage to by tending a steerage shipment of live cattle to England. During the crossing, a storm and heavy gale caused the cattle pens to break apart in the lower decks. Mulholland’s passage was in jeopardy as the scene was complete chaos. On board the ship was a young writer who witnessed the situation. In 1894, Rudyard Kipyard described the scene in his poem entitled “Mulholland’s Contract.”
Mulholland’s fears were realized when he landed in England. His life was spared the dangerous Atlantic crossing, but his employers refused to honor the contract. They refused to pay his salary and most of his return passage. Mulholland was still determined to return to the Americas and eventually succeeded in returning to Toronto.
While in Toronto, he married Emma Jean Harper who he had met at Corrigan’s General Store in Oshawa. The two were married on May 7, 1890, and soon moved to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The couple remained in the city for 30 years, gaining a foothold in the advertising sign business. The company was located at 12th and Girard Streets.
The Mulholland’s had two sons, Harry Harper, who was born in 1893 and Frederick William, born in 1897.
At that time, ice cream was served from bulk containers in ice cream parlors. Double-sided signs were placed strategically in front of the ice cream parlor to advertise the brand. Customers were served ice cream on paper plates, imprinted in the center with the company logo, with a small tin spoon.
Mulholland realized the paper plates with the printed logo were not safe as the ink melted into the ice cream. He also found that the tin spoons were not pleasing to the palate of ice cream customers and had sharp edges. He set out to find a solution to those problems.
On October 15, 1915, Mulholland filed a patent with the US Patent Office for a “paper dish or plate which permits printing or other colored advertising to be used in a sanitary manner.” The patent was issued on September 5, 1916, launching Mulholland into the ice cream product industry. The process he invented laminated a glassine lining to the plates after the logo was printed. However, Mulholland was not finished solving the ice cream supply issue.
Between 1918 and 1919, Mulholland developed a revolutionary new wooden spoon. Fascinated with the veneer process used by Delaware canners to create sturdy but cheap baskets for fruit drying, Mulholland began looking at the various types of wood that could be used for small spoons. His research revealed that the sweet gum tree, which were plentiful in Delaware, served the purpose.
The A.W. Robinson Basket Company in Laurel, Delaware, had perfected the art of basket making using veneer, a process where logs were steamed and stripped of bark before being peeled into thin layers. Mulholland spent 1918 perfecting the process and developing a stamping die press which cut the design of the flat spoon from a sheet of sweet gum veneer. The early spoons were shipped out of Laurel by boat to Baltimore.
In 1920, Mulholland made the decision to move the spoon making business to Milford. He sent his son, Harry, to Milford with instructions to get the plant built. While Harry was setting up the factory, Mulholland launched his first sales trip to the west coast with a sample of wooden spoons in one pocket and “a piece of sandpaper in the other.”
In 1920, the News Journal announced that “a large building is being built at the North end of Marshall Street, adjoining the crate and basket factory of the Milford Lumber Co., by John Mulholland and Co. of Philadelphia. Here the firm will manufacture wooden sanitary spoons now being used in the ice cream trade.” While the building was constructed, Mulholland perfected what he called his “bentwood spoons,” receiving a patent in 1922.
The original design of the spoon did not lend itself to scooping. Mulholland developed a process that used steam and pressure to bend the flat spoons, making it much easier to eat ice cream. The cost of $3.00 per 1,000 spoons, about $60 today, was relatively expensive compared to the tin spoons.
The business grew so rapidly that by 1923 an addition was necessary on the building. A report in The News Journal stated that “the industry of making wooden spoons has grown rapidly and the factory is not large enough now to take care of the demand.”
By 1924, the plant had built a solid reputation with the larger ice cream makers in Philadelphia. A personal friend of Henry Breyer, president of Breyer’s Ice Cream Company, Mulholland sold him on the benefits of wooden spoons and glassine plates. Mulholland had lived and worked in Philadelphia since 1890 and observed successes of many companies, including Campbell’s Soup. He often claimed that Dr. John T. Dorrance, who invented the process of condensing soup used by Campbell’s, became a millionaire not on the basis of the superior quality of the soup, but on the strength of his marketing and advertising.
In 1924, a fire damaged one building at the spoon factory location. The warehouse, storage houses and packing house were saved but a cold, high wind made it difficult for firemen to extinguish the blaze. Sparks carried to the Hirsh Canning Company across from the spoon factory. The biggest loss in the fire was the specially designed machinery with an estimated value of $50,000, about $973,000 today.
Mulholland and Emma Jean moved to Milford in 1924, joining Harry and bringing their son, Frederick with them as well. Harry had married Nellie M. Grimes on June 27, 1916 and the couple purchased a home at 304 Lakeview Avenue. They had two children, Harry H. Jr., who was born in 1925 and Jean E, born in 1920.
Frederick married Edith Young and they had three children. Marjorie, born in 1920; John Douglas, born in 1923; and Clifton born in 1926. Sadly, John Douglas died at the age of 21. Clifton died in 1931 at the age of five. There is no information available on why the boys died so young.
He began forging valuable relationships in an unusual way in the early 1900s. Mulholland purchased a small peninsula of land overlooking Haven Lake. Eventually, it became known as Mulholland Point. Nothing existed at the entrance of what is now known as Chestnut Knoll. Then, it was known as Cat Island, owned by Charles M. Hammond and later T. Coleman duPont. The point purchased by Mulholland is formed due to the joining of Shawnee Branch and the Mispillion River.
An avid fisherman, in 1923, Mulholland built a summer cottage on Mulholland’s Point. Fishing was a period of contemplation for Mulholland, as it is for many who fish. But Mulholland took it a step further, entertaining business and personal associates at his cabin and taking them out on the lake in his boat.
An unusual occurrence happened at the Mulholland home in February 1924. While the family was away, vandals entered the summer cottage and damaged a significant amount of furniture. The only thing stolen were cigars. On a large library table, the word “phantom” was carved using a candle. There is no indication if anyone was charged in the incident.
By March 2, 1925, the company had become the second largest employer in Milford, although the main office remained in Philadelphia. The Evening Journal stated that “Mr. Mulholland maintains a country residence here. He has plants in Wisconsin, Michigan, Maine and Oregon. The Milford plant specializes in the manufacture of wooden ice cream spoons and plates.”
On January 29,1926, Mulholland and Emma Jean purchased a home built for General Alfred T.A. Torbert at the corner of North Walnut and Southwest Second Street. It was here that Mulholland began focusing on a strong marketing campaign for his wooden spoons. In that time, using personal relationships to grow business was uncommon, but Mulholland knew that it was easier to sell his product to friends rather than people he did not know.
Mulholland was somewhat eccentric. On February 16, 1926, the Evening Journal reported that “John Mulholland, owner of the Milford Spoon Factory, has two mechanical toys that this week has attracted a great deal of attention in Milford. Mr. Mulholland has two cages of artificial canary birds. These birds sing for an indefinite time in such a natural manner, that they have deceived many persons. Mr. Mulholland purchased the “birds” in France.”
In May 1926, Mulholland built a small cedar shingled clubhouse on the western shore of Mulholland Point which he named the Bentwood Club. The club was named after the design of his wooden spoon. He began using the club as a sophisticated sales tool to bring customers to Milford. He felt that if he could convince his customers and prospects to meet his employees and the sincere, honest people of Milford, they would be convinced of the superiority of his products. Using the pretext of fishing, Mulholland lured the leaders of major ice cream manufacturers to Milford.
Some of the prominent business leaders who visited included Henry W. Breyer, president of Breyer Ice Cream Company; Richard Kennedy, Alliotts Dairies; along with Foster and John Wood of the Keystone Ice Cream Company. Richard Kennedy from Denver, Colorado, and C.W. Field, from Indianapolis, Indiana, also joined Mulholland at the club.
By 1926, the spoon factory was up and running with an article in the Evening Journal on July 29, 1926, stating “The Milford Spoon Factory, conducted by J.H. Mulholland is now running to full capacity. The plant makes small wooden spoons and pop-sycle [sic] sticks. It employs about 200 people.”
In 1926, he began publishing a lighthearted company newsletter he called the Bentwood Club News. This was distributed to his prospects and customers. According to the masthead of the newsletter, the purpose of it was “for the creation of more laughter, fun, good will and right business relations.” The newsletter highlighted that the Bentwood Club was to disprove the old idea that there is no sentiment in business and to let those who bought bentwood spoons know that the “folks in Milford, Delaware, are real human beings, who believe in treating customers like real human beings.”
Dues for the Bentwood Club were “your good will, which is worth more than money. There are no other dues.” The newsletter was published monthly with news about the business, homespun humor, good advice and good business principles until 1933.
Fred Mulholland worked in the family business for a short time but did not make a full career out of the bentwood industry. By 1932, John Mulholland was 67 and was moving toward retirement. That year, his wife, Emma Jean died, leaving him a widower. Despite his semi-retirement, Mulholland continued socializing with Breyer, becoming friends with his office administrator, Marie Wimersberger. The couple married in 1934 and moved into the summer cottage, selling the stately home on Walnut Street.
Harry took over the business in the mid 1930s, eventually shifting to the Mulholland-Harper sign business that formed in 1938. The sign company was created to serve the Breyer Ice Cream Company. A local man, Clarence Welch, joined the sign company immediately after high school in 1929. INn1935, he was named plant manager and, in 1940, named general manager and treasurer.
Welch was entrusted with plant operations as Harry became actively involved in politics. He served as State Senator and president pro-tempore of the Senate from 1943 to 1945. Welch continued to grow the business which now manufactured wooden spoons, plates, popsicle sticks and tongue depressors.
John Mulholland officially retired in 1940, and Harry took over as president. By 1948, sweet gum timber was becoming scarce in Milford but was still plentiful on the eastern shore of Maryland. The Mulholland’s were not interested in moving operations, so Welch formed the Princess Anne Corporation and erected a new factory in Pomonkey, Maryland. This facility supported the needs of the Milford operation.
An interesting fact was revealed about Welch. On November 16, 1953, The Morning News announced that he was missing. Police did not suspect foul play but family members worried that something was wrong. Welch was found in a New York hotel room with a noose around his neck in an apparent suicide attempt.
In 1948, Harry purchased the southern portion of the point to construct a home for his family. In order to build the home, a 24-foot section of the Bentwood Club bunkhouse was moved and used as the office of Charles Murphy’s M&H Lumber Company office on McCoy Street. This building became Steiner & Company in 1984. The main section of the Bentwood Club was awarded to the person who agreed to move it. It stands on the south bank of Cubbage Pond in Lincoln today.
The Mulholland Spoon Factory still stands, owned by Sudler and Joan Lofland. The building houses several small businesses. The sign company moved to Denton and operated into the 1980s.
John Mulholland died on September 14, 1958, just one month short of his 93rd birthday. His legacy lives on in those who remember the small wooden ice cream spoons they used as children. Mulholland also helped design the Milford City seal and also designed the City of Milford flag, both still used today.
