East Dallas’ Historic Mrs. Baird’s Bakery Rises Again
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Mrs. Baird’s is a name near and dear to the hearts of Texans. It all started with Ninnie Baird, who built a thriving company when the term “businesswoman” did not exist. She did it because she had no choice.
In 1908, as her ailing husband’s health took a turn for the worse, she started baking bread and selling it out of her home in Fort Worth.
Baird’s sons helped out with baking and did the deliveries — first on foot, and as the word spread, they hopped on their bikes to get to more customers faster. It wasn’t much longer before they were loading the baked goods onto a horse-drawn wagon. By 1928 the bakery was one of the largest facilities in Texas with four locations and a fleet of trucks. Mrs. Baird’s eventually became the biggest independent baking company in the country.
A Dallas Expansion
In 1928 Mrs. Baird’s expanded to Dallas. The location at 1401 North Carroll Avenue in East Dallas was chosen because it was close to railroads. Not only could ingredients be delivered, but the bakery goods could also be easily shipped.
This location is quite the preservation success story, especially as you seldom see a commercial manufacturing building in a prime part of Dallas escaping demolition.
Preservation Dallas provided the following information:
Roland W. Baird, son of Ninnie Baird, the bakery founder, announced in February 1928 that designs for the $250,000 plant would be drawn by a New York firm that specialized in bakeries. The two-story solid brick commercial building that was built featured handsome Prairie School detailing and opened on February 28, 1929, producing 3,500 loaves of bread per hour.
Demand grew, and a $12,000 addition designed by Bertram C. Hill was placed in 1934 on the side and back of the structure, expanded the cooling, wrapping, and loading areas. Population growth after World War II outstripped production capacity, so Mrs. Baird’s built a new facility on North Central Expressway, which opened in 1954 (now demolished). The historic building was sold in 1956 and housed a book cover manufacturing facility and a fabric company. The Mrs. Baird’s building was listed on the National Register in 1995, so it is eligible for both state and national preservation tax credits.
Both the 1919 and 1937 Mrs. Baird’s Bakeries in Fort Worth, as well as the 1954 Dallas bakery, have been demolished, leaving this as the earliest Mrs. Baird’s building in the Metroplex. The handsome bones of this solidly-built structure await re-development, but the current high sale price and lack of landmark protections for the site could forever banish memories of the smell of freshly-baked bread on this corner.
From Dough to Bows
The building was home to Dallas Bias Fabrics until a few years ago and has sat vacant since then. Enter Mark Marynick, who grew up in Dallas and has a particular affinity for this building.
“I have driven by that building since I was a kid because my father is a doctor at Baylor, “Marynick said. “I remember going into it when it was Dallas Bias Fabrics with my mom once.”
Marynick grew up around architecture and building. His pal and former business partner Porter is an architect and the son of the legendary J. Wilson Fuqua. Marynick studied visual and environmental studies and economics at Harvard, so it’s not surprising running a business full of craftsmen was in his future.
He and Fuqua purchased Casci Ornamental Plaster, another venerable Dallas business founded in 1930, a few years ago. Marynick has since bought out Fuqua. The company won the Craftsmanship Award from Preservation Dallas in 2019 and has been a go-to resource for preservationists for decades.
Saving a Structure For Good
Casci is not far from the Mrs. Baird’s location, so Fuqua was again driving by the old factory regularly. It wasn’t long before he decided he had to take action to preserve the building and give it a new purpose. Sadly, even though this location of Mrs. Baird’s is on the National Register, it could have been demolished. Considering the scraping and new construction going on in East Dallas, this building certainly needed a white knight to ensure preservation.
“It’s a great location for us,” Marynick said. “Casci does a lot of work downtown and in the Park Cities, so it’s perfect. Many people had tried to do something with it, but it’s a manufacturing building at the end of the day.”
Marynick has big plans, and when they come to fruition, he hopes the new location will become a design destination much like Jamb in London, which is his inspiration.
“That building has so much potential,” Marynick said. “The genius of the architect is that he left the outside with room for additions.”
The building is basically a shell now, and everything from plumbing to HVAC has to be installed. Marynick has plans to add ornamentation to the exterior, including a stately metal gate, and lanterns. Extensive landscaping is also part of the design.
“Historic buildings add to the depth of a city, and Dallas needs that depth,” Marynick said. “I just could not bear to see this building get demolished.”
I think Mrs. Baird must be smiling down on Mark Marynick, and I cannot wait to see the results of his endeavors.
My father, Michael C. Antil Sr., consulted with Ninnie in the early 1920s and Roland when my dad was a bakery sales consultant with the W.E. Long Company out of Chicago, Illinois. My father’s story is told in the book HOME ON THE RANGE by Jerome Mark Antil. An interesting tale about the baking industry and my dad’s impact on it. I was disappointed when the bakery was sold, and as rumor has it, all the employees were let go, the building on Mockingbird and Central sold – and new employees hired.
Love this story! Thank you.
Thank you. Great story.
Karen. Thank you for capturing this wonderful story.
I drove by the bread plant many times on my way to & from St. Paul Hospital where I worked. The smell of bread baking was about too much! I would love to see a Mrs. Bairds Bakery in operation again!
Jolene, Grupo Industrial Bimbo bought Mrs. Baird’s in 1998. They still have a factory location in Fort Worth and continue to produce products under the Mrs. Baird’s name. While we won’t be smelling bread baking on N. Carroll, you can bet Mark has something fantastic in store for us.
Driving through Dallas, in the good ole days of Mrs. Baird’s Bakery, if we were oh so lucky to be driving by when they were baking – my kids would holler as we all quickly rolled down our car windows to take a very deep breath of baked bread deliciousness!! It was like an unintended act of kindness for them to be baking as we drove by. It’s right up there on the short list of favorite memories from childhood.
Our family lived about 4 blocks from the bakery in the 40s and 50s. The aroma was so good. Walked by the building many times as a kid.
From the delicious aroma of the area, the,so special,miniature loaves received at U.P. elem. field trip visits, to my dad and I in 2001 doing
the last day drive through loaf give away to
say,a sad,good bye to Mrs. Baird’s aroma