A Beltsville Small White turkey from the Good Shepherd Turkey Ranch near Lindsborg, Kansas. Photo by Craig Hacker ______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
By Pauline Masson –
For two hundred years from the early 1800s the White Holland turkey was the favorite holiday dinner across the U.S. and by the mid 1900s Pacific had more of the beautiful historic birds than any city in Missouri.
Pritchett Turkey Farm in Catawissa, the crown jewel of a series of local turkey growers, boasted a flock of 15,000 White Hollands in the 1950s, and shipped another 50,000 turkey chicks (poults) to growers across the U.S. each year.
Newspaper ads offering the prestigious Pritchett White Hollands for Thanksgiving and Christmas dinners listed Pacific as the address of the business and extolled the tenderness of the Pritchett White Hollands.
This was a unique bird, developed with a cross breeding program that produced a wider chest, more white meat, than the traditional White Hollands available everywhere and especially tender.
Allen M. Pritchett, Sr. ________________________
The baron and the brains of this turkey empire was Allan “A.M.” Pritchett Sr. His claim to fame was the unique breeding program that engineered the pedigree of the Pritchett White Hollands.
He was ahead of his time, both traditional and modern, practicing what would later be known as vertical marketing. He controlled every aspect of the life of his turkeys where a penny could be made, including eggs, feed, and oven ready turkeys for holiday dinners. He created the growing, advertising, marketing and shipping. He bred more turkeys on his farm than any other Missouri grower and sold more turkey poults than anyone in Missouri. He sold feed, eggs, bred every bird – chics and oven ready – sold under the Pritchett brand. He placed his bet on the oldest commercial game bird in American history, the Holland White Turkey.
The origin of the birds is difficult to authenticate. Aztecs raised white turkeys that were sent to Europe. In Austria and Holland they became the favorite. European settlers brought the white birds back to America and by 1800s, the American Poultry Association recognized them as White Hollands
Mr. Pritchett was lifelong student of turkey breeding. In 1944 he was seen touring the big Chaumier Turkey Farm in Steelville. The following year he enrolled in the turkey growers short course at the Missouri College of Agriculture, where he was elected a member of the Turkey Growers Federation board.
A 1949 biography of the turkey farm, printed in the Missourian newspaper, noted that Mr. Pritchett was living on the 80-acre Catawissa farm and doing general farming. In 1930, he bought 12 bronze turkey poults. Only one of the poults survived the first year but he kept going. The following year he bought more poults and eventually began cross breading them with the White Hollands that dominated the eastern turkey market.
In 1940 he added brooder houses and pens, large sheds, a 20 foot feed room and 100-by-40 foot hall, and incubators that could hold 2,000 eggs.
Mr. Pritchett’s partner in this breeding practice and partner in the constantly growing turkey farm was his wife Edna. They started to cross breed traditional bronze turkeys with White Holland in order to get a wider bird. It took eleven years of breeding to achieve the new White Holland bird that was branded as the Pritchett White Holland.
The public was invited to come to the farm see thousands of turkeys, a flock that that grew each year. A 1952 ad boasted 2,000 birds. Three years later the number had grown to 5,000 and by 1955 it was 15,000, all hatched in the farm’s incubator.
Mr. Pritchett made a deal with giant animal feed producer Purina to sell customers who bought his poults the feed for their young flocks. Within a year of their breeding program, Mr. Pritchett developed a processing plant where turkeys were plucked, evicerated and sold oven dressed. They were also available smoked or live.
But there were bigger things to come.
In 1948, Mr. Pritchett invited the Catawissa Parents, Teachers Association (PTA), to serve as hosts as he and Mrs. Pritchett created an annual Turkey Day celebration each October, leading up to Thanksgiving.
The event was such a success, the following year, in 1949, The PTA offered turkey dinner to 2,000 in attendees. The crowds was so large that the following year the turkey dinners were moved up to the Catawissa school gym.
The PTA established a fundraising booth to benefit the school lunch program at the Turkey Day festival where they sold their home made apple butter.
Mr. Pritchett was a lifelong supporter of the turkey industry, supporting other growers. In 1949 turkey grower Fred Growth responded to the success of Turkey Day.
“When I first thought of raising turkeys, I approached Al Pritchett for ideas and plans,” he said. “I was amazed at the unselfish openness in explaining to all, and I mean all of the intricacies of turkey raising. I never received such help on any farming matter from others.”
The local newspaper editor noted that the other big growers were in awe of the Pritchett success and complimented them for “taking the lead,” in turkey farming. They talked of starting an annual regional turkey festival with conducted tours of the other turkey farms based on Pritchett’s Turkey Day. Their vision included a big parade, various restaurants serving only turkey on that day. It never came to pass but its appearance in the local newspaper was a testament to the Pritchett Farm fame.
In 1950 Pritchett’s sold pen-run eggs at $70 a case of 200. Special breeders’ cases ran up to $500 per case. Mr. Pritchett said that he had all the orders for eggs that he could fill that year. Oven ready turkey hens for holiday dinner sold for 78 cents a pound. Oven ready toms could be had for 68 cents a pound.
In 1952 the Catawissa PTA served 620 pounds of turkey on Turkey Day.. And Ted Joule of the University of Missouri was recruited to gave a demonstration that showed how to carve a large turkey to get the maximum number of servings. A turkey shoot was added to the annual festivities.
In 1954, Mr. A.M. Pritchett senior suffered a heart attack. He stepped away from the grind of operating the farm and turned absolute ownership and control of the farm to his son A.M. Jr. and his wife Jane. Mr. Pritchett Sr and his wife Edna moved into Pacific and started another business, Pritchett’s Feed and Farm Supply, offering professional feeds to local livestock and poultry producers.
With his multi-taxing skills, Mr. Pritchett entered into city life in Pacific. In 1957 he was named chairman of the Soils and Crops Conservancy and chaired the annual conference. In 1962 he became Pacific City Clerk In 1963 he was named Worshipful Master of the Masonic Columbia Lodge.
The year Pritchett’s Turkey Farm closed its business was not found. Now, White Hollands turkeys are considered a unique variety that is slowly disappearing according to Savannah Brown’s article Morning Chores – a gardening and livestock advice publication.
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What began as a prelude to Thanksgiving dinner revealed a vibrant segment of Pacific history that seemed worth remembering.
Fun fact, Grandma Kay wouldn’t eat turkey for Thanksgiving! Every year we had to make a ham because she always said “she never wanted to see another turkey again after growing up on the farm.” 😆 Thanks for the article, Pauline!