ARMOUR GRAPE JUICE FACTORY

Grape grower Bert W. Payne sold to some Battle Creek interests Lots 1, 2, 3, and 4 of Block 6 of Kinnie’s addition to Mattawan, on April 20, 1903, to the American Fruit Juice Company. However, because of lack of funds to promote the sale of grape juice, on December 12, 1905, sold the business to H.S. Gray of Benton Harbor.

It is not certain whether the Gray’s operated the factory or not. On April 8, 1908, they sold it to Henry Knapp of Battle Creek and Julius Desenberg of Lawton.

Desenberg was in mercantile business in Lawton for many years and was an owner of a vineyard near Pretty Lake in Kalamazoo County. He hired Philip Deats, who has some experience with the Lawton Fruit Juice Company, and the factory again operated until Desenberg and Knapp sold it to J. Ogden Armour on May 9, 1909 for $5,000.

The building was a one story, wood constructed, 40 by 60 feet plant. In 1927 Amour and Company sold the Grape Juice factory, a building which is used for storage today, to the United Grape Products, Inc. of Buffalo, N.Y., a conglomerate of several near-bankrupt New York Grape Juice plants engineered by C. C. Palmer, president of the HungerfordSmith Grape Juice Company of Lawton and the purchase of Armour’s Mattawan plant mostly for the sole purpose of putting Welch out of business, and for control of the market.

The depression came on and the plan backfired, with Welch buying the whole plant. From about 1934 to 1960 Welch operated the plant and then sold it to the firm of Glazer-Crandall. The United Grape Products started production of a grape concentrate product about 30 years too soon. The product was made by adding about an equal part of cane sugar to pure concord grape juice. This syrup was to be sold to bottlers and soda fountains to make a carbonated drink to sell in competition with “Coke.” It was a good product, but it would not stock. This was before the juice concentrators of today for making concentrated fruit juices.